The Fly in the... Juice?

"Look, Momma, I found a BABY WORM!!!", she yelled across the yard at me, her face exploding in a grin from ear to ear.

Hardly surprising. My second child is such a bug girl. There is hardly a creepy crawly thing to be found that she doesn't like. More than that - that she doesn't want to bring in and make friends with.

"Wow, that's quite a cute little baby worm, isn't it?", I responded as politely as I could, trying not to wrinkle my nose too obviously as I peered down at the little thing wiggling in her hand.

Worms, beetles, flies... these were NOT my thing as a little girl. Sure I loved climbing trees and building forts and all that, but really my imagination revolved mostly around playing house and cooking dinners and rocking babies to sleep. I mean really, what's the point of building a great fort in the woods if not to play HOUSE in it?

But for my Emmy-girl, there is no convincing her that the baby dolls she has collected from friends and family over the years are HALF as entertaining as the bugs she can find outdoors.

And today is an outdoor day. The temperature has climbed above 50 - the flowers are pushing shoots up through the dirt and my hands are itching to spring clean. I did the girls' room this morning: rearranged the furniture, washed the windows, picked up all the toys off the floor, removed the huge rug for cleaning, and mopped the floor by hand - because that's the only way to do it when the floor is made of very old, rough pine boards.

While I was doing all that with my little Helper Bean, Emmy got to spend her morning with Daddy, running errands, going to K-Mart, and getting some apple juice at the gas station when they filled up. It's so rare she gets to spend time like that - just a little girl and her daddy.

After lunch and nap time, we went outside. Where all the bugs and worms were waiting patiently all winter for Emmy to find them.

As I was getting ready to pull a few stray weeds from my flower bed I heard her very softly talking to some of her new friends.

"There you go little fly... I will share some of my juice with you! You can swim in it and have a bath in my juice!"

Oh. Dear.

Very pleased with herself, she turned to me and proceeded to tell me how Jesus wants us to share and how happy she was making Jesus by sharing her juice with her friend fly.

Ooo-kay then. What do you say to that one?!

Besides, "You may share with your fly, but you may NOT drink any more of that juice now!!!"

See all her fly friends? What a girl! So very... generous...