This week our Story Dam prompt was “Where is it?”. We were asked to write about something we or our characters had misplaced. My take on it is a true story that happened in our family, I just changed the names to go along with the characters I’m using in a bigger piece.
Tiny Shoes
“You’re kidding, right?” Carly asked.
For a good hour or so she and her friend Mary had been searching for her younger sister Lucy’s doll shoe. This one was tiny, made to fit even tinier feet. You would think that since it was bright pink it would have been easier to spot. Not this one, it seemed to have vanished.
Lucy always sat quietly in the same spot at the coffee table playing. She liked it there because the table seemed to be just her size, the same reason she liked playing with the tinier dolls. Both the perfect size for her small 3 year old hands.
But today she had her sister Carly searching everywhere for one of the missing shoes. Carly knew that if Lucy were to get out the little box Lucy stored them in later and realized it was missing, that her sweet little sister would turn into Toddler-zilla.
Trying not to alarm Lucy of the missing shoe, she searched the living room quietly with the help of Mary. They removed the cushions from the couch, turned over the chair, and had been on their hands and knees looking under everything it may have slid under. The shoe was nowhere to be found.
Lucy had even entered the room a couple of times and had even asked what new game they were playing was. Both girls telling her they were just tiding up the room before their parents returned home. Carly knew if she told her the truth there was no way she’d be able to calm her down and have her distracted by something else before they got back.
After finally giving up and hoping they could get the shoe replaced with a new one before Lucy discovered it had been gone, the girls sat there recalling the last time this happened. The tears, the sobs, and lastly the late night trip to the store Carly’s dad made so Lucy would quit crying and go to sleep.
Finally deciding to let Lucy in on the problem, in hopes that she might know where the shoe was, they asked her where it might be.
“Lucy, did you put the dolls shoe somewhere, maybe hide it from the dog again?” Carly asked, bracing herself for the fit she was about to witness.
“I ate it” Lucy replied matter-of-factly.
“You did WHAT?” asked Mary while Carly stood there shaking her head.
“You’re kidding right?” Carly asked, thinking she was joking.
‘Nope, I ate it” Lucy said with a little giggle.
‘Why did you eat it?” both girls asked unison.
“Because I wanted to” Lucy giggled, turned around and went to her room.
Carly stood there looking at Mary about to burst into laughter when her parents came walking in from the kitchen.
Lucy came running in the room when she heard her parent’s voices.
“Hey there Pumpkin, what did you this afternoon?” their Dad asked grinning from ear to ear.
“I ate a shoe” Lucy replied matter-of-factly.
Their Dad’s grinning face quickly changing to a look of confusion “You’re kidding right?”
Hugging him and giggling Lucy replied “Nope, I ate a shoe”
So like a little sister to do that. As a little sis, I have been known to do things to actively aggravate my older sibling.
Tara, I’m the oldest of 5 girls, I know a lot about those things too 😉 LOL!
I LOVED “I ate it”. I felt like the buildup to that moment was very well done, especially the frantic search and the eventual resolve to just ask. The humor was such a contrast that I had to chuckle. I kind of felt like the story didn’t need any more after that, just Mary and Carly looking at each other. But I did like “What did you do?” “I ate a shoe”, and I’d hate to lose that. Fun piece.
Thanks Jessie, I based this on our youngest daughter doing this exact thing. Only in real life it was me and my friend looking for that darn shoe. Her only reply when we asked her where it was after an hour of looking was “I ate it”. Priceless. I only wish we’d have had a video camera recording it 😉
Great story, Brandi! I love how protective Carly is of her little sister. I ate a crayon when I was Lucy’s age, but only because my older sister told me the brown ones taste like Tootsie Rolls!! The big meanie lied to me. They totally don’t! 😛 LOL
LOL!!! That’s funny!
My friend’s little daughter ate a hair clip a while ago. She was really scared but apparently nothing happened and the thing was just passed. 😉
I’m not sure what a doll shoe would do to you but I suppose it will just come out again a while later.
Hi Satu! We still don’t know what possessed her to eat it, I’m glad it was only the shoe and not something else 😉
And a hair clip? ouch!
Great story! “I ate it.” Kids are so honest at that stage! Seriously, you have so many great stories, I love reading them. Totally understand the desire to do anything to avoid the toddler meltdown. We are in the thick of that every day here 🙂
Thanks Caroline, when Brandon and I first thought about this prompt I was going to do one about my phone, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked for it only to find it in my coat pocket or purse…you know just where I should have looked in the first place, LOL!
But then I remembered the shoe and and was going write a regular blog post on it anyway, so I just worked it into our prompt last week. Lexie’s response was priceless, no explanation, nothing, just “I ate it” 😉
And thanks for reading about all our craziness, I only wish I had written down more of some of the stuff back then to share. we’d definitely have a few books worth by now.