Locked Out

Last night as I started preparing and setting out the lunches for today, I realized there were no dessert items. I cannot in good conscience pack a kids lunch without giving them a dessert. It just seems unAmerican or something. So even though I was tired and would rather go to bed, I decided to make cookies.

I turned the oven on, softened the butter and then the frustration began. I could not find this:

For those of you with a Houdini toddler in the house, you may know what this is. For the others, I will explain. This is a very powerful magnet that sits on the side of my microwave oven. It is used to open magnetic cabinet locks. These are the only locks I have never seen a kid break into-ever! This sweet little knob never leaves its home, except when the flour/sugar cabinet needs to be opened. Then it is allowed to momentarily makes it presence known on the cabinet front and is sent immediately back to its lovely home. So where in the world was it???

I glanced around the countertop, in the sink, on the floor-all of the obvious places it might have come to rest if it had been knocked off. I would be blaming a dear little boy, but he hadn't been around for 4 days. So I called in the search team. After questioning each one as to whether or not they had possibly forgotten where this lil' knob lived and inadvertantly given him a new home, I had them searching. I even had them check their bedrooms on the off chance that someone was holding lil' knob and walked off with him. Nope! No where to be found.

My oven was more than preheated. It was already baking, just didn't have anything to bake. Poor hubby. He was called in and aided in the search. He finally got out a knife. What was he going to do? Saw into my cabinet? I should have more faith in him. He managed to slip it between the door and the lock, after a bit of trouble, and magically open the door. I was elated! And wouldn't you know it. There on the inside of that door sat mr. totlock. He somehow jumped from the microwave to the inside of the cabinet, thus locking himself inside the very cupboard he was designed to open. I would have never found him if it hadn't been for my very smart husband.

The cookies were made. The lunches were saved. Some kids had a very good lunch today. I just might have to remove not only Mr. Totlock, but his locking counterpart.