STINK!

It started as any other day. I woke up and roused Emmalee from her sleep to get her ready for school. She got dressed and we were preparing her breakfast when we heard a strange sound. I thought it sounded like Micah whining upstairs. Emmalee said it was a bird - she had just seen one fly by the window. In any case, the noise stopped. And then immediately the house was full of the odor of... SKUNK! I opened the back door and was nearly knocked over by the scent. Gross! So we sprayed Febreze and continued getting Em ready for school. Steve woke up and came downstairs and asked if I was cooking something with a lot of garlic. Come on - me? Cooking? And in the morning? He could smell it upstairs. I briefly had the fleeting thought that we might smell like skunk since our house did - like the way people smell like fish when they have cooked it that day...
So Em went off to school and it was business as usual - until the phone rang. "Town of Simsbury" the caller id read. I answered it and it was the nurse at Emmalee's school. "Oh no!", I said, "does Emmalee smell like a skunk?" Yep. She was the stinky kid in class. I had to go get her from school because she was stinking out the classroom.
So I quickly got dressed and drove to the school. I was slightly embarassed and extremely self-conscious as I walked into the school, hoping I wouldn't have to pass anyone in the hallway who would smell me since I obviously smelled like a skunk too. I enter the nurse's office and there is Emmalee, sitting in a chair with her backpack, looking forlorn. Fortunately (if there is anything fortunate about this), the same thing happened to the nurse's house, so she was able to give me tips as to how to rid the house (or lessen it anyway) of the odor. We chatted briefly (her eyes were tearing at the scent of us), and then Em and I were off.
On the way home, I asked Emmalee what had happened when she got to school and she said that all the kids were holding their noses and saying that someone smelled like a skunk. "Oh that must be me! My house got sprayed by a skunk this morning!" Em exclaimed - poor kid didn't know she stunk! Her teacher very nicely had Emmalee gather her items and she sent her to the nurse. I tried so hard not to laugh as I imagined the scene, and how the nurse must have felt having to call me to come get my stinky kid. At least it was something we couldn't control and not dirty body odor or something - you know? Em started crying as she relayed the story to Steve - not because she was embarassed but because she was upset to have to miss a day of school. She wanted to change her clothes and go back to school! Of course, ALL of our clothes smell - I will be doing laundry for a month!
Presently, Steve has returned from Home Depot with odor eliminators, and is spraying stuff around the outside of the house. I will be starting the laundry, bathing the children, keeping windows open and candles lit and praying that the stink goes away soon! Thank God we have nowhere we have to go until tonite. Will we still stink? I hope not!