This post is not for the faint of heart. We have had children for over 10 years and have managed to fly under the radar as far as Emergency doctor visits have been concerned. Apart from the occasional sore throat, breathing problems, and once for a pretty bad hand burn, we haven’t had to take our kids to the doctor. Leonard, however, has managed several visits for various injuries. Stitches a few times and once to take a fish hook out of his finger. The number of times that Leonard has had a pretty bad cut on his hand are seriously too numerous to count. He has gotten pretty handy with a little superglue. I guess when you have a knife in your hand about 50% of the time you are awake (usually for gutting the most recent kill) you are bound to have quite a few cuts. Anyway, Kanyon has taken the steps to follow his father as we made our 1st visit for stitches on Saturday. 
Saturday afternoon he asked to use his new pocket knife to cut some branches for a new “club” he had discovered. I said, “I don’t know, buddy…” Leonard said, “If you cut your finger off it will be pretty hard to play baseball.” Kanyon said, “Please, I promise I’ll be careful!” So we gave him the knife and sent him out the door.
Only about a minute later Kanyon comes running in the door. “I AM GUSHING BLOOD. I AM GOING TO DIE!” I thought he was joking because it had happened so fast. I thought he must be teasing me. But he, unfortunately, was not. He had cut his left index finger and it was, indeed, bleeding quite a bit. Don’t look at the next picture if you have a weak stomach!!
We washed it up, held pressure and I thought about trying to just bandage it but the bleeding was too much and the cut was pretty bad. We knew that it would take a long time to heal without stitches. I headed with him into the Urgent Care clinic in town and he won himself 7 stitches plus one underneath. 
He was pretty tough about the whole thing, and morbidly curious too. He watched the whole time they stitched him even though it freaked him out just a little!
He said a few funny things that I want to remember:
- He said that he would not use his pocketknife again until he was 13.
- He had cut his finger just a little bit with the pocketknife about a month ago and said, “I thought I already learned this lesson – why do I have to learn it again?!”
- “I tried to squeeze my wrist so that the bleeding would just stop!!”
All-in-all he really was a trouper and handled it well. Hopefully we can last at least another 10 years before we have to do something like that again – although, I have a feeling that is not very likely!
Leonard went to the store and got the right blade for his dad’s jigsaw and had a bit more success. Kanyon worked hard to sand it, paint it and decorate it to get it ready for the big night. It was a lightweight when we got there but Leonard added a few extra touches to make it heavier. 
