Catch & Release

My daughter, who’s completely grossed out by things such as tomato sauce on pizza and fried okra, is not adverse to picking up any creepy crawly that comes along. She almost sheds a tear anytime I squish a spider. [Mind you, I don’t squish any spiders that I know are nice, or any spiders that are larger than a thumbtack because the squishiness would be too much for me to handle] She questions why we eat meat, so I’m almost positive vegetarianism is in her future. The girl once found a garden snake in my mom’s backyard, lured it into a bucket and wanted to keep it as a pet. I don’t know where she gets this extreme love for ALL of God’s creatures, but it’s definitely not from me. We didn’t keep the snake.

Since we’ve moved in with my mom and grandparents, snail hunting has become the thing to do. The snails have been devouring my grandpa’s broccoli and many a snail has fallen victim to the bottom of my grandpa’s boot. Not good when you have a mollusk lover around. So, in order to appease the masses, Audrie and Finn were sent on a mission to find and capture as many snails as they could, and release them far away from the garden [in the front yard]. This is the result:

48 snails saved from the boot. Well, actually 49. We found a straggler who had hidden on the edge of the back porch table on which they were kept until their release.

Audrie has no qualms letting slimy snails slowly slide up and down her arms.

After we watched the curious creatures [and after I took a billion pictures of the things] the time came to release them into the wild.

I’m pretty sure they’ve made it back to the garden by now. But, as long as Audrie’s here, we won’t be having escargot for dinner.

xo

nessa dee