Improvement

First - 2 questions from the comments -
"How long 'till the pins come out?"  I believe they come out when the cast comes off, which is in approximately 6 weeks.  I cannot really remember what the doc said though, because I was trying to forget the detail in which he explained the surgery.  *Shudder*  Brian takes Ethan in to get the plaster cast on the 28th and I'm sure they'll firm up the further details there.
"How exactly did he do it?"  He was climbing a structure in our playground - kind of like a tree made out of tires.  He must have just slipped.  He was doing nothing wrong, it's not an unsafe piece of equipment, it was just purely an ugly accident.  The doc said that at his age their bodies don't automatically brace a fall correctly, so this kind of break is fairly common in the ortho world - though not to this extreme necessarily.
Did I leave anything else out?  I'm not sure my brain is even yet functioning correctly.  The adrenaline and exhaustion messed with me....
Friday was pretty much a "stay on the couch and do nothing" day.  For both Ethan and I.  My mom came over and cleaned and grocery shopped and E and I rested.  Much. Needed.  Although, because we did nothing, I was nervous about how quickly we were going to be able to get Ethan up and moving.  He was still screaming every time I tried to move him.  Add to that the car not starting and the stove sparking and then not working and I was feeling pretty overwhelmed.  Luckily, Brian came home early and miraculously got both things to work.  Ethan realized that if he didn't want to take the big meds, he'd have to be more honest about where the pain levels were and not panic and freak out.  Separate pain from panic.  That was enough motivation to get him a little more perky.
In fact, Saturday morning he was ready to show us his stuff.  He was up and moving around, finding his new center of balance, remembering to not bump into things, sitting and getting up by himself!

Lucas and I practiced making monster marshmallows and pretty quickly Ethan was over to investigate.

I've never loved video games so much as I do now.  They were the motivation and distraction needed to get my boy feeling more like himself.  In the morning and in the evening he played for long periods of time - standing up and moving around!

Throughout the day we had a few friends pop in to say hi.  So great to see them and I think it's comforting for all to get to see him looking a bit more normal.  Lucas especially loved seeing his friends.  He is seriously missing his chief playmate, though is actually learning how to use the wii so he can play too.  

I think most of all I am feeling pretty darn lucky.  We have a boy who was seriously hurt, but will heal quickly and fairly easily.  We have family that take care of us and give us constant prayers, smiles and support.  We have friends that care so much.  It's easy to become frustrated at all this will entail for us - going from a pretty independent kid to one that needs a whole lot of help with basic day to day functions.  But, we are lucky.  He's off the heavy meds, at a pain level 0 (unless I try to move his arm at all), and laughing again.  We're lucky.