Train in the Drain

This past weekend was filled to the max, with a Mother's Day dinner on Friday at my brothers, to a 5k race with my mom Saturday morning, to visiting the Powell family and meeting new little Haley, and finally a friend party (we didn't make it to, as you will soon find out why.) Let's just say it was a fun filled weekend, with an unexpected twist that threw a small wrench in our last planned activity for the day. Everything went as planned, however, after a few hours at the Powell's we were suddenly faced with a possible tragedy, a forever lost train! As many of you know Carson is absolutely in love with trains, and he happened to have one with us on Saturday, that met a fate that looked grim. As the adults were sitting around talking and the kids play outside, Carson came up to us distraught, exclaiming "train, water, train, water." It took us a few seconds to realize what had happened, Carson had dropped his prized train down the storm drain. After a few minutes we decided the men had to at least attempt to retrieve the train, otherwise it would have been a horrible experience for Carson for a few days having to leave his precious toy in the storm drain and not fully comprehending why we had to leave it behind. Robert and Doug first attempted for about 45 minutes to retrieve the train using a paper clip attached to a hose with a string attached to help guide the hose to the train, unfortunately that was not successful. In the meantime, a neighbor of Shauna and Doug's began to look through his gadgets to figure out something that would be more stable and help retrieve the train. In the meantime Carson started getting a little more worried that the train would have to stay down the drain, he would run from the storm drain to where Shauna and I were sitting and visiting say, "Train, Train, Train, " poor little boy. It was becoming more apparent that we needed to try everything we could to retrieve this train. Finally the men decided to try to open the storm drain to retrieve the train, so with a shovel, a crowbar, and muscles the men were able to pry open the grate and give themselves more to work with. The neighbor had also taken apart two broom handles and taped them together to make a long pole, which came in handy once the grate was removed. Finally after probably about an hour and half at least we finally succeeded in retrieving the train, and boy were all of us glad we were able to retrieve it. I am sure many parents have had similar situations which didn't turn out so great, so we were very grateful of the outcome. Needless to say after all was said and done, we ended up missing the friend party, which was a bummer, but I am so glad the train is clean and safe and sound, I am not sure I would have liked Carson's reaction for a few days if the outcome had been different.

Unfortunately, as it sometimes goes you forget you have a camera, so no documentation of the train actually in the drain, but it was. 

 A closeup as the train is being carefully raised out of the storm drain. 

Carson's 3 heroes for the day! Daddy, the neighbor, and Uncle Doug!