A Warning About Dollar Store Toys...

Let me begin by saying I am sorry there are no pictures to show with this post...my camera or software is acting up and after 3 attempts, I gave up.
Anyways, back to the warning.
Two mornings ago, Samuel got off the couch while watching PBS and held up his finger to me and whined, "It's stuck!" What I saw was a small orange tube stuck on Samuel's pointer finger. I thought to myself, "No big deal. It's not REALLY stuck. I can get it off. Worse case, I'll lather it up with soap and it will surely come off."
I then asked him what it was and where it came from. He quickly informed me in his Samuel-sort-of-way, "Well, well, it's to my gum (translation: from my gun)."
After a moment of consideration, I realized it was the tip off of one of his dollar store guns (his and Joel's favorite place to go now).
So I calmly took his finger and tried to pull it off. Nothing. I then tried twisting it. Nothing.
Okay, no need to panic. Off to the bathroom sink. Water and soap applied. Pulled. Nothing. Twisted. Yes, it now would twist, but that was it. It was officially stuck on his knuckle.
Now he was crying and I was starting to panic a bit myself. How ridiculous I would look going into an ER w/ this situation.
"Call Rob! He'll know what to do!" I thought.
So call him I did. He offered to come home to try to solve the problem. In the meantime I calmed Sam down and tried to think of other ways to get it off.
My Pampered Chef all purpose scissors! Don't worry, I wasn't going to cut his finger off, though they will cut a metal can. They infact, won't cut you at all! So I slid them up the side of the tube and tried cutting it. It worked, but I couldn't get it to cut all the way to the top. Alas, it was still stuck.
Then Daddy arrived just in time to save the day, as now Samuel was starting to panic again.
Rob tried pliers to pull it off with. He then tried cutting it more. Still nothing. Then he headed to the bathroom for more soap.
Sadly, in the end, he simply had to resort to a good-old-fashioned tug. With Samuel screaming as he held him still between his legs, Rob pulled as hard as he could and off came the tube, with a bit of Sam's skin as well.
Once neosporin and a Spiderman bandaid was applied, all was right in the Tombrella home once again.

So, the moral to our story: beware of dollar store "treats". They can fall apart (and usually do within a day) and result in a crazy morning like this one. Sure glad it wasn't worse!