Category: Our Family

I was out front mowing the lawn today, Kyle was at home depot getting some bricks for a project we are working on in the backyard, but I really wanted to make sure that the lawn got mowed. Our stinky HOA left us a notice saying ‘Your yard needs improvement’, so if nothing else got done in the front yard, I wanted to make sure it at least got mowed.

Well I finished mowing the front and decided that while I’ve got the lawn mower out, I should mow the backyard too. So I took it out back and had all the kids help clean up the toys and things so that I could mow. I had gone back and forth a few times, and Ethan went into the house. Just a couple of minutes later he came to the back door to tell me that someone was at the front door. So I turned off the lawn mower and ran inside to answer the front door. There stood the sheriff! I stood there wondering what he wanted and he proceeded to tell me that they had gotten a 911 call from this location. I turned and looked at Ethan and asked him if he had called 911, after all he was the only one in the house. Ethan just stood there looking at me, and the officer asked me if everything is ok, and he asked what the number here at the house was. I told him and he looked confused, so he asked if we have any cell phones, and I gave him both my cell number and Kyle’s, and then he looked really confused and asked “No number that starts with 953?” Uh no… So he said not to worry about it and they just wanted to make sure everything was ok.

I called Kyle to find out where he was, how soon was he coming home, and to tell him what just happened. He said ‘Go check my work cell’. I had totally forgotten that he had a work cell phone, not like it would have helped any because if the officer asked me what the phone number for that cell was I don’t know it! But when Kyle mentioned his work phone I went to go check it out. Right there on the screen it said ‘Call Work 911’! So I mentioned this to Kyle and I asked him what the number to this phone is, he didn’t know and started coaching me through the menu to find the phone number. Well at some point in searching the menu I must have hit the wrong button because it ended up calling 911 AGAIN! (I DID NOT HIT THE GREEN ‘CALL’ BUTTON I don’t know what button I pushed and I don’t know WHY it started the call!) I hung up hoping that it hadn’t connected, but it was too late, they called me back. So I answered and talked to them and apologized for calling. I must not know how to work this phone because I hit the wrong button and I don’t know how it ended up being programed to call 911. They said that that was alright and they would let the sheriff know that everything is ok. So I then talked to Ethan and told him that I saw the call on Daddy’s work phone and I asked him again if he made the call he avoided me (looking guilty) and went outside to hide in the playhouse and I went back out to the backyard to finish mowing the lawn. Little did I know that the sheriff was going to turn around and come right back! But this time he already knew that I was in the backyard mowing the lawn (since that’s what I was doing last time he came) so he didn’t bother with knocking on the door, he just came straight into the backyard. I was mowing the other direction and when I turned around and saw him my heart nearly stopped! I certainly wasn’t expecting to see a man standing in my backyard. I stopped mowing to talk to him and I had to explain that the call was made from my husbands work cell (but that I don’t know the number so I can’t verify that with him) the first call was made by my son (who was still sitting in the playhouse sulking) and the second call ended up being made by me because whatever button I pushed just made the call. So I told him that I had locked the cell phone in my bathroom so that the kids won’t be able to call again while I was out mowing the lawn. He said it was alright they just wanted to make sure everything was ok, and they just wanted to make sure that there wasn’t really someone with a cell phone around, calling for help. And he said that he would let me talk to Ethan about the call that he had made.

When Kyle got home I asked him if he would talk to Ethan about it, since Ethan was avoiding me, and when Kyle got him alone he asked him about it and Ethan’s response was “I must have been out of my mind! I didn’t know what I was doing!” I laughed so hard when Kyle told me that’s what Ethan said.

Later I was thinking about the day and remembered that after mowing the front lawn, I came in the house and sent all the kids outside to pick up their toys. I got a drink of water and while I was in the kitchen I thought I heard music coming from somewhere in the house. But when I went to look for it, it stopped so I just thought that buzzing of the lawn mower must have been messing with my head. But then I heard it again, and again when I went to look for it it stopped, so I seriously thought that I must be hearing things…I listened to the buzzing lawn mower too much for sure. But then after the sheriff had come and gone the first time, and 911 called back after I accidentally called them and after the sheriff came and went the second time I realized that the music I heard that I thought was the buzz of the mower messing with my head was the sound of the cell phones ring tone that I heard when 911 called back. So Ethan must have called while I was out mowing the front lawn, and when I heard the random music must have been when they were calling back, but nobody answered so they sent someone to check it out!