Dawn -- it isn't just for dirty dishes any more.

Those of you with children, at least more than one child, are well aware that baby proofing a house is an on-going, child-specific process. When my son was little, we had no need for toilet locks, stair gates or any of that stuff. We put a couple of locks on cabinets and were done with it. When the middle girl came along, we needed a lot more and now knew why some people installed cabinet locks on their upper cabinets (had we any cabinet doors on our upper cabinets, we would have considered locking them). Finally, the Toddler Girl -- she has interests that are again different from the older two.

One major difference? With the older two, we never had to put any locks on the bathroom cabinets. They just simply never showed any interest in getting into the stuff in there. Not so with the third child. She's very interested.

Since we contend daily with extra toothbrushes (still in their wrappers) and hairbrushes and what not being strewn all over the floor after one of her "investigations" you would think we would have locked things up by now. But we are busy, slow to get things done and well, sometimes a wee bit lazy. Even after she managed to open up and empty an entire, brand new bottle of shampoo into a drawer, we have not put on the kiddie locks on all the places we need them.

Thus, the cries from the older two children, "Mom! The Toddler got into something yucky!"

There she sat grinning at everyone, with both hands in a tub of Vaseline she had managed to open. She had painted herself and rubbed it over her head into a good thick layer.

Bath time. But shampoo and body soap are not made to contend with grease like that. I called for the dish soap and after a couple lather, rinse and repeat cycles, we had a non-greasy, merely water-slippery baby.

Yes, it is certainly time to rethink the baby proofing. No, we haven't locked the cabinet, but at least after we tossed all the stuff that couldn't be salvaged from contact with too much shampoo or Vaseline, there isn't much left in there.