maybe he's meant to be a southpaw like his mamma...?

this little guy's world was turned upside down last week...

It went a little something like this...Friday morning the kids were doing their thing as usual and suddenly we hear Henry's scream. He was climbing up in the stroller inside our apartment (like many, many times before) and fell off the step of the stroller, maybe 6 inches off the ground. Typically no big deal, seriously this little guy has had so many falls it seems to not even phase him. Except this on did. He was holding his (our) cherished mini Australian flag in his hand and we think, because neither of us saw it happen, that because he was holding on to it he didn't put his hand down but landed on his elbow. Oh, and I should mention here that lovely Harvard housing has no padding under the cheap carpet so the floor feels like and is a slab of concrete :)

It took him a good 20 minutes of crying and then about an hour of cuddling to calm down. And probably the first time in his life he's cuddled, I should have taken the hint at that point something was wrong.

When he was calm enough we stood him up to make sure his legs were okay, check. Then he stumbled like most 13mo olds do and landed smack on his face even though he put his arm down. Hmmmmm, not good. Me being the optimist that I am (ha) assumed it was just a bruise and would go away with time. Well, with time no bruise appeared and suddenly we had a gimp on our hands. He mastered the tripod 'scoot' and within hours became a better walker because crawling was out of the question.

Saturday morning we decided to take him in - lucky for us not many urgent care places are open on Saturday and those that were didn't have a radiologist on call at the time so to the ER we went, my inaugural trip as a mom.

He was a pretty good sport over the SIX hours it took, and looked irresistible in that mini hospital gown. 

Hours later we found out he has a fractured elbow and was due for a full-arm cast. Lovely. It took four of us to hold him still while one person casted his entire, helpless little extremity. And yes, we requested cougar blue :) When he was casted he still didn't seem content but I just figured it was because 4 adults were just sitting on him to make him hold still, turns out it was because the cast was too high and digging into his armpit. This picture below is just before we realized the cast was hurting him. A few more 'straight-jacketeer-nurses' later and they had sawed off the top of the cast to make it more comfortable.

It was MUCH better! Despite the hassles, he was SO happy has we left (could have been the balloon) which made me happy and forget the fact that we had practically spent the entire day there.

So we survived. He survived. The truth is babies don't lie. He wasn't using his arm and there was a reason. Duh Mackenzie. Our first ER trip, despite being unnecessarily long, was, for the most part calm, warranted, and methodical. Hopefully any future ER visits can be this stress-free!

He slept SO well that night (and come on, remember Henry's sleeping habits??!?) and the next morning was beaming, practically begging for the camera, the real camera and not just my phone. I obliged.

still flexing his muscles...

We go back in tomorrow to get another x-ray to make sure everything has set right and hear if we need another cast and for how long, fingers crossed!