it's all fun and games until...

...someone gets their eye poked out.

That saying has taken on a whole new reality at our house.  Curious?  Here's the whole story:

Time: noon yesterday
Location: our house

We had just finished having lunch and I was getting ready to put Millie and Tate down for their naps.  But they were having so much fun playing together so I thought, "Well, I'll just take advantage of this time to upload a few pictures to my blog..." (which then never happened, but you'll see that post tomorrow).  They were running around in the kitchen and laughing like crazy.  I was basking in the sound of them playing so well together.

Then, suddenly, Tate's laughter turned into a scream.  And Millie cries, "Mommy, Tate fell on Odie's kennel and I didn't mean to!"

I ran in right away and picked Tate up, only to see that blood had filled his eye.  I couldn't even see his eyeball, there was so much blood and it was beginning to pour out.  My first thought was that he has lost his sight.  Through the blood I could see he was trying to look at me and couldn't get his eye to focus.  He was scared.  I was scared.  Millie was feeling awful.

The only thing I could think to do was call 911.  We live 30 minutes from the nearest ER, but I knew the paramedics could be here in just a few minutes.  The 911 lady was so great.  She could tell I was breaking down and she talked me through everything.

Within a few minutes, a detective was at our house.  He was in the area and heard the call on the dispatcher, so he came over to make sure we were okay.  He was very friendly and tried to help calm us all down.  Although he frightened Millie to death.  She still thought it was her fault, although I had told her over and over again that it was just an accident.  It was really mommy's fault for leaving Odie's kennel open.

See that long part of his "door" sticking up?  That's what he fell on.  Yikes.

In another minute, the paramedics were here and they were checking out Tate's eye.  They concluded that the important part of his eye (the iris and such) was okay, but there was definitely a cut on his inner eyelid and possibly back farther on his eyeball.  At this time, however, the bleeding had stopped, so that was a good sign.  They offered to take him by ambulance to the ER, but said I could choose to drive him if I'd rather and if I was in the right state of mind to do it.  I don't think I was probably in the right state of mind, but I opted to drive since I knew it would save us a bundle, and at least his vision wasn't in peril anymore.

On the way to the ER, I tried frantically to get ahold of Chad.  You see, he doesn't have a cell phone (I know... WHAT?!?) and he wasn't teaching like usual yesterday, he was attending some class off site and I couldn't remember where.  So, after calling his school's secretary, she was kind enough to take charge of tracking him down.  Which, I guess, took several phone calls and emails all over the place.

At the ER (Chad did eventually get there after a little while), we were so relieved to find out that he had only cut the inside of his eyelid, and his eyeball was unharmed.  Needless to say, we were praising God for that!  Just a centimeter difference and it could've been a much sadder story.

We did finally get Millie to realize that it wasn't her fault at all.  They were just having fun and playing, and that's good, not bad.   So she's fine now too.  :)

And this little guy...

 Well, he might look kinda funny...

But he's definitely back to his ol' self!

Thank you, Lord, for watching out for our son.

And on this Good Friday, may you all take time to reflect on the sacrifice that Christ made for us.  If you're looking for a great service to commemorate his death, come to our church tonight!  I'd love to see you there!  :)