No, not mad cow disease

Erin has a virus. The Coxsackie virus, to be specific. Also known as hand-foot-and-mouth disease, not to be confused with hoof-and-mouth disease or mad cow disease - those only happen in animals.

I unfortunately did not catch it until AFTER we had been at a birthday party drooling over everything all morning Saturday (Erin drooled, I was just there with her). She has little sores that look like whitehead pimples on her hands, between her toes, on her buns, and around her mouth. I think they are itchy and the one between her toes is open now and red. Worst of all, though, she has a big flaming red one one the middle of her tongue, another on the edge and one on the inside of her lower lip. Needless to say, she has not eaten much more than raisins and graham crackers for the past 3 days. And she has not slept well at all. And her shirt front is perpetually wet because she doesn't swallow.

I think she is on the mend, though. This morning she practically inhaled 2 bowls of Cheerios. For lunch she had 2 pieces of banana bread and a whole pear - I almost thought I might have to cut up another. And she took a long nap this afternoon. I haven't heard a peep since she went down an hour ago, either. Hopefully I can get some sleep, too, tonight.

Here's a cute picture of her right before the birthday party we went to Saturday morning. She was looking pretty stylin'.


And here's a strange story, just for fun.