Have you seen this Webkinz?
Sometimes there are things that a parent just can’t fix.
I guess someday it’ll be friends moving away, pets dying and broken hearts. Tonight it’s something a little less devastating in the long run, but it’s still a crisis of epic proportions for a five-year-old: The Boy left his beloved stuffed animal at school today.
About a month ago, The Boy received a golden retriever Webkinz for his birthday. Bart (as named by The Boy) quickly became stuffed animal numero uno and has become The Boy’s bedtime companion and traveling buddy. He even took Bart with him to Disney World.
Unfortunately, he also took him to school today. I wasn’t aware that Bart had made it to school when I picked The Boy up after work because The Wife had dropped him off this morning. And The Boy apparently forgot all about it until bedtime.
There was much crying at bedtime. Much crying and some borderline hyperventilation. I felt really bad. The Boy was obviously very shaken up by the whole thing.
He kept asking me over and over to go up to the school and get Bart for him. I tried to explain that the school was locked and that Bart would be safe until the morning, but it’s pretty useless to try to reassure a frantic preschooler when their best friend is MIA.
The Boy also explained that Mane the Tennessee Manatee (his other favorite stuffed animal) couldn’t sleep because “he’s crying all the time because he misses his friend Bart.”
As if I didn’t feel bad enough already. Now I’m causing grief for bean bag sea cows as well.
After about twenty minutes, The Boy calmed down enough to listen to some music in bed and he eventually fell asleep. Or passed out from exhaustion. Either way, he’s not crying anymore.
I fully expect him to wake me up at 4:30 in the morning, clamoring to go down to the school immediately and rescue his stuffed friend.
Needless to say, Bart will not be going back to school any time soon.
You’ll be pleased to know that Bart has been rescued from The Boy’s cubby at school and is safely in his backpack. Hopefully he won’t be taken out at naptime.
By the way, you spelled his manatee friend’s name wrong. As I was repeatedly scolded when he joined the family, it is spelled Mane (but pronounced Monny). I still don’t know how he came up with that.
I’m glad he was there. I didn’t want to have to go through a repeat of last night.
I’ve fixed the spelling of the Tennessee Manatee’s name, but I can’t be held responsible for my son’s weird sense of pronunciation.
That is the cutest and saddest story I have ever heard!!! I am so glad that everyone is safe and accounted for!
Poor little guy.
Hey have you heard the crap about babble stealing pictures from people on Flickr and using them in their stories?
http://flickr.com/photos/sweetjuniper/1398158017/
Just wondering your thoughts, since you have Flickr and lots of pictures. I also have a Flickr account, but I have crappy pictures that no one in their right mind would steal.
Unfortunately, as long as people can do screen captures, there’s really no way to safeguard photos online (even if you disable right-clicking and so on). We’ve raised a generation of people to think that everything on the Internet is free for the taking – and now they’re entering the workforce. I’m sure that the number of occurrences like this will only increase in the future.
All you can do is be vigilant and prepared to go after some bozo who takes your stuff. Or not share.
I kept our photos offline for a long time for that very reason, but the convenience of things like Flickr is just too nice to ignore, especially when you have family who all want to see pics.
Having said that, I’m sure one of these days I’ll see my face plastered all over a Cialis billboard.