The Real Story Behind Ammon's Strep Throat

On April 29, Ammon stayed home from school with a slight fever. On the 30th, I noticed that he was covered with bumps... the same bumps that he had when he had strep throat a few months ago. I took him to the doctor and she was surprised at how red and swollen his throat was. The funny thing (well, not for Ammon!) is that his throat didn't even hurt. He had a very slight fever and the bumps and a positive culture... and that was it! Of course, this was enough to keep him out of school for three days... and to change a lot of other things about that weekend.

That's the story on the surface. The real story is that I believe a Higher Hand had a plan for us and the strep throat was a part of that plan. Jacob's original plan was to take the two boys to the Palmer Track & Field Relays for that weekend. Well, since Ammon does not do well with oral medication, we opted to have him take a three-day course of an antibiotic shot (done at the doctor's office, of course!). Because of that, Jacob decided to skip the track meet and stay home so he could help me nurse Ammon back to health (ha, ha!! Ammon was just ecstatic to not have to go to school... he felt totally fine had all of his normal energy - and then some!).

On Friday, May 1, we'd already been inside for two whole days and the kids were going crazy. We packed up a lunch and I took them to the park to burn some energy. They had a fantastic time playing soccer, jumping rope and drawing with sidewalk chalk. While they played, I got out my Windex and cleaned the back window of our Suburban. For weeks, I'd intended to put a vinyl cut-out of a representation of our family on our window, but I just hadn't found the opportunity. Here it was! Perfect!! With Kenai's representation on our car window, I guess he finally felt like we were ready for him to be born (he came on Sunday, May 3!).

In other words, instead of being split up by a couple of hundred miles, we had some really great family time for several days before baby Kenai was born... all because of strep throat!