The Elevator

Travelling with children isn't exactly easy...but I have learned that there is a magical age (somewhere between 3 and 4) where kids become great travellers. Both Lydia and Claire are pretty easy - they're entertained easily in the car, they can get themselves in & out and buckled, they drag their own suitcases around, and can follow instructions...mostly.

Scarlett, however, is so much trouble that she cancels out all the good that her sisters do.

Case in point: The Elevator

We were checking out from our hotel room one morning, and as we pulled our luggage out to the hallway I told the girls to go wait by the elevator with their stuff. Josh was doing one last sweep through the room looking for anything left behind, when I hear both Lydia and Claire yelling and crying. I figured they were fighting over who pushes the button and then started hitting eachother or something. The usual. So I stomped down the hallway ready to scold them, and when I get there both of my sweet girls look up at me, red faced and tear-streaked, and say "Scarlett got on the elevator" ..."she's gone".. "we couldn't stop her"

I had a lot of mixed emotions through this scenario. First, I was so touched by how much Lydia and Claire feared for their sister's safety. They loved her. Then, I laughed a little, because I pictured Scarlett, holding her Dora pillow, going into the elevator to press every single button she could reach. Thirdly...I began to panic...especially when the elevator returned empty.

I took the elevator down to the lobby, and she wasn't there. I went around the breakfast area, out the front doors..nothing. I asked the front desk if they'd seen a baby with a Dora pillow...and they hadn't. Then what impressed me about the hotel staff is that they took this seriously. Thank you Hilton. They scanned all their security cameras and couldn't see her...on any floor. So then the manager gave me a walkie-talkie (do they still call them that?) and she and one other gal went to personally search each level and I went back to the rest of my family to search our floor. Finally the front desk notified us that she showed up on the security camera on the 3rd floor, just walking around clutching her pillow, and so the manager got to her and sat with her until I was able to get there.

Scarlett was absolutely fine. She wasn't even crying. She must have really enjoyed the freedom, and wasn't worried that her parents weren't around. That's what scares me the most.