When he was small, my youngest son had a habit of filling his pockets with treasures he encountered in his daily adventures. I didn't always understand the value he saw in his chosen objects -- really, how many rocks and sticks could one boy keep? In his eyes, though, each one was beautiful and important. Life is just like that on a larger scale, isn't it? We gather up the precious bits of our experiences and save them all to learn from and enjoy later. Perhaps you'll find a little something here that you'd like to keep in your own pockets. Thanks for visiting.

Sunday, July 1, 2012

Piggie's day out


Our pet guinea pig, Butterscotch (also known simply as "Piggie"), really likes to eat.  Despite the fact that her diet is a healthy one, full of colourful veggies and hay, she is quite a bit more... well, "portly" than any other guinea pigs I have ever seen.  The boys and I decided today that it would be great for her to go outside for some exercise, so we hatched a plan to make it happen.

Matt came up with the idea to make an enclosure for her by tipping four of our patio chairs over on their sides, end-to-end, on the lawn.  Will was a little worried at first that if we brought Butterscotch outside, a hawk might swoop down and carry her off, but after convincing him that a) we would stay with the piggie the whole time and defend her from any hawks that happened to be in the neighbourhood and b) that the piggie, due to her girth, was likely much too large and heavy to be carried off by a hawk, anyway, he agreed that we should set her "free" in the great outdoors.

It was exciting for all of us (including the piggie!) when we set her down in her makeshift playground.  She did some tentative exploring by taking a cautious stroll around the enclosure, and repeatedly tossed her head up and down, as if trying to encourage the afternoon breeze to rustle up all of her fur.  She purred when we pet her, and seemed very quick to decide that she quite liked being outside where there were so many new things to see and smell and feel.  Before long, she began to sniff and nibble the grass all around her.... and in that moment, all of our hopes for her getting some exercise completely vanished.  Piggie parked herself on that lawn for the next hour and ate...


and ate...


and ate...


and ate...


and ate.



Noah and Will tried tickling her to see if that might encourage her to run about, but she was having none of it.  That grass was just too good.  They tried to entice her with a ball to see if she might like to push it around like she does with the ball in her indoor cage, but she just turned her nose up at it and continued munching.  The boys wondered in awe (and with a little bit of worry and disgust) at how she could continuously keep putting away so much green food, but Butterscotch was as happy as a pig in mud grass. 

Matt and I suddenly realized that having a lawn tractor was unnecessary; it dawned on us that if we just kept moving the piggie around all summer, the grass would never need mowing. (Kind of like having goats, only cuter.)  While her day out didn't go quite as we had planned, Butterscotch was completely oblivious.  She's already dreaming of her next trip to the salad bar....

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