Chim Chim Cheree...

I check on Gwendy every night before I go up to bed.  Last night when I first walked into her room I noticed her basket of hair accessories spilled on the floor, and as I squinted in the dark room I could see something black was smeared all over and around it.  "Oh God, please don't be poop!" was my first thought, but no, upon closer inspection it was a small plastic tray of greasepaint leftover from some Halloween years ago or a scene study from school or something.  I had (stupidly) left an old makeup bag in Gwen's room from having painted her nails and she had climbed up to get it and smeared said greasepaint all over the rug:

With a sigh of resignation I bent down to start cleaning up.  And suddenly it occurred to me that I hadn't actually looked at Gwen yet.  And when I did, this is what I saw:

You guys, I couldn't even be mad-  I was laughing so hard I nearly peed my pants-  but now I had the problem of what the hell to do.  I couldn't very well leave her like that, but I knew full well she was not going to take kindly to be awoken at 11:30pm to wash up.  Well first, I got the camera.  Because, come on?  I then took a baby wipe and started cleaning her face, and eventually she woke up enough to go with me to the bathroom for some bigger intervention (the baby wipe was a bit like fighting a forest fire by waving a towel at it):

after wiping her face a bit...making progress....

enjoying this way too much.

When we got into the bathroom, I began running the water to get it warm and figured I'd show her what she'd done.  "Look at your face, baby!" I told her as I held her up to the mirror. "AHH!!! NO!!! I SCARED OF THAT SCARY THING!!"  She refused to accept any explanation I offered that it was actually her own face that she'd seen and once I'd gotten her settled and somewhat clean she still kept mumbling "Makeup is scary, Momma" every so often.

I had to change all her bedding and I'm still not sure what to do about the rug- my attempt to clean it has made a giant black vortex a la "The Ring".  And even after several washings Gwen has a distinct swarthy look today, kind of like Captain Jack Sparrow:

vs

...But every so often, your kid does something that you just know will go into the Legend of Her.  And this one, this one's for the books.  Well played, my little Chimney Sweep.