Kaitlyn and the Box Turtle

Some things just need to be shared! All of our children LOVE pets; but Alyssa, our oldest has a rare and unique passion for animals - particularly dogs. You know how some people just 'connect' with animals in a way you never can? Well, that's Alyssa.

But as I mentioned previously, Alyssa traveled to Atlanta, GA over a week ago so we've had the 2 younger ones at home. Kaitlyn (age 9) found a box turtle and brought it home. She got a box for it to live in (it hated the box); she gave it water and we researched on the Internet what it needed to eat. Each and every day she'd take it outside to play on the playground, but she was always a bit frustrated that it tried to crawl away. :) She just couldn't understand why it kept wanting to crawl off. Trust me folks, she loved the turtle, she'd put it on the swing and swing with it and all kinds of great things. Well...she thought they were great, not sure what the turtle thought.

She would give it water in its box, but it would step in it and THEN it pottied in the water - so uncalled for! :)

Isn't this picture of her and the turtle adorable?


Well, a few days ago, Kaitlyn came home and through tears told me she thought she should let the turtle go because it didn't like living in the box. You could tell she had thought long and hard about this and it was killing her. She was sobbing.

I gently walked her through the process letting her make the final decision on what to do. I was very surprised to see her so sad about this - but this was a big deal.

I took the above pictures just before she decided to let it go. This next one is her W-A-Y O-U-T in our backyard getting ready to turn it loose.

This last pictures is an up close picture when she returned with the empty box - no turtle. I took the picture, then she broke down and sobbed again. It was a tough evening, but she knows she did the right thing. The tears don't come so quickly now because we focus on how the box turtle has probably already found new friends and is exploring like it loves to do!

Hope you all had a great weekend. Thanks for stopping by...even if it's not stamp related! :)

Hugs, ~M.