take that, Hollister.

No. . .there's no baby yet.

Bill and I had a rather. . .comical. . .parenting situation last night that he asked I share with you. So while I'm in that hour and a half of my morning that I'm not laying down. . .I thought I would update.

So we're at the mall. A strange thing in itself, because rarely are the three of us home together and even then, we don't really want to go out. But we decided to brave the cold and get out of the house for awhile last night. And the majority of us were feeling well, so we did.

While cruising the mall, I gave Cole a bit of mini vanilla wafers to snack on. He, of course, tries to stuff 3 in his mouth at once and starts to gag. He managed to do his own finger sweep, got the cookies, but the gagging made him throw up just a tiny bit.

No big deal. I have wipes. I have disinfecting wipes, too. And I have the wipes that are baby-safe Purell sort of wipes. So we're set. We wipe, and continue on. In fact, I thought for a second not even to tell Bill what happened (he was in a store at the time) but I do. . .we give Cole that "what are we going to do with this kid" look, and keep walking.

Here's where I screw up:

I give Cole the bag of vanilla wafers again. And he continues snacking. And is pretty happy, I might add. Until he tries to do the same thing and stuff too many in his mouth. The gagging starts. We stop walking so I can bend down and check that he's not choking. He keeps gagging.

He spits out a big lump of chewed up cookies (still so gross) and I think we're done. He keeps gagging. He coughs, and in my hand he deposits a good amount of throw up. Awesome. I look at Bill and he shakes his head and goes for the wipes. . .

. . .But Cole stands up (as much as you can in a stroller) and starts to seriously throw up all over his coat, and pants, and shoes and my arms and the floor at the mall. He tries to reach out for me and Bill and we both stand back and let him finish.

It's then that we briefly look around the mall to see if we're making a scene. We are making a scene. People are walking by with terrible looks of disgust. . .one even holding their nose. Bill and I look at where we are. . .we're smack dab in the middle of the mall, in the entrance of Hollister. I look at the poor teen aged girl folding shirts in the store. . .she's horrified. People try to go into the store. . .and they turn away.

Bill and I start laughing hysterically. The music is pumping and I can smell the fake cologne they spray at the door mixing with the smell of my toddler's seemingly large amount of puke and I laugh harder. And Cole starts laughing. And now the three of us are helpless. . .

So I figure it's best to let him finish, right? I mean. . .everything in a 1.5 foot radius was covered. . it made no sense to haul him half way across the building to the restroom. Plus, I didn't pack extra clothes. Bill catches a few glances with people who see us laughing. . .and laugh themselves as they walk past.

When it was all said and done, Cole left the mall wearing just a tee shirt and socks. . .and Bill did take some wipes and make an attempt at the floor. And as Bill and I continued to laugh with each other about what just happened. . .a very happy (and apparently relieved) Cole looked at us and laughed, too.

Even with the smell of lingering puke mixed with the car heaters on high. . .we laughed all the way home.

I suppose the moral is not to give Cole anything like that to eat on his own. . .or maybe it's to bring a change of clothes. . .or maybe yet it's not to think you're safe from your child's fluids even if the baby bag is full of wipes. But it'll be awhile until we venture out to the mall again, I'm sure.