It's a Wombat!

The other day, while running errands with the kids, we stopped in a pet shop to look around. You want a cheap way to entertain the kiddos? Just go to your local pet shop and let them admire all the creatures there. So, the kids were staring at the birds, then the mice and hamsters, then Lexi walked over to another enclosure and squealed, "Look! Jaguars! Look at the jaguars! Jaguars, Mom! Look!"

I thought, "Hmmm, this pet shop is really expanding if they're selling jaguars now." I peered into the tank to see a couple of ferrets sleeping, all piled up on each other. "Um Lex, hon, those aren't jaguars. Those are ferrets." but I could see how you could confuse them because they look so much alike

"Oh that's what I meant!"

I thought maybe we should take one last trip to the zoo before school starts. You know, remind my kids of the difference between say, zebras and lizards, jaguars and ferrets, and such. So, yesterday I packed up a cooler and the kids and went to the zoo with my dad. Since a lot of kids are back in school, it was pretty empty and the weather was absolutely beautiful!

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As the kids were getting ready for bed last night, Jackson looked outside and yelled, "Mom! Quick! There's something outside! Come quick!" Well I ran to the door but missed whatever Jackson had seen.

"I think it was a wombat, Mom!"

"It wasn't a wombat. Wombats live in Australia." did they learn nothing at the zoo???

"Well, it looked like a wombat," Jackson insisted.

"It was probably an opossum or a raccoon or something," I informed him.

Well, Clay, being the little punk he is, decided to scare Lexi. "A wombat's outside and it's going to come into your room while you sleep."

There went the next half hour as I tried to convince Lexi that even if wombats lived around here, I wouldn't let one into the house and into her room.

Things have a way of coming back to bite you in the butt though. So, a few minutes later, Clay decided that he was scared of killer wombats too and he walked into the family room insisting he could only go to sleep in my bed.

"There are no wombats outside! If there were, they wouldn't come inside anyway. And wombats don't eat people. They eat plants! You guys are reading all the signs in the Australia house the next time we go to the zoo and there will be a test on it!"

Savannah volunteered to take Clayton back to bed. She scooped him up and started carrying him to his room. Awww, how sweet, huh? About halfway there, she shrieked, "Aeeeiiiiiaaaaeee! A WOMBAT!!!"

Clay actually took flight as he leapt from her arms and ran back to the family room.

I slept with Clay, Lex, and Brooklyn last night.