Where's the Hair?

People often assume this little fella is bald.  

It would be a good assumption since he's so fair skinned and has big blue eyes. (No, we do not know where this came from other than we both have blue eyed grandparents).

However, this guy has plenty of hair.  It's just lighter than my other kids' hair so people just assume he's bald.  (and not my kid)

But he's not bald.  As evidenced by these photos from this morning.

Did you ever see a bald kid with such messy hair??

Let's not even get into the fact that this bugger is 8 months old now too.  And I caught him getting up on all fours today trying to crawl.  I nipped that in the bud.  Scooped him up, set him on his bum and told him to "SIT STILL!"  

If he thinks he's going to crawl or walk or talk, he's sorely mistaken.  He is THE baby and he will do as I tell him.  

PA Farm Show 2011

If you ever have the chance, I highly recommend taking the opportunity to visit the PA State Farm Show in Harrisburg.  There is so much to do, so much to learn.

Various High School FFA participants put together amazing exhibits highlighting advancements in agriculture.  From Organic Chicken Farming - this display showcased the cleanliness of the cage free facilities to demonstrate that corporate farming can be clean and conscientious.

 

Whitaker even enjoyed learning about all the technological advancements in farming!

 The children had the opportunity to try to "milk" a cow.  But we got there too early in the morning - the "milking" station hadn't been set up yet.

You can see neat farm toys.  This was like a pedal tractor/go cart hybrid.  With a seat behind the driver.  Very cool - but way too expensive for our farm.

Willie demonstrates how big a tractor tire is.

Not to be outdone, Walker climbs inside too!

 The kids can participate in the Farm Detective program where they visit various stations around the farm show and learn about each subject.  From apples to wood, the kids are exposed to all aspects of farming.

A kid area sponsored by the Beef Council.

Did you know . . .

 They even had exhibits to encourage an active lifestyle.  This was an exercise event where the kids danced and did some exercises.  At the end, they got to select a low fat chocolate milk for a treat.

The farm show also has beautiful displays.

And a large play area in the family living section.  Here the kids get to dress scarecrows and play in "corn" boxes.

For some reason, my kids loved dressing these scarecrows.  I suggested to Erik that I'm going to put scarecrow heads on all our clothes hangars and give the kids their laundry baskets and tell them to go dress the scarecrows!

It really a wonderful event and as a Pennsylvanian, you really should go see the amazing things Pennsylvania Farmers are doing for us.

The "Hoopty Cough"

We've got the Post-Farm Show Hoopty Cough at our house.

For those of you that don't know, the Hoopty Cough is that deep, chest rattling, bone jarring, head pounding, voice hoarsing seal-like bark that affects many people this time of year.  

I made the colossal mistake of saying to Erik, "You know, here it is mid-January and no one has been sick!"

The next day I noticed a weight depositing on my chest.  It got heavier and heavier throughout  Monday but I kept fighting it off because I had a Kindergarten meet and greet to attend with Maggie, and a double date with new friends Monday night.  It got so bad I even dragged our new friends to Target Pharmacy for some Mucinex DM!

Despite my best efforts to avoid it,  I woke up Tuesday morning still fighting, but by mid afternoon, I had developed the full-fledged syndrome along with a fever, chills, body aches - well, you probably know what it is like.    

No one else seemed to have any symptoms, so I thought I had avoided spreading it but late yesterday afternoon, right about the time I was feeling better, the rest of the house started showing symptoms.  

This little guy is sick, but you'd never know it.  The poor fella even vomited all over me last night then looked up at me with that big four tooth grin!  

This gal told me she was worried because her voice sounded different.  And it did.  It sounds a lot like mine - like there's something stuck in her throat.  I told her that we had frogs struck in our throat.  Now she wants to know how frogs got into our throats.

 This boy may or may not be sick.  He won't sit still, so I can't tell if his too-warm-to-the-touch face and body is from that or from an actual fever.  He keeps telling me that various parts of his body hurt so I will give him cough drops.  The boys knees hurt "reawry bad, Momma.  Serioiuswy!"

I feel the worst for this boy.  When he is sick, it shows.  He gets pasty white, he gets dark circle under his eyes, and he truly just lays around.  Usually when given the opportunity to watch TV, I often find him wiggling and jiggling and playing with other things while he watches.  Today, I hooked up the TV in his room for him so he could stay in his bed, and he was still.  Poor guy.  

Everyone has been appropriately dosed with acetaminophen and is resting quietly watching the TV shows they aren't usually able to watch during the day. 

I'll be catching up on everything I didn't feel well enough to get to the last few days.

And spraying the house down with Lysol.