In Which Connor Sees Some Cool Bugs

So today Connor and I took a field trip to Bug Safari in Seattle!  They're sort of a gift shop/exhibit combination, with the space split about evenly between the two.  They had about 50 different kinds of insects, arachnids, millipedes and centipedes arranged in large tanks around the room.  While it seemed to be geared more towards elementary and middle school aged children, Connor still had a good time.  His favorite bugs were the Sunburst Diving Beetles and the Goliath Bird-Eating Spider, which was a spider with a body about the size of a baseball.  I'll spare the squeamish by not posting pictures.  I'm the type of gal who, when I find spiders in the house, carefully picks them up and takes them outside so they can live in my garden, so I thought it was pretty cool.  Though I might think twice about picking up a spider that size-- even with my trusty rolled-piece-of-paper method.

Before we visited Bug Safari, however, we had to get there.  This proved to be a bit of a problem. 

See, the store is located on the third level of what is known as the Pike Street Hill Climb.  This involves a whole lot of stairs.  And no handicap ramp.  And no elevator.  Apparently if you call ahead someone will give you access to a service elevator at the rear of the building the store is in, but of course we had no idea this was going to be a problem, as we just assumed they'd have some sort of a wheelchair ramp.  Luckily we had a friend with us, and she graciously helped me lift and carry Connor's wheelchair up three flights of stairs.  So if anybody with a little one in a wheelchair plans to make a visit to Bug Safari (or the Mexican restaurant, gelato place or other stores located in this building)-- either call ahead or be prepared to do some heavy lifting.

We rode the service elevator back down.

After our trip to Bug Safari, we walked up and down Pike Street for a little while.  A street busker saw us and  called us over because he decided that we had to hear a special song.  By some weird coincidence, he sang "There Ain't No Bugs On Me."  Connor thought it was fantastic-- he was totally enthralled, and giggled and clapped his hands through the whole thing.  I'm not normally big on watching and tipping street buskers, but I gave the guy a fiver.  If he can entertain Connor to that degree, he deserves it in my opinion. 

After a brief stop in the park, we bid goodbye to our friends and grabbed some lunch at Piroshky Piroshky Bakery-- one of my favorite to get portable food-- and then stopped by the Perennial Tea Room for something to drink.  We sat outside and people-watched for a while, which was fun.  The market area is always full of interesting people, and while the Perennial Tea Room is a little off the beaten path it still gets its share of colorful characters.  Finally we walked down to Fran's to pick up some of those ridiculously good salted caramels for Jeremy (and maybe a truffle or two for me) and it was time to go home, after a quick stop in a restroom, which is where I discovered Connor was sporting an extremely nasty looking rash all across the right side of his rear end.

So we canceled our evening plans, as Connor was not likely to be in a wonderful mood, but also because one of the potential side effects we're supposed to look out for with the little guy's medication change is rash.  Apparently you're supposed to tell your doctor if you develop a rash while on Tegretol, as one of the (extremely rare) side effects of the medication is toxic epidermal necrolysis-- also known as "your skin dying and falling off."  Glorious.

We did just up Connor's Tegretol this morning, per the doctors orders on transitioning between Tegretol and Trileptal.  But we also tried a different diaper brand (we switched about a week ago).  So more than likely this is just a nasty reaction to the different diapers-- Connor's not running a fever and, other than being itchy, he doesn't seem to be in any distress.  I ran to the store this evening and grabbed a tube of diaper rash cream and Connor's regular brand of diapers.  We'll take a look in the morning and see whether or not he's looking better, and if the rash has spread significantly (or shows up on parts of his body other than his rear) than we'll put a call in to the doctor.  It's probably nothing to worry about, though; we're certainly not going to call them for a case of diaper rash.  Lord knows we're in that office enough without abusing the system.

But otherwise we had a fun day!

~Jess