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Sunday, October 5, 2008
The case of the missing blanket
It’s fantastic when kids have items that help them self-soothe, but it’s terrible when you lose those special things!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I knew it would happen one day and when it did, we would be in deep trouble.
Sooner or later, we were going to lose our baby’s favorite possession in the entire world — her pink satin blanket. It travels everywhere with us and at some point, just based on sheer odds; it was going to be left behind.
My aunt sent her the blanket a few weeks after she was born, and it is rarely out of her sight for long. It’s pink silky satin on one side and soft micro fleece on the other. It has a 1-inch silk ruffle that runs around the edges.
She has a very specific way to hold the blanket. She gathers the blanket over several times so she can feel the soft fleecy part in her palm and then rubs the tips of her fingers over the silky ruffle. At the same time she pops the thumb of that hand into her mouth. It is the most precious thing in the world to see and makes her so content!
(I’m sure I’m going to get attacked for letting my baby suck her thumb, but people she is my only baby that has been a thumb sucker or had a special comfort lovey, and she is the happiest baby I’ve ever had. She self-soothes, puts herself to sleep and is very content. She’ll give it up when she is ready, and I’m not worried about it.)
Because the blanket gets carried all around the house, it is a normal state of affair to be searching for it. I even posted one night on my Facebook status: Theresa is “searching for the baby’s blanket so she can finally go to sleep.” Another mom friend commented online that she too is constantly looking for her baby’s blanket and hoped I found it soon.
We’ve had many scares before when we thought the blanket was lost, but this was the real thing. It wasn’t in the office behind the desk. It wasn’t under the dining room parsons chairs. It wasn’t in my diaper bag. It wasn’t shoved into the big blue couch.
And worst of all, it wasn’t in my van. I searched the front seat, the middle aisle, and even the back hull. I took out the stroller and pushed the seats up. No blanket.
As I searched the van, I started flashing to all the places we’d been the day — the park, Mimi’s house, the post office. I had taken the dog with us to the park. I was so scattered cleaning up the dog’s poop in the park that maybe I missed the blanket falling out of the stroller onto the track. I didn’t remember loading the blanket into the car after our walk. I had visions of mini-vans rolling over my sweet baby’s blankie all day long. We had to get to the park right away.
Even though it was way passed nap time, I took her out of her crib and loaded her into the car. We drove back to the track. I searched under parked cars and asked a few walkers if they had seen a pink baby’s blanket. Finally I put the baby in her stroller to search the mile track. (We had already done three miles that day. Plus, I didn’t even have on my tennis shoes, just sandals that rubbed.)
We asked everyone we passed if they had seen the blanket. A man on skates circled the track quickly for me and told he didn’t find it. By about the half-mile mark, I started to think maybe I did load it back into the car. I had a vague recollection of the baby carrying it into my mom’s house. We didn’t think about leaving the baby blanket when we left my mom’s house because she gave us a bunch of fancy purses that the baby carried out.
I finished the mile and drove back to my mother’s. I ran into the house. The blanket was lying on the floor of the children’s playroom - safe and sound.
The baby was so happy to have her blanket back. During the two-mile drive home, she caressed her favorite blanket and fell asleep with her thumb in her mouth. All was right with the world.
Epilogue: I am now currently in search of a second blanket for the road so we can leave the good one safely in her crib.
You can reach Theresa at ajcmomania@gmail.com. Ideas are welcome!
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