Throwing (up) a party

Let me tell you about Emmie's big first birthday party. We had everything in place, the pizzas were on the way, the beer and soda were chilling in the ice tub and the cupcakes were on display. She was in her cute little birthday dress waiting for the guests to arrive when Jack woke up from his nap.

Josh went in to get him, took two steps into the room and announced, "Uh, Amy? Jack is sick." And with that, the Mommy in me went from party mode to parent mode. We got him out of his vomit-covered crib and into the bathtub, where Josh stripped him down and bathed him while I stripped the crib and got all the sheets and blankets and loveys into the wash.

Because it was 15 minutes before the party was set to start, it was too late to call the guests. We decided to keep him upstairs and warn everyone at the door that we had a puker. If they didn't want to come inside, we wouldn't hold it against them in a court of law. Even better if they offered to go upstairs and nurse him back to health.

Since Emmie had only puked once when she had it two days earlier, I figured he would be fine, but he was still sequestered upstairs. The two grandpas volunteered to play with Jack so we could attend Emmie's party with her and make sure everyone was having a good time.

No one ran screaming from the house when they arrived and heard the news, so the party went on. Uncfortunately, so did the puking. There's nothing worse for a mommy than being torn between two children who need you. Every time he puked, Jack would ask for me and I would run upstairs to see if he was OK and tell him how brave he was and then I would run back downstairs to celebrate the big milestone birthday with Emmie.

It was almost a blessing that Jack was as sick as he was because he had no idea what was going on downstairs. He just laid on the floor of our bedroom on a sheet, watching "Sesame Street" on a constant loop, occasionally playing with some toys we brought up for him. Also a blessing was that it was so bitterly cold last week because it meant we kept the kids out of the basement playroom, so he hadn't played with any of the toys in three days and therefor had not contaminated any of them and the guests could play with them without fear of germs.

Emmie had a great time and everyone sang Happy Birthday and she enjoyed licking her cupcake and daintily eating some of the cake and frosting. Mostly, she just crawled around and investigated all the people invading her house. As soon as the last of the kids departed, I went upstairs to Jack for the rest of the evening. In all, he threw up eight times over five hours. I can't thank the two Grandpas enough for all their help, from teaching him how to use the bucket to playing Hungy Hippos with him.

By 10 p.m., he could keep a teaspoon of Pedialite in him every 15 minutes for an hour and we put his pale little face in bed for the night. I figured he would be up all night, but he slept through the night and woke up the next morning bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

Years from now, when he asks us why there's no pictures of him at Emmie's first birthday party, we'll just tell him we made him stay upstairs while everyone else had fun.