Fishy Tales

This is the story of a couple of sad little fish, and more kid moments :)

We attended our ward service auction a couple of weeks ago where our kids insisted on catching the real live goldfish swimming in the kiddie pool. McKinley named hers 'Tarsa' (she likes to make up names?). When I asked Mason what his fish was named he said "he's a daddy fish, daddy's don't need names, they are just called daddy". Naturally. Well, I knew these fish weren't going to make it too long, but I figured a few days, right? Well, we went straight to Wal-Mart, bought fish food and a bowl, and put them in their happy home. The next morning the kids ate breakfast watching the fish swim around, they were so excited about them! Well, by lunch one of the fishies had decided to 'take a nap' and wasn't so much swimming anymore. The other one would swim to the top, then float to the bottom, swim to the top, then float to the bottom, until finally he came to 'rest' at the bottom of the bowl. I debated running out to the store when Matt got home to replace the fish before anyone noticed that they weren't 'waking up', but decided that it was a good opportunity to teach them about life and death. I prepped myself for sad tears and explained to the kids that the fish were not alive anymore, they had died and gone to fishy heaven. I tried to discuss this all very carefully and sensitively. Well, apparently my kids weren't too attached to these fish because when I told them that we would flush them down the toilet they were beyond thrilled! It was the most exciting thing they had ever heard! We flushed them down and they told me we could just get some new ones another day. So much for learning about life and death. We will work on the grieving process some other day. For now, every time Mason goes pee-pee in the potty he tells me he just peed in fishy heaven :). You can't say I didn't try!

Today I told my kids if they were really good listeners on our errands we could stop at the pet store and get some new fish. By the end of our list of errands I was WIPED out. I had forgotten about the fish promise, of course. We began to head home when McKinley said "Mom, are we going to get our new fish?" Not REALLY wanting to turn back around and make yet another stop, I said "we'll see" hoping that would appease her and we could do it another day. But instead she said "Mom, that's what you always say. Whenever you say "we'll see" you always figure out "no". :) She's right, dang-it. So, we went to the pet store and we purchased two female beta fish (since the females won't eat each other, and since the pet store guy said that beta's will live a lot longer than goldfish - we can hope :). Off on another fishy adventure. This time McKinley named hers 'Sweetie' and Mason decided this one isn't a daddy fish, so his name is 'Stinky'. I asked him why he named his fish 'Stinky' and he said "because he smells like fish." Of course - duh. Oh, and did I mention that this makes us the proud owners of two fish, one dog, one cat, a husband, and two children? I think we can officially call our house a zoo!

This one was a few weeks ago, but still makes me laugh :). We were outside playing and Mason went inside to go potty. He was in there quite a while, so I went in to see what was taking so long. He was just coming out of the bathroom and jumped when he saw me. Bad sign.

Me: Mason, you okay?

Mason: yeah

Me: What were you doing in there?

Mason: I don't think me want to tell you

Me: Why?

Mason: I maybe didn't flush anything down the toilet

Me: You did or you didn't flush something?

Mason: Me don't want to tell you

Me: What did you flush

Mason: I maybe didn't flush the white lids down the toilet (the white lids are the caps that cover the bolts on the bottom of the toilet)

Me: Mason, did you flush the white lids down the toilet?

Mason: Me did, but me not going to tell you, okay?

Me: (trying not to laugh at my 2-year-old telling on himself, I would never have noticed they were missing!) Mason, let's go look okay?

We went into the bathroom and sure enough both lids were gone, and we had a talk about not flushing anything down the toilet. I hope the fish didn't confuse him :) In conclusion, if you come to my house and notice that the white lids are missing, now you know why.

Again, I am PROMISING pictures next week! Thanks for checking in on us - all two of you! :)