Hide and Seek Gone All Wrong. . .

This may be humorous now, but I assure you it was not at the time!!

It was naptime in our household, and I went upstairs to put JCT down. Elijah was already asleep, and Joshua was playing quietly downstairs. I use this time each day for a little alone time with my middle child. We talk about the morning, read a book or two, and sing a song or two. I was probably upstairs 15-20 minutes.

When I came down, Joshua was no where to be found. Now, sometimes he likes to hide from me, so this wasn't such a surprise to me. I played along, "Where, Oh, Where is my Joshua? I can't find him!" I looked in the usual places - no Joshua. I looked in some new places - no Joshua. I scaled every square centimeter of the downstairs - no Joshua. I started to get a little nervous, but I held it together. "Joshua, Joshua come out. . ." Nothing. Silence. I listened for laughter, movement, anything - and heard nothing but my heart beating wildly. I checked the back door - locked - whew! I checked the back porch door because we ate lunch out on the back porch - unlocked - sheer panic! We have a pond in our backyard! The doors are always, always bolted! How could I leave the door unlocked??? I looked outside, scanned the backyard - no Joshua. You can imagine the thoughts going through my head at this moment. . . What do I do? Call Erik? Call 911? I envisioned having the pond drained. . . Or, what if he ran around to the front of the house? He could have gotten hit by a car. . . Or, he could be wondering through the woods. . . lost. . . There could be snakes, poison ivy, or worse. . . I couldn't even go there, so I went back inside. I walked into the kitchen and decided to give it one more try except this time the sound of a frightened mother bear was evident in my voice, "JOSHUA, JOSHUA, IF YOU ARE IN HERE COME OUT RIGHT NOW!!!"

The door to the powder bath flung open. . . I literally fell to the ground. Slowly, ever so slowly, my little red-headed darling crawled out of the doorway. I think I scared him as much as he scared me. I'm certain he has never heard that kind of panic in my voice. At this point I was sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, and he crawled slowly toward me one baby step at a time. Like any scared half to death post-partally hormonal woman (don't you just love how I always have an excuse for my over-exaggerated emotions?), I had tears chasing each other down my cheeks. I grabbed Joshua and hugged him tightly. And, what proceeded could seriously have won an Oscar. If not an Oscar, it would have been the perfect ending to a Lifetime Original Drama or a Hallmark Special. It was high drama at its finest. I said something like this, "Do you see these tears? Look at me! Do you know why Mama is crying? Because I love you, Joshua. I. love. you. And, for a few minutes, I thought that I had lost you. I don't ever want to lose you, baby. Mama loves you! So much! So much! If I ever lost you, I would be sad forever. You could never be replaced. I love you, my Joshua, my baby!" As you can imagine, now he was in tears, too. The two most dramatic members of the family playing off one another. Mush.

Now, somehow I had forgotten during this whole ordeal that Joshua recently learned to switch hiding places when the seeker isn't looking. Sneaky little guy, scared his mama half to death!

But, the funny ending to this little tale happened about an hour later. . . Joshua comes running up to me. "Mommy, I gotta go to the bathroom." I said, "Okay, go ahead," wondering why in the world he was telling me this. He answered that question without my asking, "Now, if I go to the bathroom, promise you won't start crying again. Because I'll be right back. I'm just going to the bathroom. Don't be sad and cry."