The kids ran upstairs after bath time to finish their nightly pajama routine. Ian, who had run into his little brother’s room, gleefully yelled, “David! Your room is a mess! And there are LADYBUGS everywhere!”
Just what every mother wants to hear. Nashville currently is experiencing swarms of Asian lady beetles, but I was not prepared for the dozens of ladybugs hanging out in my son’s room.
I walked over to the window and started looking for cracks where the bugs might have entered the room. When I lifted the blinds, I noticed that the window was open. Let’s read that again — THE WINDOW IN MY TWO-YEAR-OLD SON’S ROOM WAS OPEN.
Frantically I started trying to decide if I should look for an intruder or call the police. I started to text my Dad, who had been visiting earlier that day, when Ian in his perfectly reasonably four-year-old way said, “David, did you open your window?”
“Mmm-hmm!” replied David, brightly.
Yes, my toddler had opened his window a few inches during naptime, while I obliviously listened on the monitor. Perhaps I had left the window unlocked the last time I aired out the house, but I’m suspicious that the chair he had pushed next to the window may have helped him reach the latch.
We never had this problem with my oldest son. You see, his windows have keyed locks on them, so little fingers can’t pry them open (Fire safety note — the keys are hanging right above the windows in case of an emergency!). We just never quite got around to adding keyed locks to David’s windows. Of course after the ladybug adventure, I taped up the latches temporarily and overnighted keyed window locks to our house.
I’m a lucky mom, you guys. I’m the mom whose kid didn’t fall out the window.
It’s so easy to childproof. It’s also so easy to forget. In our first house, we had toilet locks and TV locks and furniture anchored to the wall. When we moved, it was a few weeks before we reestablished safety protocols. Until the day Ian almost pulled his dresser over onto himself.
Lucky, blessed, fortunate — for whatever reason in God’s plan, I still have both my children.
So please remember, friends. Take a few minutes and make your house as safe as you can for your little ones. And for our brothers and sisters who aren’t as lucky — the ones who do see their children injured or worse through these all-too-common accidents — let’s have some grace. It could have been us. It could have been me.
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