Craziest.afternoon.EVER

Oh you guys. I was planning to write about Veronica's turning 3 months old. But this afternoon was insane and I need to share.

My parents came to visit today. I generally try to get a whole bunch more done with the extra hands around, and my Mom loves to clean. These points are salient in today's tale. Also important - the fact that we have an alarm system. And a house built in 1967.

Over the holidays, we've asked the youngest daughter of Teddy's babysitter to look after our cats. To make it easier on her, we wanted to add a special code to our alarm system. The system we have is the same as the one we had in my childhood home, so I figured that my Dad would know how to set it up.

So - my Dad and I begin trying to add the new alarm code. And somehow - we manage to screw up the master code and arm the alarm. As such - we are trapped in the house with the alarm on and we cannot turn it off.

We call our alarm guy, who happens to live around the corner AND is the son of them woman from whom we purchased the house. He attempts to fix the problem remotely, but to no avail. He realizes that he has to come over to fix it, and that the alarm siren will have to go until he deactivates it.

While I am on the phone with Ken (alarm guy), my Mom and Teddy are upstairs, swiffering. He poops, and my Mom gets ready to change him. But before she can, she turns her back after they exit the guest room, and Teddy closes the door, locking her out. And the door would not open. It's an original door from the house, and it stuck when Dave's mom was here. It has no screws so there is no way to remove it.

To recap:

- trapped in the house by the alarm, with a siren about to blare; and
- Teddy trapped in the guest room, with the door stuck shut.

We tried and tried to get the door open. We tried to get the 22 month old to open the door -- he kept trying to turn the knob, but it wouldn't turn. He would touch my fingers, which I'd slipped under the door, and say "Mama???", then would play with the door stop. He wasn't thrilled - he was in a poopy diaper, after all, and trapped. But he did ok.

Then - Ken arrived and the alarm went off. It scared the heck out of poor Veronica (not to mention the cats), who started bawling. Teddy started whimpering on the other side of the door. And I realized that I'd have to break the door down.

I started throwing myself against the door, to no avail. I kept telling Teddy to back away from the door, just so he wouldn't get hit. And, after about 8 tries, I managed to unstick it. Poor Teddy was struck as it opened, but not too hard. I detached the plate and cracked the door casing, but my toddler was free.

And Ken managed to fix the alarm; it took a few minutes, but we figured it out and reprogrammed it. The baby stopped crying and the diaper got changed.

But oh! What a few minutes!