Kidnapper in Training

Olive was almost kidnapped on Monday. (My Mom just fell out of her seat. Sorry Mom, keep reading). Luckily, the aspiring kidnapper was, well, inexperienced.

Olive and I were at the playground and two girls, I think twins, became enamored with Olive. This might be because the Olive spent the first 15 minutes at the playground standing and staring at the girls play. Where they went, she followed. Eventually, the two girls started to notice the red-cheeked little cherub tailing them.

They eventually dropped their game of sliding down the slide and running back up it to come over and poke and prod at the baby. The girls were probably around six or seven years old (but I am a horrible judge of age, so they could have been three or seventeen for all I know) and one in particular was not shy.

“Can I hold her hand?”
Girl then holds Olive’s hand.
“Can I give her a hug?”
Girl then squeezes Olive until her face swells.
“You should take her down the slide!”
Girl runs to the slide.
“Take her down the blue slide!”
Girl runs to the blue slide.
“What’s her name?”
Girl doesn’t wait for an answer. Instead, hugs her again. Olive gasps for breath.
“Can I pick her up?”
Girl picks Olive up. Remember, Olive weighs 22 pounds.

This is where there girl’s mother/grandmother intervenes (again, I’m a bad judge of age, this woman could have been either) and tells the girl to put Olive down. Well, I think she said to put the girl down. The mother/grandmother didn’t speak English (I’m also a terrible judge of ethnicities and foreign languages, so I’m not going there) so she could have been saying “Lift with your legs, not your back. That baby looks heavy.”

I blame all this on dolls. My guess is that these girls probably have dolls, and they probably lug them around by an arm, entertain them by pushing them down slides, and toss them aside when they are done. My guess though, is that their dolls aren’t built like a fire hydrant.

This entire time Olive is just standing, staring, expressionless. Every once and a while she would look up at me plaintively as if to say: “Dad, I know I got us in to this mess by following these girls around. I’m sorry. Please, don’t let the one on the left hug me again. My ribs hurt.”

Then, one of the girls comes hurtling down the slide, runs up to Olive and says: “She would like that slide. I’m going to take her down that slide.” Uh-Oh.

She then wraps both arms around Olive, grunts, picks her up and starts running. And I mean at full speed. Olive looks horrified. I go after the two of them and grab Olive by the arm while saying, “Nonononono, I think I should take her down the slide.” The mother/grandmother grabs the girl and says either “Stop, put the girl down” or “You’ll hurt your back trying to carry her like that!” This girl was quick! If she had made it much further, I would have had no choice but to tackle her.

I ended up having to take Olive on a couple runs down the slide on my lap to appease the girl and make sure she wouldn’t make another guerrilla kidnapping attempt. After a couple trips up and down, Leanne got back from work and found us at the playground. Gave me a good excuse to pick up Olive, say goodbye to the girls, and run home as quickly as possible.

Kidnapping plot foiled.

In other news, tomorrow is Olive’s first birthday. A year ago today, Leanne was just about ripened and we were preparing for her to start getting a pitocin drip.

Oh, how times have changed.