Poor David. If it weren't bad enough having us squirt salt water up his nose and then stick a plastic bulb up after it, we are now in major lotion mode. He has eight, count them eight, different lotions on his changing table for five different skin problems.

Diaper rash. All babies get diaper rash. We've almost finished a tube of desitin tackling his.

Things get more interesting with the eczema. As far I understand it, that's just really dry flaky skin for no good reason. He's got it on his forehead, cheeks, behind his ears, and on his legs. In several of those places, it's also red, blotchy, bumpy and can become oozy and crusty and just plain gross.

For the places where it's just a dry patch, we have two lovely mild baby lotions: the commercially available Burt's Bee's, all natural and organic, and Esther's Excellence, a local blend of olive oil, vitamin E and calendula flowers. If we're feeling prosaic, we can also just slap on some Vaseline.

For the red, blotchy, crusty, icko parts, we go for the steroids—cortizone. It's over the counter, only has 1% hydrocortisone, but people swear by it. It seems like steroids are the ubiquitous cure. Every time I turn around—little warts on my finger, itching where I prefer not to scratch, behind the ear crud—they seem to be the answer.

We were using hydrocortisone on the red patches under his arms, behind his knees, and in the folds of his neck, and they seemed to be getting worse, so I took him to the doctor yesterday. Yeast. He's overrun with yeast. So now, three times a day we wash the effected areas with a wet cloth, dry them with a hair dryer, which we have to do in the middle of the hallway since we don't have an accessible plug near the changing table, apply Lotrimin, an anti-fungal cream, and hope.

We aren't done yet because one of his effected areas is a sweet little finger he likes to suck on. It was looking red and puffy, more then just a lot of baby suction. Sure enough, yeast and infected. So, we add Neosporin to that regimen. We have to cover his hand with a sock, so he doesn't suck on the Neosporin. He just chaws away on the sock.

And then there's his penis. He was screaming bloody murder this morning. I took off his diaper and nearly freaked at his red genital area, especially the bright red puffy foreskin. We went back to the doctor. Still yeast, but possibly a staff infection too. I really didn't want to go on oral antibiotics for a maybe situation, so I get to add mupirocin, an antibiotic ointment, to the lotrimin and Vaseline that area is already getting.

The bad news—so far no improvement, but it's only been a few hours.

The good news—he seems fine. All those unsightly blemishes don't seem to be bothering him. He nurses fine, he sleeps fine, he grins and giggles fine.