Well, for those of you that know me, I am not an animal lover by any means. I really don’t ever want a pet. Sorry, I know that those statements for some of you grind down to your souls. I just do not have the love for animals in my heart. My kids and I were at the church playing the other day and Dylan found a chubby fuzzy caterpillar. He carried it and talked to it for the rest of the day. He asked if we could take him home….”sure?”, was my reluctant reply. He was so excited to share him with his friend Luke the next day at a play date. When we got home we made a home for him, putting leaves in a box. I thought it would be nice for Rhino the caterpillar to have a stick in his box to climb around on. Dylan was adamant NOT to have the stick because he would make a cocoon on it and he wouldn’t be able to show his friend the next day. I argued and said what are the chances! Let’s just leave the stick. So since I am bigger, we left the stick in the box. The next morning Dylan ran down stairs to get Rhino out of his box to hold…and what WERE the chances? He had made a cocoon! So the morning began with tears and heart ache. Dylan was never going to see his beloved Rhino again. I tried my best to explain the miracle of life and how Rhino would turn into a beautiful butterfly, just like in the book The Hungry Caterpillar. Somehow that made him more sad because Rhino would then be able to fly away. The tears ceased for a few minutes when the Elmo music started up in the background on Sesame Street. As the show ended and Dylan still had puffy red eyes from all the tears, he came to me and said, I think Rhino would love to have a fish friend just like Dorothy (Elmo’s fish). How could I resist? “Sure?”, was my reluctant answer. And we were off to purchase a goldfish, which shortly became 2 goldfish because Molly needed one as well! On our way home from the back seat Dylan announced, “This is the best day of my life! I never thought I would have a pet, and now I will have 4! Rhino (the caterpillar), Tinkerbell (the goldfish #1), Tito ( goldfish #2), and Scotty (his unborn baby brother!).

Pet update: Tinkerbell and Tito, didn’t make it through the day ? Rhino still cocooning, and baby Scotty still in the womb.