Critters in my Home

My home smells slightly of soil and my kids seemingly have permanent residue of earth beneath every single finger nail.

Their shoes are unwearable at the moment, as they sit soggy and muddy outside in the garage.
Currently our home has ten new residents who sit in jars and Tupperware on top of our family room shelf:
7 pond fish,
a tadpole,
a clam
and a salamander.

There really isn't a favorite among them; each critter has ignited the same amount of delight upon discovery.
I actually encourage the adoption of these critters.
This quarantine from school and schedule (coupled with our outrageously gorgeous weather) has made the forest my territory with my children.
 It helps with my sanity, and it's a wonderful place to learn and get some energy out.

As a child, I have many happy memories of wandering through fields and wading through ponds, catching fireflies and nursing hurt rabbits back to health. My attempt to recreate  this idyllic existence for my children in suburbia has led me to many hours exploring the forest and river behind our house, uncovering secret trails,  wading in small creeks and even digging in a dinosaur bone exploration site. 😊

These boys are dedicated to unearthing some dinosaur remains...

They believe they discovered a whole T-Rex head.

So, when my kids started bringing all these relics into my home, it represents,-in my mind- a happy childhood; and thus, I welcome them gladly...just as long as they keep track of them.

One afternoon the salamander and its container it lives in was missing from the counter.
 "Where's the salamander?" I called out,  while I sat folding towels in the other room.

I heard a faint reply, "I think he's in the fort, Mom, in the family room."

I surrender all. ⚐

I went back to casually folding my towels, apparently satisfied with the answer.

Now, I have to come clean about one of the critters on my shelf....Here is the story....😐


The pond fish were captured with my kitchen colander. Swift as a cat, I lunged at them in the water, desperately determined  to make a memorable educational experience for my children.

I was going to give them the magic of witnessing a tadpole transforming into a frog.

You should have heard their excitement when I successfully caught seven little tadpoles. As we walked back to our house, they held their jars proudly, telling everyone they passed about their tadpoles. I got several "air high fives" and I must admit, I felt pretty good.

I was going to give my kids a real, hands on, earth science education.

When we got home, everyone was buzzing with the excitement of it all.
Seven frogs! 🐸🐸🐸🐸🐸🐸🐸We were going to watch seven tadpoles grow little legs and develop lungs...what a magical childhood experience! 

We began researching tadpoles and how  to care for them properly.
As I watched the little educational videos on line, I was suddenly struck that our tadpoles looked quite different than the ones in the pictures.
Could my memories from long ago have failed me?

I finally had to admit to myself that they, in fact, weren't tadpoles at all;
they were only little pond fish! 😬

Lost in my thoughts, I could still hear the murmur of excited children in the background, scheming about how they were going to care for their tadpoles. I just couldn't disappoint them, especially when I talked up this experience so much and was so confident about how to catch them.

So I didn't say anything.

I confessed to John later that night and he only laughed.
But, then I confessed that I did something desperate to fix it: I ordered a tadpole on Amazon. 
He looked a little more concerned.

Yes, I found out that you can do that; and yes, it comes alive in a little bag filled with water.
And yes, we failed to get our mail for one whole day so the poor little guy was stuck in the dark mailbox for longer than he should have been.

But alas, he was alive and the kids were absolutely delighted with him, and it quickly made up for my error of catching pond fish (which, by the way, Evelyn, figured out the following day..." Mom, I'm not sure these are tadpoles...")😳

So there you go.
I'm not sure if this makes my tadpole less authentic-it kinda feels that way to me- but nonetheless, it's a tadpole which will turn into a frog in 12-16 weeks. We may still be in quarantine. Who knows.

But at least then we will have a pet frog, because the instruction manual it came with explicitly states that this frog can not be released into the wild because it won't know how to survive. ...
And Evelyn, who knows how to read everything, promptly pointed that out as she read the manual to everyone.

I've read that pet adoption is way up during this quarantine; families are adopting puppies and kittens.  Evelyn has basically claimed the neighbor's cat as her own. Bob, the nextdoor neighbor's cat, happily lounges with her on the deck as she does her school work.

However, now I can proudly tell my children that their pet frog was a result of the 2020 pandemic, and they can't claim they didn't have a magical childhood. 😊