Clean Underwear

**Cute Story Alert**

Last weekend the kids came for the third session of Nana Camp 2013.

On Friday night, as they were preparing for their baths, Amelia came downstairs with a distressed look on her face. She couldn’t find any clean underwear.

“Aunt Dee, may you help me find my underwear?”

I looked. But I couldn’t find clean underwear either. Evidently, she had worn it all during a week at the beach.

I suggested that she turn her underwear inside out. No.

I suggested that she go without underwear for the night so that we could wash her underwear for the morning. No.

“You have to have clean underwear to go to bed,” she said.

A few weeks earlier, on our camping trip, she had declared: “This is how you get ready for bed: You take a shower, put on clean underwear and pajamas, brush your teeth, and go to bed.”

Clearly, dirty underwear was not an option for Amelia, so a quick trip to the store did I make.

With 11-year-old Jack.

Not being a frequent Maxway shopper, I wasn’t sure where the little girl’s underwear was shelved. After a few minutes of walking around the store, passing ladies underwear and bras along the way, Jack sheepishly said, “This is kind of weird.”

Chuckling, I said, “I bet it is. You don’t have any little sisters."

“Nope. I’ve never done this before.”

When we finally found the little girl’s underwear, we spent about five minutes trying to decide if “4” and “4T” were the same thing. One we realized they were, we identified three options for Amelia: Dora, Disney Princesses, or Minnie Mouse. Immediately dismissing Dora, we discussed the merits of the other two and decided on Minnie Mouse.

When we got home, Amelia was playing in the bathtub. Upon looking at her new three-pack of underwear, she said, “Hmm. I think I was hoping for princesses or something.”

Expecting that reaction, I said, “Yes. We knew that. And we figured you already had Princess underwear. So we decided on Minnie Mouse so that every time you wore it you would think about Jack and me going to get it for you.”

My mom chimed in by saying, “And the same you came to Nana Camp with no underwear.”

As Amelia considered what I’d just said, about thinking about Jack and me every time she wore the new underwear, a smile formed on her face until she was flat out grinning.

“Yeh…” she said, beaming with love.

Love causes us to do and feel strange things.

I think of Jack’s willingness to put himself in a weird situation so that Amelia wouldn’t suffer from dirty underwear and I think of the smile that grew on Amelia’s face as she realized that her big cousin and I had chosen underwear just for her.

I’ve thought about this story many times this week, and each time it’s crossed my mind I’ve smiled at its sweetness.

I hope you’ve smiled too.

And I hope you have on clean underwear as you prepare for bed. If so, Amelia will be proud.