HBD G and Meet Picky

Last week was G’s birthday, so we celebrated by taking her to the beach – her favorite place!  It was a great day of jumping the waves and searching for shells. Despite the zinc we all got a little too much sun…oops!

After being unable to find any hermit crabs on the beach, G convinced me to let her buy the boys their first pet.  Everyone meet Picky, our new hermit crab! After much deliberation at the beach store, Mac settled on the most active crab in the tank as surely that meant he was healthy and would live a long life {hopefully not too long I thought!}.  I only let the boys get one crab as I was {note the past tense} convinced the crab wouldn’t live long and didn’t want G to waste another $10.  G and Mac went straight home and read all about hermit crabs.  Mac was quickly furious that I only let them get 1 as he learned crabs are very social creatures and like to have several other crab friends around.  UGH!  Next he learned that they do much better in glass aquariums as compared to the cheap and small plastic carrier that came free with the purchase of Picky.  Double UGH!  Just recently we have learned that hermit crabs can live for up to 25 years.  WHAT. THE. HECK.    

After having Picky for a week and a half I can tell you that we have lost him twice.  Yes, twice!  Mac would forget that he took him out to play {another thing we learned – hermit crabs should come out of their tank and play for at least 10min every day!} and would forget about him.  Once he was out for over 3 hours while Mac and KK went swimming.  They spent over 30min looking for him when they got home and he was still missing when I arrived home from work.  Thankfully Coe found him shortly after I got home when he reached way under the couch and “felt something”!  We {and by we I mean I} clean his food bowl every two days and change his water dish out.  Mac is diligently trying to finish his summer workbook so he can go to the store and pick out a prize– a glass aquarium for Picky. And we are all learning to adjust to life with our new pet.  *Note: it will be a LONG time before we are ready for a dog!