A doctor's visit

We went to the doctor's this morning for Frankie's 2 1/2 year old check up, and Dexter's 15 month check up. We went in ready for shots! I told Frankie this morning about the shots, and that Dr. Mitchell would not be giving them to her (she loves Dr. Mitchell, and I think it's good to keep Dr. Mitchell the one to never have to give her treatments that hurt her, like shots). She understood that "Dr. Mitchell not hurt me. I get a shot. It hurt just a little bit. I'm going to be a brave girl and not cry." (holding up her hand and scrunching her fingers together for emphasis the way she does when she's really adamant about something, like the motions to "He's got the whole world in his hands"). We realized together that Dex would probably cry, because he's a baby.

Dexter currently weighs 22 1/2 lbs, and Frankie is a little over 29 lbs! Dex is 31 inches, and Frankie is 36. They're both about 50th percentile for both, except that Dex is a little lightweight - he's in the 10-25% for weight.

Frankie had developed a puffy, red eye over the weekend that we were mildly concerned about, although not enough to take her to the ER over the weekend - her eyeball was fine, there was no discharge, and the swelling wasn't that bad (i.e., her eye was not swollen shut). She also told me many times that it didn't hurt. Dr. Mitchell thought it was just a scratch, but might be infected, and since it was so close to her eye, gave her some antibiotics for it. Frankie is thrilled about this, because it means she gets to drink bubble-gum flavored medicine twice a day for 10 days.

Dex got a steroid cream for his patch of excema on his chest, and 2 vaccines. It was like Christmas - a little something for everyone. As Frankie and I suspected, Dex cried like the baby he is when he got his shots. Bless those nurses for being like Ninjas though. She snuck up on him and got him with the first one when he wasn't looking. By the time he realized what was going on and started to cry, she was almost done with the second. The crying lasted about 20 seconds; much less time than the crying that resulted from Dr. Mitchell opening the door and startling him (because he was standing behind it) about 5 minutes before.

Then we had to wait another 15 minutes at the lab to get their blood drawn to test for lead. We live in a house with known lead paint (save the lectures on how terrible it is for my children, we have researched the issue thoroughly and don't think it's that big a deal, and that de-leading and stirring up the lead paint dust would be way worse for the children and ourselves). Because of that, Dr. Mitchell is required by the State of Massachusetts to lead-test my kids via blood draw (not just finger prick) every 6 months.

Frankie actually did not cry at all when she got her blood drawn; she acted like she did it every day. It was impressive and a little bizarre. I asked her afterward (covered in Dora stickers, on the way to McDonald's for some ice cream) if it hurt. No.

Dex on the other hand, fought me like a moose and screamed the entire time. He was sweating and red in the face from the effort by the time we were done. Poor kid.

I feel like that sums them up in so many ways, at least right now.