Just because I don't ever want to forget...

It was summer 2005 and was about 90 degrees outside. Ella was one and half years old. I was getting ready to drop the kids the off at Hallmark for Roxanne to take them home. I had also planned to meet two new Body Shop Consultants on my team there, where we would car pool to a Girl's Night Out that they were going to observe.

So, I put all of my Body Shop stuff and all of the kids stuff in the car. I opened the garage, put Ella in the car and realized that I forgot something in the house. Since the garage was open and Ella wasn't buckled up yet, I didn't want her to run into the road (she was quite the runner) so I closed the car door, knowing that she would be safe in there. I came back inside to grab whatever it was that I needed and had Cole follow me outside. And I was right, Ella was safe in the car, she didn't run out into the road. But what I wasn't counting on was Ella locking the doors with the key inside the car! Ordinarily, I would have had a spare key, but I lost my keys a few days before that and was using my spare. So, there she was, running around the car, happy as could be. I tapped on the window, telling her to push the button, but at one and half years old, all she did was tap back and giggle. To make things even worse, she had the key in her hand and was tapping it on the window. I remember feeling so helpless and of course like the worse Mom in the world. I think I tried to coax her into somehow unlocking the door for 15 minutes. Now, remember, it's summertime, so she was getting warm in there without any windows down. I had been on the phone with everyone that I could think of and once I saw sweat coming down her face, I decided that my only choice was to call the fire department. I grabbed the phone book, called the nearest station, and no answer. So, I tried to next closest station. Once again, no answer. I was out of stations and had to call 911. This is when I felt myself starting to panic and cry. More sweat was pouring down her face and she was getting pretty red. Cole (at 4 years old) was starting to see that I was getting very worried, so he started getting upset. Then, I heard the sirens from the firetruck and thought to myself "are you kidding me, as if this isn't bad enough, they are on their way with sirens and lights!" Once they pulled up, neighbors came outside staring, cars were pulling over and I once again, stood there helpless with Cole.

About 5 firefighters jumped out of the truck and ran over to the car in the garage. I remember one of them waving at Ella and saying how cute she was, thank you to him for making me feel a little bit better. She was watching me out the back window. Two of them went to the front doors, and one to the back with their little door unlocker thingy and could not open the door. So, they grabbed a case out of the truck that had other tools to open doors. They tried again and had no luck. They started asking me about breaking the window and after seeing how hot Ella was, I told them to go ahead. But they grabbed a book and some other tools and finally opened one of the back doors. She was in there for almost an hour once they got her out. She was so hot and red and sweaty. They told me to take off her clothes to cool her down and so they could assess her and after a cup of water, she was fine. They packed up their stuff and left. And I made a couple of phone calls and stayed home for the night. Thanks Ella for making life anything but dull!!