The story of Ernie...

I have to take a moment to write a bit about our experience this past weekend with Will's friend, Ernie. It was one of my moments that I realized that I can't control everything and Chad reminded me that the world is not ending.

Will & Ernie getting ready to leave

Here's what happened...

Before Will leaves to go out the door he has his routine of getting Ernie, sitting on the bench, putting his shoes on, putting his sweatshirt on, and then stands by the door. He's got it down! We went for a walk around 1:30pm on Sunday, after we returned home from Vienna and Will was a bit sleepy. We walked about 15 minutes and realized Will was nodding off to sleep, so we headed back to the flat so he could sleep in his bed. Chad went to get the laundry and I carried the little guy up to his bed.

Fast forward to 6:30pm...

We decided to go for another walk because it was such a nice day and our first one was a bit short. Will's "going for a walk" ritual began with me stating, "go get Ernie." Will looked for him, I looked around for him, and then I realized that when I carried Will upstairs earlier that afternoon, I didn't carry up Ernie. Oh no, where was Ernie? My brain quickly realized that Ernie was lost somewhere on our first walk. When Will fell asleep he probably let go of his little friend and he was somewhere on the side walk alone for the last 4 hours. Ernie was fair game for another child to take, for a dog to use as a chew toy, or for some random person just to kick up and down the street. I was devastated (and said a quick prayer to St. Anthony)...Chad was rational...Will just wanted to go for a walk.

We quickly went got Will in his pusher and headed to retrace our steps from earlier that afternoon. I was about 15 steps ahead of Chad and Will and turned the corner out of the driveway to see a glimpse of orange near a tree. About 2 houses down someone leaned Ernie against the tree. There he was sitting comfortably waiting for his friend Will to return. Crisis averted! Thank God someone was kind enough to just place him where we could find him. It was one of those days that I was happy that we were living in Germany, because I'm not sure that in Milwaukee we would have been so lucky.