Tuesday, June 14, 2011

a tale of three critters

In the last three weeks, we've had just as many pets come and go in the Flibbertigibberish household.

1.  Dole the Centipede

  • The girls found Dole in the backyard and put him in a jar.
  • They taught Brody how to say "Dole" and they all convinced themselves he was their new brother.
  • They faught over who would sleep with Dole that night.  Emma won.
  • They kissed and hugged the jar good night.
  • Dole died sometime in the night.
  • Brody trudged up to me the next morning and said, "Dole Dead."
  • We threw Dole away and moved on with our lives.


2.  Elizabeth the Caterpillar

  • We found Elizabeth in one of our puzzles.
  • The kids had been doing the puzzle outside earlier in the day.  I suppose she was a stowaway when we packed it up - I guess she was destined to be part of our lives.
  • The girls put her in a jar, along with a small aspen twig from our yard and a drop of water.
  • Each day, the girls would clean out the jar (caterpillars poop!) and put fresh aspen leaves in there for her to eat.  She would leave bite marks in them - kind of fun to see!
  • The girls took really good care of Elizabeth, and even took her to Grandma's house to spend the night.  Grandma was thrilled.
  • They liked to play with Elizabeth.
  • Is it weird to think Elizabeth really loved us back?
  • They were letting her race a roly poly bug on the backyard table when they turned their back for just a few seconds.
  • When they turned back around, Elizabeth was gone. Gone!
  • I helped them look for Elizabeth, but she was nowhere to be found.
  • I choked back tears.
  • Had I really gotten attached to a CATERPILLAR?
  • Yes.  Yes, I had.
  • The girls were sad, but no tears were shed.


3.  Molly the Vole

  • The girls found a mole rat mouse vole in the window well.
  • They rescued it and put it in a tupperware container.
  • They bathed it with the garden hose.
  • They fed it cheese.
  • I came home and almost puked when they showed me.
  • They said it was cute and cuddly.
  • I refused to believe it.
  • They did not fight about who would sleep with Molly the Vole, because Molly the Vole was NOT allowed into the house, because YUCK.
  • The next morning, Molly the Vole was very dead and very stiff.  Legs up in the air and everything.  I bet it's tongue was hanging out too and maybe it's eyes had turned into x's, but I didn't get close enough to check.
  • Addie declared she'd been a good pet for a day and went on her merry way.
  • No tears.
  • Except my tears of joy.
  • I don't do rodents.


I wonder what our next pet will be?  I can handle bugs, I can handle frogs, but I don't want it to be anything featured on the Orkin website.  LIKE A VOLE.  Stay tuned, because I have a feeling this is just the beginning...

4 comments:

  1. I scrolled down to see if there was a pic of the vole and when there wasn't I was relieved and disappointed at the same time.

    SICK!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I can not believe you let them keep a vole. Even for an hour. Ewww! Cute. But eww!

    ReplyDelete
  3. want a dog? his name is gunther.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Aubri and Rylynn recenty got a pet hamster. They named it Rascel Molly Melodee Roberts. It's a boy. While I am flattered, I've got to be honest... I'm not totally thrilled about this sudden jump in popularity that the name "Molly" has found in the rodent realm.

    ReplyDelete

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