My habit for several years now has been to go shopping with my mom on Black Friday. Sometimes standing in lines, freezing and waiting for the stores to open, and sometimes going later to still get the good sales but to miss the initial crowds. Good times. This year, Mom is just a bit too far away for a shopping date. Sadness.
To make up for it, I decided to take my family out for breakfast, since that was always one of my most favorite parts of going shopping with Mom.
We went to the Egg Harbor Cafe. Delicious.
Sadly, our festivities were slightly interrupted by this little one here.
The backstory: Megan was running a fever on Tuesday afternoon. Wouldn't eat, didn't leave the couch for several hours. Gave her some tylenol, put her bed, she was fine the next morning. We warned everyone coming over for Thanksgiving that there was potentionally something going around and left it to their discretion on whether or not to come. Everyone did, with the exception of the 11-day-old baby who stayed home with Grandma. Good call!
Megan was fine most of Wednesday, though she did take a nap in the late afternoon, which is highly unusual for her. In the middle of Thanksgiving, her fever popped back up to 101. We broke out the Tylenol, warned the parents, and continued on per usual as no one cared.
Come Friday morning, she was again acting fine. Once we got our food at the restaurant, though, I was really wondering if there was something more going on than just a random fever. She wouldn't eat yogurt and strawberries. Megan. Megan wouldn't eat yogurt and strawberries. Something's up. Additionally, she had some splotches on her face that were a bit worrisome, too. Lucky us, the pediatrician's office was open so we went in (the only appointment of the day).
Diagnosis: Scarlet Fever.
So, I always thought scarlet fever was something from way back in the days of Little Women and Little House on the Prarie where someone important caught it and went blind or died. Really bad. Turns out, scarlet fever is actually a form of strep throat that is accompanied by a rash. Most people died because the strep went untreated and grew into rheumatic fever, which is a lot worse. In our case, Megan gets antibiotics and she's fine. Thank goodness for modern medicine.
We went shopping long enough for Audrey to spend her money she's been working hard to save up for quite a while--she chose a whiteboard and markers--and Chris got new shoes.
Then we quarantined ourselves at home for the rest of the day.
Turns out that was a good plan, because by evening Audrey was throwing up repeatedly. Never before have I experienced--and appreciated so much--a child who is old enough to throw up in a bowl and not just all over everything wherever they happen to be sitting. So much easier to clean up!
Tomato soup for dinner, then we got them all to bed just to have Megan get us up at 11:00 because she had thrown up, then Ben got us up at 1:30 because he had thrown up. It was a fun night. *eye roll* Today, everyone is fine. Megan has been on antibiotics long enough now that she's no longer contagious, and no one has thrown up all day. Fingers crossed, we're in the clear.
