Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Mosquitos? After THAT weather?

We have known for some time that Pony Gal reacts pretty strongly to mosquitoes, and that they are oddly attracted to her. She gets this tendency from her dad, as I rarely get bitten unless it is like swarming with the evil little things. We were at my sister's the last half of the week for prison town to the north's citywide garage sales, and despite the rather chilly weather, she had tons of bugs. We haven't had any out here at the farm for quite some time. Anyway, Pony Gal got several bites Thursday, which we benedryl'd and calamine'd and moved on. They swelled a little, though not as badly as we have dealt with before. Two were on her head, and the biggest one was on her nose, making it look like it was broken. Friday she got stung on her forehead. Not good. By dinner time it was so large I wouldn't have recognized her if I didn't know who she was. Come Saturday it was on the verge of taking over her eyes, which would have meant a trip to the er. The Dr. told us to wait until that point, if we reached it at all, but to use claritin and something for the itching. So then we noticed that she was WAY hyperactive and irritable all weekend. Aaah. Thus the epiphany that Pony Gal is one of those kids who react to claritin. It has been a just fantabulous last few days waiting for that stupid bite to go away so I can get my kid back. I will not be using claritin again with her. If it weren't for the fact that it was pretty serious I would have avoided using it anyway, but she was so uncomfortable. We did get some great balm from Prairieland Herbs while were out there for their open house on Sunday. I actually bought several things and grabbed quite a few samples, too. I highly recommend the healing stick they sell. It made such a difference for her forehead. And it will be used for our diaper rashes, now as well. We will be going back. For sure. And Pony Gal is all back to normal, now, but I am rather paranoid about letting her out after sundown as we don't want anymore bites. It made our weekend waaaayyyy too long.

2 comments:

  1. Mama Podkayne said...

    We have found an awesome solution to keeping wasps/ mosquitos away from us while out: we have a chimnea and we burn wood and then throw coffee grounds into the fire. The smell of that is yummy AND detracts the buggers.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Abby said...

    We will give that a try. We have an outdoor fireplace we have wanted to try for a while. Just waiting for the right weather/reason.

    ReplyDelete

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