This - I Could Do Without
I got an email from Mister Man's teacher early this afternoon. There had been an incident. Thankfully not that kind of an incident, but she still wanted to let me know (and thankfully, I checked my email today as most days I don't check my email until after the wee ones have gone to bed.
Mister Man was stung by a bee. Multiple times. We were pretty sure he wasn't allergic, as he was stung once two years ago and was fine. But still, he was stung four times (three times on his head, once on his arm) and was pretty freaked out. They took him to the nurse who applied an anti-bee sting patch, and they were keeping a close eye on him.
I responded that I was glad to know they were keeping an eye on him, but that he should be fine.
Then I got this email back from the teacher an hour later:
Subject: Possible Bee In Sleeve of Jacket
Michelle,
Coach L said that there could still be a bee or two in Mister Man's jacket.
It is in his backpack in a plastic bag tied at the top.
Please be careful when opening it.
He is doing fine.
--Teacher
Uhhh, whoah. Bee in his sleeve? In his jacket? Now, I'm worried.
In talking to the teacher assistant when I picked up Mister Man, ten children were stung today and several were stung yesterday. Apparently they've found some nests in the ground. The custodians were being (beeing, ha ha, get it?) sent out to see if they could find and uhhh eliminate them. Until then, recess is now inside.
I was told that these bees were swarming on children. Flying into coats, covering them, crawling everywhere. Teachers and recess monitors were removing kids clothes and rushing everyone else inside. I think I'm glad I didn't know this earlier in the day.
Fortunately, Mister Man doesn't seem to be too bothered by this and is fine going back to school tomorrow. His proudest moment is that he got the "bee prize" of a hug from the principal.
When I got home from Back to School Night, my husband had still not unpacked the backpack (chicken). I opened it up and took out his lunch box and his snack box. And... this:
Ok, so that's a little freaky.
The bag is now in my freezer. I'll take it out tomorrow morning, and I figure any bees still in the jacket then will be ummm of no danger.
PS Just another reminder that I'm giving away a Connect 4x4 on my review site that ends Sunday 10/3.
18 comments:
Fantastic idea about freezing it! Love the note. That sounds really scary. We had a nasty nest under our playhouse slide and had a heck of a hard time getting rid of it. Good luck.
Poor little guy! That must have really hurt. Very glad that he isn't allergic.
How awful for your son and all the other kids! But, I'm really surprised that this message came to you via email and not a phone call-- as a teacher, I made my share of bee sting phone calls to parents over the years, just to give a heads up and to confirm that they didn't have any possible allergy. Since it was preschoolers, it was often their first sting ever, so it was important to touch base with the parents to let them know. Hmmm...
Hope you have a frozen bee or two to discard today-- grab some magnifying glasses and it's the perfect opportunity to let the kids observe a bee up close without the danger! :) (You know me and bugs!)
OMG! i'm glad I haven't gotten any nice little surprises like that in my kids' backpacks! Glad he's doing ok.
It has been an ugly year for bees this year too.
What a crappy surprise though to find.
I hate bees :( Good idea to put the jacket in the freezer.
Ooooh, that's creepy!
Freeze those bees!
That left me all creeped out. Glad Mister Man is doing okay, it had to be scary for him. Ground bees can be very aggressive.
EEEkkkk! That's one of my worst nightmares! Glad MM is OK. I am not envious of whoever opens that bag, though -- frozen or not!
Oh my goodness! What an awful ordeal - good for him for handling it so well (and good for you as well!) I am glad the school is on top of it.
Bee very careful.
Poor guy! I'm glad he's none the worse for the wear.
How scary for Mister Man and all those kids! I'm so glad that he's o.k. That would have freaked me out. Good idea about freezing the jacket. This almost sounds like a scene from one of those killer bee movies. Crazy.
Wow! That is bizarre. I'm glad they weren't killer bees. And I'm glad Mister Man is not allergic to beestings.
Laura - I don't know how the nest removal is going... but so far, recess has been inside since then. However, I will admit that it's also been raining here and cold, so that may play a role in it, too!
WeaselMomma - No kidding. I'm just hoping all the other kids weren't allergic either!
Dawn - I was somewhat surprised, too, that I didn't geta phone call. And luckily, no bees fell out of the jacket when I did the grand shake the next morning!
Cookie - Can I really call it a surprise when I was warned about it though? ;)
Jenn - It has been. Fortunately with our realllly cold and rainy weather, I'm hoping this will be the end of them for the year. I'm not counting on it though!
Katie - The wee ones aren't fans of bees, either, but I keep trying to remind them that freaking out about the bees makes things worse. Generally, if you ignore them, they'll ignore you, too.
Shelly - The image of them crawling around on the kids is still sticking with me -- especially after hearing a little more about it from one of the parents who was supervising recess!
Carol Lynn - Yeah... I'm not sure where that idea came from, but it made sense once I came up with it!
Tara - The ground bees are bad. We had bees sting Mister Man with no provocation a couple years ago who then stung me as I walked up the sidewalk to get ice and baking soda. Those ground bees died a painful death shortly thereafter, but man were they aggressive!
Hyacynth - It was me (of course). Luckily it was more concern than necessary, but ... better than the alternative.
Nichole - He was proud of the stings and enjoyed pointing them out to everyone he saw. Kids!
Unknown Mami - Ooooo, you're as bad as I am. I love it!
Karen - Me, too. He hasn't mentioned the stings since that day, so hopefully he's past it.
Kelly - No kidding. I heard that there were a few kids who were afraid to go to school after that (mostly those who weren't stung -- interestingly enough), but everyone is fine, thankfully!
Pat - Knock on wood, we don't have killer bees around here, but we're lucky in general that there were no allergies.
I'm glad he's not allergic to bees! Still, poor guy.
I think the teachers were chicken too, to not deal with that.
BUT, better to get a bag of bees than a bag of poopy pants.
Melisa - The funny thing now is that he keeps insisting he IS allergic to bees. *sigh* No, you aren't, and you can't tell people that you are! :) And YES much better than the bag o' poopy pants. Knock on wood, I'm done with that!
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