Priceless Memories

My mom has a handful of stories that she'll bring up now and again to remind me about my childhood. Stories like "Neck in the Pain," Climbing the toy shelf, and getting "Dressed"--literally--by my older sisters have been shared many times. I'm starting to collect my own set of stories for my own children. I'm sure Anna will come to dislike the one-day-to-be-famous story of the Red Hots.

On our way home from the Castleton's one afternoon, I found myself munching on some left over Valentine's Day candy. Anna, who was about a year-and-a-half old at the time, had a clear view of what I was doing and soon we heard her asking for some red hots. I figured I'd give her one to keep her pleasant during the drive home. A few minutes after I gave her the red hot, we heard her begin to cry. She seemed to be quite uncomfortable. Becky asked me if I gave her anything, so I told her about the red hot. She immediately discovered that Anna had inserted the red hot I gave her into her nose. By this point it was too far up to retrieve, and as anyone can imagine quite bothersome especially for a small child. Becky tried to encourage Anna to blow it out her nose, but was unsuccessful. The crying continued. For whatever reason Becky figured that another piece of candy would calm Anna down so we gave her a conversation heart to try. It worked like a charm. In fact, it worked so well that she began to laugh--perhaps being overcome with joy. As luck would have it the laughter actually produced enough force to send the red hot flying out of Anna's nose. Hooray. One less thing to worry about. Anna couldn't have been more pleased at that point. She grabbed the newly freed red hot and this time put it right in her mouth. At least it wasn't back in her nose.