Friday night started out nice.  We had dinner with our friend’s, Mike and Georgeanna, and talked babies and birth since they are having their first soon.  We dined like real adults at a nice Italian restaurant and the very knowledgeable hostess seated us in the back corner where there was room for the kids to get down and play.  They were upstanding little urchins right up until just before we left, so I was pretty happy with almost 2 whole hours of acting good at a nice restaurant. It was just the last few minutes where everyone in the restaurant was staring at us.  Success!  I’m sure they look at people like us coming in with 2 little kids and cringe.

That night we woke up at around 1:30am to Kailan crying and coughing.  Brian brought him into bed with us, since he wasn’t feeling very well.  His cough was bad but his breathing was scary.  He seemed to be struggling get a breath.  We both got pretty worried and ended up calling 911 after a few minutes. 

After hearing about kids dying lately from influenza, and a lady in my bunco group was telling me about how her neighbor’s kid went to bed and didn’t wake up from his nap (such a pleasant, uplifting conversation we were having!)…I’m a little jumpy.  I was really, really worried about Kai and started to feel sick myself.  Good thing the daddy was there!

The EMT’s got there pretty quick, um…so quick I didn’t have a chance to put anything decent on!  Thank goodness I was on the bed with Kailan, so I just threw the bedspread over myself. 

They listened to his breathing and said it was labored but he was getting good oxygen.  They suggested that either they or us take him to the hospital.  We opted to take him because he was pretty scared at that point.  I mean, strange people showed up in mommy and daddy’s bedroom in the middle of the night and started prodding at him.  Who wouldn’t be scared??  His breathing got worse, the more upset he got, so it was an easy decision…beside the $1K it would have cost us for the ambulance trip.  The EMT’s said they didn’t see a problem with us bringing him in. 

So, off Brian and Kai went to Methodist Hospital.  It is easier to get there than Children’s Hospital in the hood.  Really, wouldn’t you prefer to take your little sick 3 year-old to a capable hospital in a suburb instead of the very capable Children’s hospital in a rundown area of Minneapolis?  Yeah, the intelligent choice at 2 am. 

Kai has croup.  One of the treatments for the croup cough is cold air.  Well, after getting in the very cold car, during the drive to the hospital his cough and breathing got much better. 

We have some medicine for him now and he is doing so much better after his episode.  I don’t know how a child can go to bed fine, wake up and scare the bejeezes out of his parents and then the next day be fine again…HOW???  So, despite the trip to the ER this weekend, he has been his perky, Stargate watching little self.  We even went to the dentist on Saturday morning for his first ever appointment.  By that time he was acting fine and he said he wanted to go…he even let them floss his teeth!  I never thought they would get that far for his first time there.

Another exciting weekend at the Kraft house. 😉