And Then Came The Ducks

On Tuesday my mom decided to take the kids to the hardware store. They were going to check out the baby chicks and maybe pick up a few more plants for the garden. Apparently somewhere between the chickens and the vegetables they got a little distracted. And then we had what I'm going to call "a grandma moment". You know the kind. It's when your adorable grandchildren think something is cute or awesome, so you buy it without really thinking through the repercussions of the purchase.

And that is how we got ducks.

I was sitting on the porch reading when Chris ran through the door with a box. At first I was sure they had bought chickens. My mom has been talking about getting chickens for awhile now, so a chicken purchase made sense, sort of. I mean she still had no where to put them, but a chicken coop could be built. But instead, he opened the box to reveal two fluffy little ducks. Yes, ducks. There was also no where to put the ducks, and a pond is not so easily built. As my mind is reeling with, "Oh my word, why in the world are there baby ducks in the kitchen", the kids had moved on to playing with the ducks in the kitchen. And my, they were really cute.

So we played with ducks all week. And, with the exception of having to blow-dry one back to life as it's body temperature had plummeted from being put in icy water, it was a fun experience raising ducks for a week. (Yes, I used a blow dryer on a duck. Like I said, this purchase was not really thought through so we didn't have a heating lamp. So I improvised with a blow dryer.) The kids named them Fluffy and Puffy, which I thought was so Beatrice Potter and that of course made me love the ducks even more. The ducks actually became fond of the kids and began jumping from their "pond" into the kid's waiting laps. And luckily for the ducks, a friend with a real pond offered to take them when we left.

All in all, a happy ending. We got to play with ducks and the ducks got a new home. The end.

*A note to the grandma's: Seriously, The End. Thanks for the Beatrice Potter experience. I can now write beautiful children's books about a girl and her duck, a tractor driving duck, and a boat captain duck. But we will only be accepting stuffed ducks of the plush variety in the future.