Trash

For quite some time now, Baylor has been pretty attached to trash.  No, not just any trash, the trash he makes on a daily basis from pulling strings out of our terry cloth diaper changing covers.  Seriously.  Wish I was kidding.

See those bald spots and track lines?

When we change his diaper, he'll grab hold of a string, pull as hard as he can, and work on his ... wad.  If he works hard at picking up pieces he's previously pulled and dropped and pulling as much as he can with each diaper change, he gets a pretty good sized wad going.

They look like this ...

(Funny side note: the ones he pulls from our off-white changing cover he refers to as "white trash".)

And they are ALL OVER OUR HOUSE.  Oh, and he likes to take them with him wherever he goes.  (Sorry if you've found some at your house after we've visited.)

For a while he liked to chew and swallow them, making diaper changes even more exciting.  But we started putting him in time out for that, and it pretty much stopped.  The other day, though, my mom babysat while I went to an appointment, and when I came back she informed me in hushed tones that he may have stuck one up his nose.  I asked him about it, he said he did, but when I looked up there I couldn't find anything.

After he went down for his nap, I called the pediatrician's office to see what I should do.  I wasn't exactly ready for what the nurse told me.  She said that when he got up, I should lay him on the ground, pinch off the non-trashed nostril, put my mouth over his (a la CPR), and blow into his mouth, effectively blowing his nose for him.

Awesome.

So, upon his awakening, I did what she said.  Baylor seemed a little uneasy at what I was doing, but I guess he trusts me enough to let me do what I say is in his best interest (most of the time, anyway).  But he did start crying when his nose made a loud honking sound as I blew through his mouth; I guess it startled him a bit.  He said it didn't hurt, though, and nothing came out.  The nurse said if his nose started getting runny and green the next day that something was probably stuck and we'd need to go in.  The next day came and went with no nasal drainage so we were good.

You'd think this was where the story ends, but it isn't.

Saturday, as we were hanging out in the living room, Baylor, after complaining of a stuffy nose for a day or two, rubbed a lovely, giant booger out of his nose.  As it turns out, the booger was mostly comprised of a wad of his trash, encased in green.  Lovely, kiddo.

After a talk, he's no longer allowed to pull the string out of the changing pad covers, though we'll see how long that lasts.  He has been at it for so long, I barely even notice him doing it anymore.