You may remember last May/June (somewhere around the end of the school year) I picked up two Betta fish during a quick Wal-Mart run. It was impulsive and not well thought out. We didn’t have tanks, yes I said tankS, because those type of fish have to be kept separate or they’ll harm each other.
Well, it’s been over 6 months and those little guys are still doing great! We ended up putting them in 1/2 gal. mason jars that I already had on hand. They reside on the dining room table for the most part. Occasionally they get moved to the bathroom, or a shelf in the kitchen.
I think fish are easy to care for, beautiful to look at, and calming. Feeding them provides a good responsibility for the kids too.
Yesterday The Baby had a check up at the peds clinic (routine check up, she’s growing well & everything is fine developmentally. We are being referred to an allergist for an off-the-wall pear allergy she seems to have. Seriously, pears? Why pears! Little known fact- Pear puree is in SO MANY of those handy baby food type pouches!).
So since we were all dressed and out of the house anyway, I decided I’d make it a fun day and take all 3 kids to Petco. We spent an hour admiring the animals and reading the tags on the tanks and cages, so we could learn more.
My son wanted a froggy (please mommy?, please?????), my oldest daughter wanted a hermit crab or a hamster (either one, I just want to get a pet). The baby wanted to stare at the fish all day. She’s learning to communicate quite well. Any time her stroller wasn’t directly pointing at a fish tank, she let me know she was unhappy by throwing a fit and tossing her socks on the floor (as the Petco employee had to point out to me, as I was too busy worrying about where my big kids were, and what they were touching. Who has time to worry about something as silly as socks?).
In the end The Baby won. We stopped at Wal-Mart, and again, made an impulsive decision to buy two GLOFISH! I am now the “BEST MOM EVER” and the “COOLEST”. I heard “THANK YOU MOMMY” over a dozen times on the car ride home (from the two oldest, the baby was sound asleep from all the morning activities), and probably another dozen times just last night.
We’re still figuring out how to really care for the fish, what kind of water they like, how often to feed them, etc. It may have been impulsive, but it’s also a whole lot of fun!
Ps. So I was a little worried what my husband would say about the fish. He walked in the door, the oldest smiled from ear to ear and said “Dad, do you notice anything different??”, as she’s eying the fish. He says, “ohhh yeah” & then looks at me, “I’m just happy it’s not a dog”. I’d say he likes them! haha. No really, he does approve. Bonus! Welcome to the family Fish 1 and Fish 2!
Leave a Reply