Stapled, Stitched, & Glued.

Ahhhh....Life with boys.

Warning---this will be a long post, with some twists & turns.

Saturday was a long day.
I worked the night shift Friday (or, rather "2nd shift"), and so I was tired Saturday morning. Toddlers don't sleep in just because you're tired.
Saturday, woke up, got to work on yard work. Good times.

Tree trimmers came. We had 4 of our 10 trees cut back. It was so interesting and fun to watch them with their ropes & pulley system...swinging from branch to branch with chainsaws in tow. Oh, it made me nervous, but it was fun to watch. In fact....we got to a stopping point with our yardwork, and I laid out a quilt on the yard. We sat around watching the tree trimmers. I'm sure they thought we were weird. Oh well.

Nathan & Aubri came over for a while. Gage....well, he had a difficult time sharing on Saturday.
The kids were playing on the back porch. Gage didn't want Aubri to play with ANYTHING! So, he kept putting the toys up high so she couldn't reach them. He was putting his play mower away when I told him "Aubri needs toys to play with too." He put his hand on his hip, held the other hand out to shield the mower, and said, "She can play with the dirt!"
Oh....buddy.

Nathan & Aubri were over for a while, but then they went back home.
The breeze was blowing in, so Hubby lit the chiminea. I sat, bundled up in a quilt, sipping a Mimosa by the chiminea fire {while still watching the tree trimming show!}. It was AWESOME.
That's when Hubby came up with this idea: let's camp out in the backyard.
Within a few minutes, he was in the garage digging out the tent, sleeping bags, & camping gear.

So...Gage & Hubby set up the tent...





And of course, I didn't have any marshmallows....so, we roasted hot dogs instead....


...or rather, we started to roast hot dogs.
It was sometime during the weinie roast that we had a camping accident.
....and we ended up HERE:


Yes, we ended the evening in the ER.
I know---he appears to be all smiles in the above pictures.
I assure you, Hubby & I worked VERY HARD for each & every one of those smiles.
The car ride out there involved the back of Gage's head bleeding onto one of my favorite {now trash} towels embroidered with the cutest drangonflies...Beastie Boys cranked way up loud {per Gage's request, and yes, if you are curious, we picked a few of the very few songs without cussing}. Also to note, the above pictures were taken BEFORE his head was stapled shut.

So what happened?
Gage was standing behind this patio chair. He was rock-rock-rockin' it back and forth. I no more than finished saying, "Gage, stop rocking that", before it toppled over backward, knocking him down, hitting the back of his head on the rim of a flower pot. He was shocked, then he was crying. He wanted me to kiss & rub his head. I started rubbing, and it was wet.It was dark out, so I pulled my hand away...and this next part may be gross, but true---I smelled it, and it smelled like iron. It was blood. We went in---blood dripping down his neck by now. I alerted Hubby that we had a real injury on our hands. He turned the hose on the fire---I changed Gage's filthy-I've-been-kind-of-camping-pants, we loaded Gage up, and headed to the car. Gage alerted us that he had to go potty once we got to the car. We headed back in...took care of business....& finally hit the road to the hospital.

There, he had to get two staples.
It wasn't easy. Nothing is harder than having your child scream & cry "Mommy they're hurting me!" while he's fighting to get away & his little head is covered with sweat from struggling. Oh.my.gosh. I mean, you know that having the lac closed is ultimately in his best interest---but it's so hard to not order all hands OFF deck, scoop him up, and just run to some closet, rock him & hide him from all that.
Ugh.

So...Gage is not yet 4.
He's now been stapled {head lac}, stitched {leg}, and glued {forehead/eyebrow}.
He's already had his first broken bone {collar bone}.
Life with boys is ROUGH!

My mother in law keeps telling me, "Like Father, Like Son". Apparently Hubby was the.exact.same.way as a child.

Please, Lord, please....protect my child from his clumsy self. Please let the bulk of our "real injuries" be behind us!