House Pets

"Baby X"

No name yet, but we're taking submissions.

Life with kids = bugs. I loved bugs as a kid. Caterpillars were a frequent "pet". When I was little, a caterpillar made a cocoon inside the jar before I had a chance to release it back into the wild, and so it did its thing over the fall and winter and gnawed its way out in the spring. I have such a vivid memory of that and I was barely 7.

We found a caterpillar earlier this year, and I guess it was ready to make its cocoon, since it did it the same day and has been bunkered up in a Mason jar since. The boys named him Baby X.

In other related news, while we happened to be out at the park a couple of days ago playing in soft sand, that beautiful Monarch butterfly was the victim of Seth's parked behind. It was dying, but not dead so we brought it home in a bucket to take care of it. It died, but was too beautiful to just throw away and so we pinned it and will preserve it instead. A perfect specimen, despite being sat on.

These are our pets, everyone – and the best kind, since they are both so quiet.

- L.

PS. The caterpillar we found is an American Dagger Moth Caterpillar. It was quite colorful, and none of us knew it could be a little dangerous (hence the daggers I suppose). No one (including Baby X) was harmed in the handling and jarring of said Baby X, but I was surprised based on the internet to find one in our location. He or she seems to have traveled a long way to get here, and it would appear in the end that we will be "overwintering" together as a result. The things we do for love. *sigh*