The boy likes knives

The boy Ozling has an older friend in Cub Scouts who captured his fascination when he showed off his pocket knife on a recent campout.

Cub Scouts says the boy is not old enough to carry a knife for another two years.

We'll honor their rules on Scout outings, but I agreed that the boy Ozling could use a knife on our own campouts if closely supervised by me. When I was about his same age, I was whittling away, promising to be careful and sitting just a couple feet from my Dad. Then I promptly sliced my thumb.

It taught me a lesson and provided an anecdote I have remembered all these years. Not too bad.

With our blessing, Pop Pop and Grammy came through with a birthday present for the boy.

He seems pleased.

Which one is the monkey?

Hate it when life gets in the way of our blog.

We've been busy living our lives and not devoting much tlc to Gteaminoz in recent months. Sorry about that.

Here are some photos from a spring trip to Omaha.

We always enjoy our visits to the Henry Doorly Zoo. What a magical place. The Kansas City Zoo? Not so much.

Although we do have hope for improvement. The visionary behind the zoo in Omaha, Lee Simmons, sent his protege south to see if he could fix up the Kansas City Zoo.

We'll have to pay a visit this summer to see how he is coming along.

Morning mess

Matthew has transformed dawdling in the morning into an art form lately.

While he is supposed to be going through his start-the-day routine of eating breakfast, washing his face, brushing teeth, getting dressed and the like, Matthew has been taking more than his share of detours.

A zig over here to play with some toys, a zag over there to tease his sister a zig-zag combination all over the place simply to goof a bit.

Yesterday morning as I realized he had been in the bathroom far longer than necessary simply to brush his teeth, I called out from the dining room table.

“Matthew! What’s going on in there?”

A pause.

“Well, it’s a long story,” he replied.

Uh oh.

“That’s not good,” Becky and I said in unison as I jumped up to investigate.

As it turned out, it was not a huge problem. But it was a bit of a situation requiring Matthew to take a quick bath before school.

Date Night

It’s got to be a record. We are only one holiday beyond Christmas (President’s Day doesn’t count) and Becky and I managed to have a real, live, honest-to-goodness, Amazing Date Night.

Sad to say, but Becky and I have been known to go many months without managing to find an evening just for us.

Maybe this makes it even sadder, but apparently we have plenty of company. Stacey Garfinkle recently wrote in the Washington Post’s On Parenting blog about some of the challenges she encounters when scheduling dates with her spouse.

It is so different, she writes, from her own childhood when her parents “would disappear into their own world” every Saturday night while the children stayed at home with a sitter.

I certainly can relate. Not to Stacey’s parents. But Stacey’s challenges in getting out on an occasional date with her husband certainly have a frustratingly familiar ring.

For our recent outing, the Planets clearly were aligned in extraordinary fashion.

My Mom and Dad gave us an incredibly thoughtful gift at Christmas of some cash to finance a date night. Then, a good friend offered to let Megan and Matthew have a sleepover with her children.

Although Becky and I were just waiting for someone to get sick, our friend to have a conflict arise or some other development occur to short-circuit our plans, nothing bad happened. Yesterday afternoon we dropped off the kids. Then let the fun begin.

What an amazing gift.

We went window shopping at The Plaza and had some lunch. Then we picked up a bottle of wine for dinner. (The warm salad of roasted squash, prosciutto and pecorino -- I substituted gorgonzola -- from Jamie Oliver's Web site was a hit). Then we picked up some fine chocolates to nibble on while watching the DVD Chocolat (my Valentine’s Day present from Becky).

This morning the kids came home. They had a blast. We had a blast. It’s all good.

When enjoying time together as a couple, it always seems crazy to us that we don’t make this more of an ongoing priority. Yet, we also know that planning for events like this sometimes require managing more details than those handled by the Allies organizing the D-Day invasion

Yep, it's Strep

Basically, I’m a bad dad.

In my defense, however, my intentions were pure. Drug-resistant bacteria are a scourge worthy of serious concern. Parents who rush off to the pediatrician at the first sniffle or muffled cough and all-but demand antibiotics – and the pediatricians who don’t stand firm against them – are contributing to this problem.

I didn’t want to be one of those parents. I didn’t want to force our pediatrician into being one of those pediatricians.

This really is not turning into a bacteria blog, despite this post and the previous one about spreading salmonella on bread. Hang with me for a moment longer, please.

This morning, Becky thought I was being silly. Or worse. I was failing to recognize a serious problem. It infuriated her. She called in the big guns. She placed a call to her father. Her father the doctor.

Here’s the deal: a few weeks ago, the Gteam went four for four with strep throat. That’s right. Mom, Dad, Megan and Matthew all were infected with streptococcal (strep) bacteria. Oh joy. Four prescriptions of antibiotics, please.

We diligently took all the prescribed doses. We didn’t want to be those types who take some antibiotics, start to feel better and then discard the medicine before completing the all-out assault on the nasties in our system.

Well, then Becky got a cold and a sore throat last week. By the end of the week, it was not getting better. On Saturday, she visited urgent care and got a confirmed diagnosis of strep throat. And a shot of penicillin.

This morning, Matthew awoke complaining of a sore throat. Not severely sore, but sore nonetheless. No other symptoms. No fever. No vomiting. No headache. Good appetite. Decent energy and in relatively good spirits.

This advice from WebMD:

Call your health professional today if you have:
• A severe sore throat and fever over 101 °F(38.3 °C) that lasts longer than 1 to 2 days.
• A severe sore throat 2 to 5 days after you know you have been exposed to someone with strep.
• A sore throat that is not part of a cold that lasts longer than 2 to 3 days despite home treatment.
• A red rash that feels like sandpaper appears. This may indicate scarlet fever.
• Difficulty sleeping because your throat is blocked by swollen tonsils or adenoids.
I was inclined to stick it out and see whether he got worse. Becky was not. She unleashed her version of Shock and Awe. The call to her dad, who used his voice of authority to get him to the doctor for a strep test. Potential complications are not worth the risk, he said.

I caved. Twenty minutes later, we had a positive test. Positive for strep. Positive I am a bad dad.

Now, as in the first round a few weeks ago when Becky and Matthew got sick first, Megan and I are surely doomed.

We aren’t going down without a fight, however.

We also will follow this prevention advice on WebMD:
To avoid getting strep throat, it is a good idea to avoid contact with anyone who has a strep infection.
Wash your hands often when you are around people with colds or viral or bacterial illnesses. Do not share toothbrushes or eating and drinking utensils.
• Bacteria are almost always transmitted by contact with tiny droplets from an infected person. Strep throat is passed from one person to another by contact with the tiny droplets of an infected person's cough, sneeze, or breath.
• Bacteria can also live for a short time on doorknobs, water faucets, and other objects. If you touch an infected object and then touch your eyes, nose, or mouth, you can become infected with the bacteria or virus.
• Bacteria can also be carried on food.

While my pride is wounded, this situation is not a total loss. While looking for Web links to include in this post, I found this online site called GiantMicrobes.com that sells plush dolls of viruses and bacteria. The streptococcus doll looks kind of cute. Why does he have to be so mean?

Bye Bye Peter Pan Peanut Butter

It leaves me a bit disconcerted to ponder how much peanut butter Matthew packs away in a given week. It’s just about a food group of its own in our family. While Megan will rave about the flavor of capers in her Pork Piccata or at least try my latest kitchen concoction, Matthew isn’t exactly an adventurous eater.

Nearly every morning since he was about two, Matthew has started his day with a bowl of “hot-water oatmeal” (we tried to break from the packets of instant and go with a home-cooked bowl of porridge with no success -- this other story of our parental nutrition ineptitude will have to wait for another day), a toasted frozen waffle and often a slice of toast, liberally coated with jelly, and yes, peanut butter.

Should the night’s dinner menu consist of anything beyond stir-fried beef, pizza or spaghetti, we get some pouting, and maybe a bit of a battle of wills. Often we will compromise. After at least a few bites trying the night’s entrée, Matthew can have a PBJ sandwich.

Becky has tried to include turkey or salami sandwiches in his school lunch. They come home untouched. It’s to be peanut butter and jelly, or nothing, thank you.

While we had a brief dalliance with Jif and one time an organic brand from the health food store, we are a Peter Pan peanut butter family. Now the man from Neverland -- or at least his corporate overseer -- has let us down. I already was worried about the transfats or other health-hindering nasties contained in the jars of peanut butter. Now we have to worry about salmonella?

After hearing of the recall, we rushed home to check the serial number on the lid of the jar residing in our home. Sure enough, we had one of the “2111” prefixes on the lid indicating potential contamination.

Matthew was sick earlier in the week and missed a day from school because he was throwing up. Could it have been contaminated peanut butter? ConAgra (with a corporate name like that, you can understand why they prefer to hide behind a friendlier-sounding brand of Peter Pan) has let us down. Peter Pan Peanut Butter is off the shelves at the store and off the shelves of our cupboard as well.

When we did a Google search earlier in the week for updates about the recall, we found ConAgra touting the glorious history of the Peter Pan product, but no readily clicked-to details about its potential to sicken children. They since have included a link on the Peter Pan page to provide updates about how to avoid illness and procure a refund. It certainly was not as to-the-point as this headline on the Web site of the Food and Drug Administration:

FDA Warns Consumers Not to Eat Certain Jars of Peter Pan Peanut Butter and Great Value Peanut Butter

We will seek a refund for our latest jar. But the money we receive likely will go to a different company.

It's over Peter Pan. Fly away. You are about as welcome as Captain Hook would be in our home.

So much for global warming

Our first winters in Kansas City left us yearning for the abundant snow we left behind in Wisconsin.

This year, however, we are experiencing an actual winter. Snow and everything.

We are enjoying its beauty and making the most of it.