Cheerio, crib!

BOOM! Then that eerie silence that parents dread. I had just put Caden down for a nap in his crib and was talking to The Tank in the living room before the stomach-churning boom rocked the floors. I ran down the hallway into Caden's bedroom and found him on his hands and knees on the hardwood floor, trying to get up but paralyzed by a silent scream. Then he reached up to me and the scream found the vocal cords. Oh the look on his face was awful! I hugged and hugged him, thankful that there was no bleeding. He has never even thrown a leg over the side of his crib much less tried to escape from it. Still, I was overwhelmed with guilt for not foreseeing this accident. I held Caden to me until he calmed down and was able to fall back to sleep - on his new toddler bed.

As soon as naptime was over, the crib came down. No time for goodbyes, no sentimentality. Just remove the toddler catapulter from the room, please. My sweet boy had a very swollen eye and a knot on his forehead. Clearly he had fallen on his head. The next couple days he developed quite the shiner. I was embarrassed to take Caden out in public with such evidence of my maternal inadequacies on his beautiful face. The Tank mentioned one night that he wanted to visit his parents with Caden and I asked "Are you crazy? Your mother can't see him looking like that!!!" And here is one of those confounding differences between men and women. The Tank was proud of Caden's "badge of courage". To him, it showed that Caden was smart and strong enough to escape. High five! But in my mind, no nearly-3-year-old should have a black eye. Here he is 3 days out, on the mend:


And now that it's behind us, as pathetic as it sounds, I miss the crib. I have visited its remains piled up in the basement. Such solid proof that my boy was once my baby, dismantled with no thanks or glory. I bid you adieu, crib of Caden.