Here we go again

Back on June 7 we had our first go-round with lice. I followed all the recommended procedures - I did lice treatments on the girls, washed all the bed linens in hot water, sealed all the stuffed animals in big plastic bags for two weeks, combed the girls' hair out every day for a week, and then re-did the lice treatment.

Six weeks later, we had our second run-in with lice. So I repeated everything I'd already done. Two weeks after that, one of my best friends called to tell me that her daughter had lice, and since Ella had spent the night at their house a few days earlier, I assumed that we'd been the carriers. So I did a panicked lice treatment on the girls and combed out their hair. To my relief, I didn't find a single bug or nit. Still, I continued combing out their hair every morning for a week, just to be sure.

I figured we were finally in the clear.

I figured wrong.

Yesterday morning, Campbell was sitting in my lap and I was absent-mindedly fiddling with his curls looked down in time to see a louse jump out of his hair and land on his shirt. I promptly squished it and grabbed one of our many lice combs. He had lice.

So on our way to the airport to pick up Grandpa, who has the poor luck to be visiting this weekend, we stopped at Target to pick up more lice shampoo. Unfortunately, the only kind they had was the kind I'm not allowed to touch due to my "delicate" condition. So Brandon had to do all the shampooing and rinsing for the three screaming kids. I did the combing out and found lice on all of them.

Son of a bitch.

We've started all the laundry over again. We're putting all blankets and comforters in the dryer for 40 minutes on high. We're sealing all stuff animals in plastic bags. We're combing out the kids' hair every day - and if you think it's easy to use a lice comb on a squiggly toddler, then you've obviously never tried it.

I checked B's head, and he's clear. After spending a sleepless night with an itchy head, I treated my hair with the stuff I'm allowed to use and then did a combing. My head is clear, too.

I just don't know what to do next. We'll do another lice treatment of some sort, either chemicals or cetaphil or vegetable oil (one of the recommendations from friends), before we leave for the beach on Saturday, and hope that a week of soaking in salt water will rid us of this problem once and for all.

If that doesn't work, I'm giving everyone a buzz cut and dousing their heads in kerosene. I know I read about some poor orphan having to have that treatment done in some book somewhere. I'm sure the girls won't mind starting the new school year with no hair.