Taking your child's temperature

That nasty flu bug that's been circulating around the nation hit our town a week or so ago, and my two-year-old caught it. When my husband handed her to me in the middle of the night, I could tell she was hot. It wasn't until the thermometer started beeping an alarm and showed 104.5 that I realized just how high her fever was.

Taking a young child's temperature is tricky. As unpleasant as it sounds, getting an accurate reading on kids under two or three is easiest with a rectal thermometer. But once they get older, there are literally dozens of models of thermometers to choose from. I've used an ear thermometer, but couldn't get an accurate reading, and now I use a temporal artery thermometer. It works, but it's finicky. The night my daughter came down with the flu, I wrapped her in a blanket and took her out into the cool air to work her fever down until the medication took affect. After that, I couldn't get an accurate reading because her skin was cool, but I knew her fever was still high.

It's times like these that I look forward to the day when I can just stick a thermometer under their tongues and get an answer. What do you use to check your young child's temperature?