Pink hearts and pink casts for Valentine's Day

Caroline broke her arm - on Valentine's Day! Our ward had a formal dinner for just the adults, so we had lined up a babysitter and fed the kids an early dinner so we could go get ready. After eating, all our kids headed outside for a quick jump on the trampoline before we took them home, and almost immediately we heard Caroline cry and Eli ran in with the news that she fell off the trampoline. The trampoline, bought from Christmas and set up only last month, has a large safety net all around it, but what is safety to kids? Make something foolproof and you will always find a bigger fool. Instead of jumping safely within the confines of the net our kids try running around the outside of the net, on top of the pad-covered springs, while someone inside the tramp tries to catch them. Needless to say, we adults have lectured the kids more than once on how this is a BAD IDEA. So with Caroline crying we head out warming up our palms to spank her - but the look of her arm was enough to turn a spank into a large dose of kids' Advil, as much comfort as we could give, and a trip to the ER (Caroline crying all the while). I am no doctor, I get queasy at any sign of blood and have never had or seen a broken bone in my life, but in spite of my inexperience it was very obvious just by looking that she had broken her right arm. Sure enough, x-rays confirmed she broke both her bones, snapped in half like pencils. They set it in a splint and Joe brought home a much-calmed-down little lady and a load of ice cream from DQ.

Monday she got her cast, and since it's difficult to get any shirt over it and nearly impossible to fit it in long-sleeved, she prefers tank-tops. In February. Should be interesting with the snow storm on the way!

Ethan was so enamored of his sister, her cast, or the whole situation that he wanted one, too. I supplied an ace bandage in a pinch, and he wore it all day.

With her lovely pink cast on she is doing very well, no pain at all, and has really adapted quickly to doing everything with her left hand - eating, drawing, opening doors, etc. We will get the cast removed in 3 weeks and they'll x-ray her arm again to see if it's healed or it they need to re-cast (her arm will be reduced in size from atrophy, so if she still needs the support of a cast they would have to re-cast it anyway).