Stairs

One of my biggest fears came true today ..

Madalyn has been begging me to clean out the pool, and I finally got to it today. We just had a good ol' time cleaning that thing out. She scrubbed it with the mop, while I hosed the sucker down. Alex just sat back and was amused by it all. Afterwards, Madi got her bathing suit on and I undressed Alex and put him in. Poor thing, screamed his head off. I think his family jewels took a shock to the cold water. I tried putting hot water from the kitchen sink in, to help take some of the edge off, but it really didn't help at all. I took him out and I must have pressed the "off" button because he was then content as could be.

I brought him in and started dinner. While the pizza was in the oven, I decided to sweep the kitchen floor. For those of you who have been to our home before, you know that we have stairs that go from the mud room upstairs to our kitchen. I have a baby gate there, and decided to take it down so I could finish sweeping the floor. The pizza was done, and I cut up Alex's slice into pieces for him to eat (which of course, he ate it all). After dinner, I could tell that he was ready for his second nap. So I took him out of his high chair, placed him on the floor, while I ran out on the deck to get his pacifier. As soon as I picked up the pacifier, I heard a loud commotion, followed by a shrill cry. I instantly ran inside to hear Madalyn tell me that Alex fell down the stairs. My heart hit the ground, as I started to run down the stairs. I honestly thought that I was going to find him dead, or severely hurt. I didn't see any blood as I was going down the stairs, but couldn't help but shake uncontrollably as I picked him up off the floor. I immediately started praying, asking God to please touch him, and for him to not be seriously injured. Once I got upstairs, I started to look all over his body. The only injury I could see was a knot on his forehead and eyebrow. As I sit here, I'm still baffled as to how he was not injured anymore than this. I held him for about an hour, gave him some Tylenol and tried putting a gel pack on his head. It wasn't long before he was back to himself, ready to play and eat.

Jason left early this morning for another business trip, and I was anxious about calling him to let him know what had happened. About 30 minutes after this happened, he called and I told him about Alex falling down the stairs. He could tell that I was still shaken up about it, and surprisingly didn't yell at me or lecture me about the gate. He said he knew I was upset about it, and that yelling wouldn't help anything. I'm just so thankful that nothing major happened, and that the Lord covered both Alex and I with His touch, love and strength.

The first thing we will be doing tomorrow is making a purchase at Wal-mart. Jason has asked me on numerous occasions to get the baby gate that swings open and close, rather than the one we have now which you have to put up and take down.

I've had anxiety attacks about someone forgetting to put the gate up and him falling down the stairs. I'm just really upset that it was me.