A Carpet Beetle

Over the weekend Travis and Brianna found a carpet beetle crawling along, well, in the carpet...(hence the name). Actually I'm not really sqeamish about bugs and such but it did kind of make me feel gross to think about him and all his brothers and sisters crawling around unseen under the carpet fibers where Bree plays. Unlike me though Brianna though it was a great discovery and was super ecstatic. She ran up to me excitedly, "Mom, a carpet beetle! See him? See him?" She held the beetle and treated him like a little pet. Soon she was sitting him down on the coffee table to watch him walk along. If she didn't think the beetle was going the right way she was yelling "NO! NO!" at it. Then she'd scoop it back up saying "I got 'im, I got 'im," and set it back down and let it try again. I'm not exactly sure where she wanted that beetle to go but he never really did do what she wanted. So, she gave up on that for a while and took her new little friend to play in her rooom, (with Trav and I on her heels). We watched as she made the beetle go down the slide on her Little People playground set over and over. But, I don't think he really enjoyed it, he kept trying to open his wings and fly away and I'm not sure why he didn't actually fly away...maybe it was Bree telling him "No fly! No fly carpet beetle!" Well, the beetle entertained the three of us for about an hour actually until Brianna realized it wasn't moving anymore. Then we told her he was tired and need to rest outside in a plant on the balcony. (What, you want me to explain beetle death to a 2 year old?!) I like to think that beetle would have died with a smile on his face, that is, if he'd had a face or could smile. At least I can be sure none of the rest of his friends went out that particular way...death by too much sliding and being a toddler's plaything. That's the way to go.... :)