Bailey the Little Runaway

I think I have told everyone that Bailey has started swimming class.  It is absolutely the cutest thing ever.  She takes the class at the YMCA and she loves it.  We have had he best time going to swim class, except for last Tuesday.
Last Tuesday class was great and Bailey did a super job.  After class we were in the locker room and I changed her clothes and we were getting ready to pack up and leave the locker room and I went to wash my hands.  I was talking to Bailey as I was washing my hands, got done, turned to look at her and then turned around to get a paper towel.  I got the papertowel, turned back around and she was gone.  I wasn't really worried because this locker room has lots of little nooks for lockers and then a section for changing rooms, showers, bathrooms, steam room, etc...so there were lots of places for her to sit and kind of be hidden.  So I called out her name, "Bailey?"  and then nothing.  So I called her name again and then nothing.  So I start to run around the locker room a little panicked now screaming her name because I think she is playing.  Then I hear a door close.  Not like the door to the locker room but a locker door, so then I think maybe she closed herself in a locker.  Because there is just no way that she could have opened the locker room door by herself because its too heavy AND because she was showing some major interest in the lockers prior to swim class and asking me how they work, etc.  So now I am screaming her name (really screaming) because I think she trapped herself in one of the hundreds of lockers and I have no idea if she really did and if she did which one???? 

So then total panic and hysteria set in and I am running around bawling crying thinking that either my child dissapeared with a stranger or is in a locker with no air to breathe.  So I left the locker room to go and find someone to help me.  I ran upstairs to the front desk and barely able to speak told the lady, "I can't find my little girl!!!!"  Let me tell you this is the worst thing I have EVER had to say.  EVER.  Worst feeling I have ever felt in my life.  There are 4 ladies behind the desk and they are all just staring at me. Which means that they haven't seen her either.. Then a guy comes walking up to check in and go work out and he says, "I think she might be out in the parking lot.  There are two girls out there with her."  So I take off to the front door and there she is as happy as can be with two girls bringing her inside.  She was waiting for me by my car.  BY MY CAR.
How in the world she opened the locker room door by herself, ran past all FOUR ladies at the front desk BY HERSELF and was not noticed at all I will never know.  And then to get out to my car she had to leave the building and that means going through two HEAVY doors and CROSSING THE STREET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And she was doing all of this while I am running around the locker room thinking she shut herself in a locker.
The only way I guess she got out to the parking lot is by pressing the handicapp button on the doors which kids love to do...because its like magic and the doors open for you.  But Bailey had never ever used that one before so I dont know how she found the button in such record time PLUS I dont know what came over her because she doesn't like to be out of my sight.

So I felt like a bad mom for about a day.  How could that have happened?  I seriously wasn't watching her for 1 second!!  But I guess these things happen to all of us at least once...I just pray and hope that it never happens again (which it won't because I am totally buying Bailey one of those leash things you see some parents have hooked up to their kids) j/k!   Moral of the story:  Don't underestimate the power of a 3 year old who is hungry and has been promised Clifford books at the library.  Or maybe she just has super human speed...(and if she does she totally got that from me:)