one down, many more to come...i'm sure.

It was a not-so-good afternoon today. If you've got kids, you know the kind I'm talking about. Let's just say the minute Lance walked in the door, this mama had to take a timeout and head to the store for some excedrin migraine (always does the trick, by the way).

I'll spare you the details because well, who wants to read about toddler mayhem and sassy attitudes, but I will share with you my Public Service Announcement for 2011.

Goes something like this...

Exhibit A Yes, this little guy gave us {actually, gave NOONIE} quite a scare yesterday.

Noonie was watching Hudson after Mother's Day Out like she does every Thursday while I'm at the office. She was washing some dishes in the sink and Hudson was playing. Next minute, she looks back and sees him leaning over the kitchen island foaming at the mouth.

Now, here's the part where I'm so glad she was the one with him because she's a physician, a pediatrician at that, and knew exactly what to do, and me, well I'm sure I would have freaked out at the mere sight of my little boy foaming at the mouth. In fact as she was telling me what happened over the phone, my mind immediately jumped to 'he's having a seizure, but why is he standing up?'. Thank you Jesus that Noonie was with Hudson!

Here's what happened. Hudson likes to climb. Anything. The boy has no fear. At all whatsoever. He climbed on Grace's school chair, onto her little school table, leaned over the side of our kitchen island, took out the Alka Seltzer that was part of the little pumpkin's rocket experiment (from preK) and started chewing it.

Of course, it immediately started fizzing and foaming as alka seltzers do. Now here's the part that's so scary to me (and yes, I feel 1,000% guilty for leaving the alka seltzer in the rocket tube on the kitchen island. although I had no clue he could reach there).

So as Noonie is telling me what happened my mind starts turning and I'm thinking "oh my goodness, he could have choked because of the size/shape of the alka seltzer" - even though it was broken in half. But NO, that's not even the scariest part. Noonie told me itty bitties can have breathing problems from the foam of an alka seltzer, because sometimes they don't know how to handle it and it can foam up really fast. Nevermind that alka seltzers contain aspirin and are contraindicated in children under 12.

Oh my, my heart sank. I had no idea those things could pose such a threat to little ones.

Thank goodness Noonie was able to remove the yet unchewed pieces, clean the inside of his mouth all over, get rid of the foam quickly, and do everything else needed to keep my little guy safe. Thank you, Noonie! Thank you God that my little Hudson is okay!

So, if you've got a little monkey like I do, please be extra careful where you store any type of medicine... especially the ones you don't think about.
You can never be too careful.