What does it mean when the little girl is quiet...

Some times, when the house is quiet, it's because the little girl is either asleep, or engrossed in a book. But some times, the quietness hints to various levels of mess awaiting me to clean up.

Example 1.
Even before she hit two, Evelyn has learned that applying lotion is good for the skin. She loves to gently smooth any and all lotion she could find onto her face. Therefore, if the child disappeared into my room and was quiet for a few seconds, I could always expect her to reappear with her hands still smoothing some kind of lotion she found on my dresser onto her cheeks. Once, however, she did get carried away and treated her skin to something a little more unusual...

Example 2.
One afternoon, while I was busy in the kitchen and her dad on the computer, I realized that I had not heard her for a few minutes. Poking out onto the hall way, I saw her sitting serenely on the bottom step of the stairs, a tube of Desitin (from my diaper bag) in her hand, and herself covered in a thick, thick layer of the diaper rash ointment. Oh she did not cover herself randomly, the bottom half of her face was coated evenly as if she was getting herself ready for a shave, her hands were think with the ointment from front to back, and she was in the process of also applying the ointment to the bottom of her feet. Yes, even the bottom of her feet needs some loving. It took a lot of wet heavy duty paper towels and a shower to clean her off completely.

Example 3.
Evelyn was washed and set free after an hour at the pool the other day while the adults take our turns to shower. Drying my hair, I noticed the little girl who was supposed to be playing in her room was very quiet, in fact, so quiet, it was clear she was not upstairs any more. Wringing my hair dry, I started my way downstairs while calling out her name. The crinkle of plastic bags in the kitchen told me all I needed to know. Sure enough, the little girl in her wet hair and diaper was trying to put a bag of candy away. While we were busy, she'd slipped into the kitchen, moved a couple of boxes over to serve as steps, and got into the candy jar on the counter. "What did you have?" I asked. "Jelly beans, gummy bears, and CHOCOLATE!" she replied happily and proudly, with chocolate stain still around her mouth. Time to find another storing place for the candies.