Missing Context Menu on Item in Team Development for Sitecore (TDS)

I recently had a problem in which I tried to "get" items from Sitecore using TDS. The item I was trying to get had several immediate children; however, the get only fetched the top item. When I right-clicked it to try to delete, no context menu appeared. I checked the file system and found that the .item file did not physically exist, so I reloaded the Visual Studio solution. This removed the item from the Solution Explorer, but did not explain what had gone wrong.

I eventually discovered the issue was due to having an alias item of the same name at the same level in Sitecore. Once I'd renamed the alias, I could correctly get the item and all of its children.