Quiet Toddler + Closed Doors = Big Mess

We were having a nice afternoon here at the Stockemer household. We had successfully had Claire's newborn and Melanie's 2-year pictures taken and were back home enjoying an afternoon of not having anywhere to go. I was reading the paper and Matt was downstairs floating between the computer and watching some basketball on TV. Melanie had just been upstairs and I had poured her a drink at her request, then she left to go back to playing in her playroom, OR SO I THOUGHT!

Matt came upstairs and asked where Melanie was, to which I responded that I thought she was down in her playroom.

Nope, Matt said.

First red flag - Melanie wasn't where we thought she was.

We listened and didn't hear her.

Second red flag - she was quiet.

So Matt went down the hall to look for her.

Third red flag - our bedroom door was shut.

Matt went in and when he came out this is what he had:
Melanie had found my mascara.

In the back of a drawer.

That was latched shut.

She had wiggled her skinny little arm into the tiny amount of space the latch allows the drawer to open and had fished around until she found my brush case in which I keep said mascara and extracted it. Mind you she passed over five make-up brushes to get to the slot that housed the mascara, so this was not an easy thing to find or get ahold of.

Melanie's face and shins were not the only things she decorated with my mascara. Her other victims included:

The bathroom floor

*Thank goodness for linoleum!*

And the carpet just inside our door,

She also got some mascara on the door, the pack 'n play, an oscillating fan, the faces of some bathroom drawers (wasn't the toothpaste last week enough?), a Dora book and the makeup brush you see at the bottom of the previous picture that she apparently used to dig mascara out with because it's caked in mascara now.

More spots than a leopard or is she just jealous of my freckles?

She actually succeeded in getting some on her eyelashes.

So I cleaned the messy girl and Matt set to work on the carpet. The winning cleaning product? A combination of oil-free eye-makeup remover, rubbing alcohol and OxyClean.

Today's lesson: Close doors and if your toddler is quiet, start looking!