one, two, buckle my shoe

One.

First, Claire. 

Four or five days after she breaks her arm, we realize it.  Although we still don't even know how it happened, we have a pretty good idea it has something to do with the approximately 602 times she falls on her face every day.  Her little body runs everywhere she goes, but sometimes her feet can't keep up.  Turns out that she's done a number on  both bones in her wrist.  We feel like parents of the year.  Claire chooses a pink, sparkly cast and doesn't even seem to notice.  The only thing she cares about is getting a pair of fancy, purple gloves like the ones the nurse wears. 

Two.

Emmy falls off her bike a week and half later, within the first hour of the Wo-Jo family reunion.  We are staying in a cabin in the mountains.  Courtney and I watch out the window and wait to see how she reacts.  A fairly decent crash, but we hate to make a bigger deal out of it than she does.  She stands up, props the bike against the wall, and comes in the house where we are all talking.  After standing next to me quietly for a few minutes, she leans over and whispers in my ear, "Mom.  My thumb hurts really bad."

Sure enough, her little digit already looks like a little balloon.  Swollen and purple.  So. . .like any good parents would do, we wait.  Again, parents of the year.  (In our defense, we did call Aunt Jodi, who is a nurse.  She talked to her husband, who is a doctor.  They talked to their friend, an orthopedic.  And he said we might as well wait until Monday.  Whew, glad to have that off my chest.) 

So.  On Monday we went to visit Dr. Murray for Claire's follow-up visit.  Except we brought along Emmy, too.  A two for one, perhaps?  We arrived with the expectation that we would be losing Claire's cast and possibly getting a new one for Emmy. 

One x-ray, two. 

Next, we field more than a few questions from the kind doctor, who (for obvious reasons) was digging a little to make sure we aren't beating our poor children.  We pass the test (I think) and learn that Claire's arm could use a little extra time (might have something to do with the 602 falls.)   Emmy?  Sure enough, it's broken.

One cast, two. 

This time?  We leave the office with two matching, purple, sparkly casts.  Waterproof, too.  (We begged, as we are spending next week at the lake with the cousins.)   And the satisfaction of having been the first family to have had two siblings casted in the same appointment. 

We've made another appointment to see Dr. Murray in two weeks.  Courtney has made it known that if I haul in a third child to that appointment, he's not going.  And.  In the slight, but obviously not impossible chance that it happens, he has advised me to find a new doctor.