Guidance?

Tomorrow is Isaiah's sharing day at school. This week's theme? Bring your favorite animal.... ah man. I read that and thought neither choice is going to be good.

He's going to initially choose Matilda, the dog. Matilda happens to be the sweetest dog I know. She's kind, patient, gentle, craves attention and loves to get hugs. She also happens to be quite protective of her pack, meaning her family, us to be exact. She's usually just fine as long as the new people or animals don't impede her turf while the kids or I are present. She just gets protective. I'm quite certain she would enjoy all the little first graders in Isaiah's class but I do not feel I should take the chance in trusting an animal while other parent's children are involved. We've only had Matilda since December, she's approximately 7 and we have no idea what her past entails. I just don't feel "Sharing Day" is a good enough reason to experiment with Matilda's threshold for 23 first-graders.

Isaiah did in fact bring up his sharing day options on Monday night after a fellow classmate brought in their family dog. I took a deep breath and anticipated the next question. Yep, sure enough Isaiah wanted to bring Matilda to school on Thursday. I explained our thoughts on the safety of all involved. He understood and took the news like a real champ. Did you expect anything less? He does, after all, have a back-up plan..... THE LAMB!

Matthew happened to be home during this conversation and knew exactly the next direction the conversation was going. After some minor cajoling on Isaiah's part it was agreed that Lamby could go to school. We got the excursion approved by all the school officials that need to approve of such ventures. Lamby is going to school.

Anna has been singing "Mary had a little lamb...." all week. She replaces the Mary and sings Isaiah.

Well, since Lamby has a busy day on Thursday he's required to have a bath. This is not anything unusual per se. Sheep shown at fairs, as well as other livestock, get scrubbed before their events. I have never done anything like this, however. I've watched it being done when Matthew and I would observe and root on his younger brother and sister while they were still showing at their local fair. I can wash our dog in the tub but as I stated before she's the mellowest thing I've ever given a bath to, including my own two children. I have a feeling Lamby is not going to cooperate with a scrub in the tub, just guessing.

I did pick up a bottle of Woolite at the store yesterday. No joke. Sheep are washed with Woolite. Seriously, makes sense doesn't it? I'm considering surprising Matthew with a squeaky clean sheep compliments solely of yours truly. I looked on the back of the Woolite bottle and the only thing it said was 2 Caps for a medium load and 3/4 Cap for hand washing. I'm assuming I'll be washing Lamby by hand so I'll use the 3/4 Cap and see what happens. I'm going to wait until Isaiah gets home. I don't know if I can get the job done while Anna's napping so I'll just be patient until the reinforcements arrive.

I've made supper so all I will have to do after Lamby's bath is warm it up. I'm not going to tell Lamby what's on the menu. We're having ground lamb meatballs with a mushroom gravy. I think he'll cooperate better if he doesn't know.

I'd take pictures of the event but somehow feel it's not going to be possible. Just so nobody gets their hopes up. I'll let you know how it goes, if I make it.