The great Desitin caper

Everyone has that story from when they were a little kid that relatives and friends retell into adulthood. It involves an ornery three-, four- or five-year-old smearing [insert your favorite sticky substance here] all over the floor/walls/couch and creating a disaster zone of permanent stains.

My particular story from my childhood involved ketchup and Italian dressing, but I was mostly an accomplice. I had always wondered when one of my children would have their epic moment, and I think it happened last night.

We had a babysitter so L and I could go hear Greg Mortenson (as in, Three Cups of Tea) give a talk and then solve the problems of the world over dinner with friends. This particular sitter has been here before, she's a college student, and we were very confident. We were at dinner at about 8:15 when the cell phone rang, and it was the dreaded call from the babysitter. I braced for having to ditch the restaurant for the emergency room as I answered the phone. Luckily, what she had to say ended up making for great dinner fodder, and very little harm was done.

She had put Jellybean to bed after Peanut was asleep. Things seemed to be going well, but the sitter heard Jellybean talking animatedly on the monitor. She opened the door to Jellybean's room, and Jellybean announced to her, "My hands are dirty." What Jellybean failed to mention, and luckily the sitter turned on the light to discover, was that it wasn't just her hands that were dirty. It was her face, her hair, her pajamas, her bear, her sheet, her comforter and her wall that were dirty. All covered with Desitin.

In case you're not familiar with Desitin, it is used to prevent diaper rash on kids. Put it this way: When you were at that pool party and you wore your wet swim suit/trunks all day and got all chafed, that wouldn't have happened if you had Desitin on.

So, the sitter was calling us at dinner to see if I thought Jellybean might have eaten the Desitin, since it was on her face. Jellybean wasn't sayin'. The sitter had read the label, and you're supposed to call Poison Control if you ingest Desitin. I felt pretty confident that eating Desitin wasn't something Jellybean would do, so I just told the sitter to keep an eye and ear out for the next hour until we got home, and to call me if anything strange happened.

We came home to a quiet house without further incident. The babysitter had cleaned Jellybean's face and hands, changed her pajamas and gave her new covers. She couldn't have handled it better -- and she even said she's willing to babysit again. Phew!

For the work we avoided on the front end of this, we made up for on the back end, this morning. I Googled stain removal with Desitin (wow, are there many a Desitin-ruined garment and couch out there) and proceeded into stain-removal mode. Because it is a water repellent, you have to treat the stains like you would grease or oil. I spent about 45 minutes doctoring the various surfaces and laundering things. The stains didn't come out completely, but now they're a lot less obvious. L got most of the Desitin off the wall, but you can still see a bit of residue.

The story from my childhood -- now known as the Great Ketchup Caper -- ended much worse, with my parents' neighbors having to replace their brand-new (as in, installed the day before) carpet. My parents offered to help pay for it, but the neighbors knew it was their own son who had inflicted the damage while I mostly served as witness.

I am hoping, though, that once word spreads about the Great Desitin Caper, maybe we can shelve the Ketchup Caper story once and for all. I'm tired of hearing it.