The most recent event started when I decided to see a movie Sunday afternoon with some girlfriends. I made the plan two weeks ago, not remembering that Jeff would be covering a golf tournament through Sunday evening.
I sent an email to my girlfriends and told them that I had screwed up the dates and wouldn't get to go. One of my friends volunteered her husband to babysit Biscuit. To her face, I said, "Okay, let me think about it." But in my head, I thought, "There is no way I'm going to leave my split-personality 2-year-old with this man, not knowing what mood Biscuit would be in or how he would act without me there. This unsuspecting guy doesn't have kids of his own yet, and I didn't want my son affecting that decision!"
But alas, my friend wore me down, and I consented to let her husband babysit Biscuit.
To make sure Biscuit and this guy were comfortable with each other, we devised a plan where they would come over Saturday evening and bring pizza. If anything will get on the good side of my son, it's somebody bringing him pizza.
Before they arrived, I was folding laundry on my bed, and I turned on the TV so Biscuit could watch cartoons in there with me. The show he watched was about a duck, turtle and guinea pig who go around the world saving other animals. The animal in trouble that afternoon was a baby kangaroo, which they later learned is called a "joey."
My friend and her husband arrived, and Biscuit saw the pizza box and got excited. I told him to say thank you for the pizza. He looked at my friend's husband and said, "Thank you for the pizza, Joey."
"No. His name isn't Joey," I told Biscuit. "Joeys are baby kangaroos, remember?"
That wasn't the only time, either. He called him "Joey" three or four more times. But the point was that they got reacquainted, and I felt better about leaving them together on Sunday.
The plan for the outing was to leave my house at 1 p.m. to go meet my girlfriends for lunch, then head to the theater for the movie. My plan at home was to have Biscuit down for his nap by 12:45, then when the babysitter arrived, Biscuit would be already be asleep. He usually naps for at least a couple of hours on the weekend, so there wouldn't be a whole lot for the babysitter to do until about 3 o'clock.
Have you ever heard that saying about how the quickest way to make God laugh is to tell him your plans for your life? Well, that goes for raising a toddler, too.
Biscuit just would not go to sleep. I had him all tucked into my bed. I put a long pillow beside him (so he wouldn't roll off the bed), we had counted the covers (sheet = 1, blanket = 2, comforter = 3), I had given him a kiss, and he was ready to go. Except that he wouldn't close his eyes.
I don't know if he sensed that I had I was anxious or what, but finally, he said, "I go to sleep in my big boy bed?" I tried to convince him to stay where he was, but there was nothing doing.
We went upstairs, went through the whole routine again, and he was all tucked in and ready for naptime. And then my friends arrived. He heard their voices as they came in the house and jumped out of bed. It was a couple of minutes before 1 p.m., and I was flustered. I didn't know whether to call the whole thing off or just leave or skip lunch and join them for the movie.
Finally, I said, "Biscuit, do you want to watch TV in my bed?" He said yes in a very excited way and headed downstairs. I tucked him into my bed ... again ... and turned on the TV. Then I walked back into the living room and told the babysitter just to leave him in there by himself. "He will either go to sleep or get bored and come looking for you," I told him.
Lunch was great. The movie was great. And I arrived home to the babysitter and Biscuit playing in the living room. There appeared to be no blood shed, and the fact that the babysitter hadn't run screaming from the house was a good sign.
Let me say right here that the babysitter did everything right. He did exactly what I asked him to do.
But ...
By the time Biscuit finally went to sleep, he crashed hard and slept way longer than he usually does. That meant that instead of waking up at 3 p.m. and having lunch, he woke up at 5:15 and had lunch at 5:30. So to recap, Biscuit went to sleep at least an hour and a half later than his usual nap time, and he slept longer than he usually does. Dinner at 7? Um, no. Usual bed time? Um, no.
Jeff got home from the golf tournament that evening, and I got distracted catching up with him and didn't realize until 10 o'clock ... "Oh, shoot! Biscuit hasn't had a bath." Jeff was off the next day, so he said he would give him a bath that next morning. I dreaded having to rush to get everything done the next morning, but at that point, it was just too late for bath time, so we put Biscuit to bed.
Biscuit was in a glorious mood the next morning. And I say that with all of the sarcasm available. He was whiny. He was grumpy. He was just in an all-around bad state of mind. I felt bad for him because he was just completely out of sorts. I told Jeff to get Biscuit undressed, and he could just jump in the shower with me, but Biscuit was having none of that.
"I need a bath, Mom. I don't want a shower. I need a bath. Not a shower. A bath," Biscuit whined.
I was in no mood to put up a fight, so I gave in to the bath. I told him that he couldn't play with any of his bath toys because he were in a hurry. Luckily, he didn't fight me on that.
I was trying to do a really quick wash job on him, and as I was washing his chest, Biscuit looked down at my hand. My index finger on my left hand raked right up his chin, taking with it a chunk of skin.
I had a chunk of my baby son's skin UNDER MY FINGERNAIL!
It took a second for him to realize that I had hurt him, but the wailing that came next just ripped my heart out. I felt so bad. Biscuit was crying. I was crying. Biscuit was bleeding. I was trying to soothe him.
After I realized that he wasn't going to bleed to death, I quickly finished washing the rest of him. I put medicine on it and apologized to him at least 50 times. He was so sweet. He kept saying, "That's okay, Mom. It was an accident." And the fact that he said it was okay somehow made me feel even worse.
By the time Biscuit came home from day care yesterday evening, things were pretty much back to normal. He put on his red cowboy hat and ran around the house saying, "Howdy, pardner. I'm cowboy Biscuit. This is my horse, Pinto."
I'm glad I had an afternoon out. And I really appreciate Joey for babysitting. But it'll have to be a pretty special movie to get me out of the house like that again ... for at least a little while.
Here's the damage I did to Biscuit's chin:
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