The Cast: Wear and Tear

Life was not all bad, for Little P with his cast. Much time was spent lying around or being carried from one room to the next. (Oh, he milked it. You know he did!)


Yet even with all the requests to be carried, he managed to wear off the entire bottom of the cast. In fact, in the following photo, there was not even any fabric on three-quarters of the bottom of the foot. At that point he only had two days left until D-Day, but the cast moved around so much he developed quite a wound (as you can see in THIS photo.)


And these toes. Oh, the toes! Such dirtiness! The toes, the rarely washed hair, the creases that could not be submerged in a tub of hot water! But we made it, and when he returned home after the cast's removal, he took a nap and then got right into the bath.

And, Finally...

So after four and a half weeks, the cast finally came off. Little P was a bit hesitant about the whole whirring blade thing. Mama had to hold his leg and take photos at the same time.


After shouting, "No, no!" a few times, he settled into submission. He was fascinated when the tech pried the cast apart on both sides.


Such a kind and helpful tech, he was.


After the cast came off, Benjamin immediately began bending his leg...repeatedly. He knew what was up and was clearly interested in this new sensation. He bent and straightened his leg continuously, saying, "I bending and bending and bending and bending..."


"...and bending, and bending, and bending and bending..." Mama stopped him long enough to snap this photo of his walking wound. "And bending, and bending, and bending...Mama! I bending and bending the leg, and bending..."

A Place to Call His Own

As if his own bedroom is not enough, Little P scored this lovely domain at a garage sale for a mere 10% of its retail value. He likes to stand atop the slide and survey his kingdom.


He is, however intimidating, a friendly landowner. He maintains an open door policy.


He is much loved by the peasants. They come to his window asking for basketballs.


He is also unconventional. Why slide down when there's more of a challenge in walking up?

Basketball

For Easter, Benjamin came into a bit of cash and this is what he purchased. His own basketball hoop - it's adjustable from three feet to six feet. it's presently set at four feet, which means he can barely make a basket. This does not inhibit his fun in any way. (Please disregard the sad state of our backyard. We will, one day, plant the hill. Those planters will, one day, be growing tomatoes, among other things.)


Little P does like to involve the dog in his sporting endeavors.


But only briefly. Once the dog begins playing with the ball, Benjamin runs after him shouting "Mines! Mines! Mines! Stop it, Buckley! Stop it! Mines!" Mama is not quite sure what to do about these fantastic outbursts.


But the boy sure does love his dog.

The Cast Goes to The Museum

Papa took some time off work while The Cast was with us (unrelated events), so we went down one morning to the Museum of Natural History's dinosaur exhibit. Fun, and a little bit scary.


You see, there was a young wooly elephant-mammoth thing that was begging to be ridden. It required great concentration.


And then there was this poor creature. Clearly no one was safe once the dinosaurs moved in.


They took over two levels!


And the T-Rex, well, he was terrifying. He moved his head and snapped his jowls, emitting a fearsome roar and that was more than Little P could handle.


I can't imagine why, can you?

The Cast and The Harmonica

They really have nothing to do with each other except that during this period of cast wearing, a harmonica was discovered in Mama's great box o' stuff. Actually, Mama has far too many great boxes o' stuff to mention, but we won't dwell on that unfortunate truth.

Instead, we will enjoy Little P's new adoration for the harmonica. It is certainly something to behold.

The Cast: More of What We Did

Mama was really stretched to come up with ideas for activities for a boy who could no longer run and climb at the playground. So we entered the kitchen for some high-fallutin' fun. Like homemade granola bars. They're easy and they don't taste very good (because they are totally healthy), but drizzle some honey on top and Little P snarfs them right down. Best thing? He made them. Of course he loves them!


Next up, his personal CD player. One of his grandmas got him this and the day he first used it, he was busy for about a half hour listening to music and reading books. Big thank yous go out to everyone who gifted him with photos of themselves in a cast, with activity books, stickers, grow-a-bug capsules, and the like. You helped Mama get through the weeks of his cast.


While the cast laid him up for the first few days, it was not long before Little P learned to walk on it. He was practically unstoppable. So we taped letters on the floor and played with them. We stepped on them.


We drove cars on them, but not until we lined them up very carefully.


Of course, the cars had to drive fast.


And we sat on them. What else is a boy to do at the end of the day?

The Cast: The Early Days

Oh, for crying out loud...it's already the end of May! And you all have been anticipating cast photos so patiently. A quick update - on Thursday, Little P got his cast removed. It was on a total of 4.5 weeks. But before I show you those pics (yup, I took photos while helping hold his leg still), let's go over the past few weeks in sequence.



Homeschool Preschool. We did some of that. He knows the letter A pretty well, in fact. We practiced tracing the letter with fingers and crayons, driving over it with cars, walking on it (I taped an "A" and an "a" on the floor), sitting on it, and building it (with cute alphabet building blocks from Emma). Photos to come on the taped floor activity.



We also practiced folding, putting stickers on things, and using glue sticks. Mama is not fully comfortable with Little P's approach to glue sticks yet.  




But he's pretty good at building letters. Until he decides to bite the foam blocks.



Mama also discovered that a leftover piece of construction paper and a pair of kid scissors will keep him occupied for nearly an hour. So long as Mama does not mind picking up half a million tiny pieces of paper off the floor. (Oh, it is SO worth it!)



Funny, how that big A looks suspiciously like an H.



In other news, Little P can sing the entire alphabet song now. By himself. But only when it's his idea...