They Are All Dropping Like Flies!

It's apparently that time of year.  Where sniffles and snot are heard all down the hallways.  Where hacking and coughing are the symphony in the rooms.  Where the blushing red faces of my lovelies become pale and colorless as they leave their lunch lying on the floors.  And, please don't make me spell out that last one more than that.  Yet, anyways.

Yep.  It's the start of cold and flu and stomach bug season...and it's definitely in full swing all around me. 

Yesterday morning, Jelly woke up telling me she wasn't feeling well.  She has had some allergy stuff going on - just like me - for the past few days.  Now, it's apparently moved down in to her chest and started a nasty cough.  I really didn't want to send her to school, but once she got up and started moving around she told me she felt better and was ready to go to school.  I know that I wake up most mornings when my allergies are playing up not feeling so great - so I figured that's what was going on with her, too.

That was until I got home from work to discover my poor little Jelly laying on the couch - and I knew straight away that my baby girl did NOT feel  so great.  Hubby had picked all the kids up from school because I had to go to a meeting and he told me that she'd been on the couch since they'd got home.  She didn't want to eat and just wanted to sleep.  Great.  A sick baby.  I needed that icing for the cake of a day I'd had.

Earlier on in the day, my class had gone to the science lab.  They did a fun experiment with the science teacher with M&M's.  Fun, yes.  But probably not the best experiment to do right before lunch.  The teacher was teaching a great lesson on camouflage and was using M&M's on construction paper to teach the lesson.  The problem was the amount of M&Ms many of my kids consumed..again, right before lunch.  I even said as we were leaving "I bet someone gets sick from all of that".  Well, wouldn't you know I just had to be right.  Being right really stinks sometimes.  Literally.

A few hours later, after recess and P.E. of all things, one of my kiddos gets sick.  All down the hallway.  All over himself.  Awesome.  The color completely left his face.  And how do I make it better?  By reminding him that he probably shouldn't have eaten so many M&Ms.  Wow.  Teacher of the year right here.  One of my poor kiddos gets sick - and I'm right there with a big fat "I told ya so" sign.  What's wrong with me?  And what made it even worse... yes, it gets worse... is the fact that the M&M's was just a minor factor.  He was running a fever and really was sick.  I felt so bad for him.  Despite my cold blooded taunt, my motherly instinct kicked in and I just wanted to hug him until his mom got there.  Poor little thing.  I bet that he doesn't touch M&Ms for a while, though. 

And if poorly 4 year olds and puking students weren't enough, I woke up this morning to discover that Hubby had come home from work early.  Why?  Because he got sick at work.  Lord, Help Me!  Kids that are sick are bad enough, I don't need a sick Hubby piled on top.  Those are the worst!  I kid.  Kinda.  Not really.

Thankfully, as bad as that sounds, with Hubby being home, Jelly can stay home.  They can stay home and take care of each other.  When Jelly's sick all she wants to do is lay on the couch and sleep.  While Hubby's sick, all he wants to do is lay on the couch and sleep.  Win Win for both of them. 

Now, I'm just terrified some of these germs are going to try and invade my territory.  Being stressed and tired are the two worst factors to have when you're trying to fight off germs.  It's like they can sniff out the weak spots and invade with vengeance.  And I just can't let my guard down.  I can't afford to get sick right now.  I will be loving me some Germ-X for the next few days, weeks, months... I know it.

I did get some good news this morning.  Good news in my warped brain, anyway.  There's a cold front heading this way which is going to knock temps down in to the 50s this weekend.  And the 50s are the highs!  At night, Weather Man is saying that we could get down in to the 30s.  Holy Woowsers.  My kinda weekend!  I'm imagining stew, coffee, my laptop, and that's about it.  I don't know why cold weather makes me so happy, but it does.

I guess I'll just focus on that to get me through the rest of this week.