Saturday, August 14, 2010

Misadventures of Babysitting


Before reading...ask yourself, what could these tools be used for? Got an idea??? Okay, finish reading then!



I was given the opportunity of a lifetime...an entire evening with my baby girl! I jumped at the opportunity and then quickly realized, I wouldn't be able to sleep in Friday morning (hey, summer is winding down and I love my sleep in days).

After having the baby with me at my house to get items needed for the evening as well as meeting with another gentleman looking at my windows to give me a quote, I took the baby to the grocery store, picked up my items and headed to their house. She had fallen asleep in the car seat, so I just set her down in her room and made dinner while she cat napped.

The evening passed uneventfully. Dinner time, bath time, and play time. I finally gave her her evening bottle and off to bed she went. I shut the door and headed out to chill until it was my time to fall asleep. I had heard about the meteor shower, so I headed out to watch for some. I did see a few, but the thought of sleep was overpowering the urge to watch meteors, so I headed in and settled down on the couch around 10:30.

Two hours later, I heard her crying in the night. I headed to her room to put her pacifier back into her mouth and discovered the problem. I couldn't open the door. It was locked. I quickly woke up and tried not to panic. I had jiggled the handle just to make sure and then went looking for something to poke the lock out...thankfully I am familiar with the pop in and out locks. I found a toothpick and attempted it. Nothing...apparently those aren't strong enough.

With my stomach feeling like I was about to throw up, I called her mom and again, trying to not panic, explained the situation as calmly as possible. She told me that there was a key above the trim on the doors. I slid my hand along every door...nothing.

With my stomach becoming a roller coaster, she was going to call the neighbors and I was going to head to the garage to look for tools. My baby girl was crying even louder at this point. She heard the door trying to be opened, but no one was coming for her. I don't think I can even put into words how horrible I felt listening to her cry and knowing I couldn't get in there yet.

I raced back into the garage and found a long plastic thin tool and headed back to the door. Still nothing. Back into the garage I went and grabbed three different tools, hoping that just one of them might work.

I pushed one of the tools into the lock and heard the pop...I pushed the door wide open and went to hold the baby. As soon as she was calm, I called the mom again.

I waited a while before I laid her back down to sleep, put on her mobile, made sure the door was unlocked and headed back out to the couch. It definitely took a while for me to fall asleep again...and when she did awake at 6:30 for the day, it made for a very long day.

I'm glad it all worked out and I am inferring that the doorknob had become locked when we had been in the room earlier that night packing her bag. She had held onto the door as she was standing and if the door pushes all the way back into her closet doors, the lock will engage.

Lesson learned...always check the doorknob before closing it.

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