Nosegay

M&M and I went shopping last night, just the two of us. We had a lot of fun wandering around the store looking at toys, trying on shoes, and enjoying being together. She is very much a "girly girl" and loves thing like flowing skirts, jewelry, shoes, ribbons, lace, flowers, dolls and anything pretty--especially if it's pink.

One of the things we bought was this bouquet of pretty posies:



You may notice, though, that a couple of the flowers are missing several petals. That's because Baby E climbed up on a chair to inspect the bouquet this morning.

No, she wasn't playing "Love me . . . love me not."

She was poking petals into her nose.

It gives a whole new meaning to the word "nosegay." I wonder what Cyrano de Bergerac would think of Baby E's definition?



All of my kids experimented with putting things into their nose and/or ears around this age, but Baby E carries it to a whole new level. She doesn't just do it occasionally; it's a constant thing. It's been going on for weeks now, many times a day.

It isn't just if she is given a food she doesn't like or is full, either. Chicken, hamburger, bread, pears, cereal, broccoli, potato stix, matzo cracker--it all gets shoved into her nostrils or ears the moment I let my guard down. Then I'm getting bits of it out of her nose for the next two hours.

I wonder if it's her way of trying to relieve itching from allergies, or if it's just an obsession with trying to see how much food she can stuff into those fascinating little holes.

As she demonstrated this morning, she also stows away things other than food.

She was sneezing, sniffling and coughing occasionally all morning as the petals worked their way out. I called the advice nurse, who said not to worry about it unless the "foreign object" didn't come out, or if it was impeding her breathing, causing pain or showing signs of infection. She suggested using an aspirator to get the petals out without just pushing them farther in as any other method might do.

I managed to get three pink petals, a white petal, and a piece of a leaf out of her right nostril. The left nostril only yielded one white petal, but it appears there may be more lodged farther back.

At least it's not impeding her breathing.

I try to keep an eye on her and stop her from doing it. But I can't hover constantly and I can't exactly just stop giving her food.



What's a girl to do?