Our week of Ducks

I have a strict no pet policy in our home. Not even fish? No thank you. The prospect of cleaning gravel, algae and smelly fish water all while hoping I don’t kill the creatures is not an enticing prospect. Plants? I like you, but you have to be able to withstand extreme neglect and recover quickly from physical abuse at the chubby hands of a toddler. That leaves you rosemary. So what on earth possessed me to say yes to ducks? My friend posted on Facebook that she was going to hatch some duck eggs in her incubator (everyone should have a friend with an incubator) and has some extra eggs, would anyone else like some ducks? Yes, I say. I would like three please.

What?! Not sure where that came from. Either I need more chaos in my life or I really, really love my children and knew they would be over the moon excited about some duck friends. It wasn’t logical. I still don’t have a plan for when they turn into … you know, adult ducks. I’m pretty much hoping they will fly to Hoomaluhia and we will visit them regularly and feed them bread. Because that’s what you feed ducks when you’re at a park. The neighbor’s cat has other ideas.

We got to see #2 hatch, which was really cool. I put #1 next to the pipped eggs, they starting chatting and #2 immediately started to bust out. #1 even helped with the effort.  I guess I should tell you their names. Ready? Okay, Spoon, Fork, and Butt. The latter was Mila’s contribution. Micah originally named two of them fork and we re-named Fork II because Mila was pretty insistent on Butt.

And so, our first week with ducks began. It pretty much involved me keeping the kids from killing the ducks on accident. They were surprisingly gentle, but there have been incidents. One involved an unintentional catapult, another a Mila monster learning to walk, and most recently they almost drowned. Micah put them in the (soap-filled) water table and they sank like bricks. He thought all that peeping and splashing about meant they were having a really good time. Why does this stuff always happen when I go to the bathroom? Can’t keep kids and ducklings separated since they follow anyone that moves fast.