Our New Addition.

Meet Erwin.



He's cute, and this 11 year old girl is in love with him.



I said no seven hundred times before I said yes. And before I said yes, I told her to ask her dad. We are not anti-pet. We are just highly discouragingly pet. I changed diapers for almost ten years with my four kids and I do not want more responsibilities along those lines. Plus I just in general would rather not live with animals. It's not that I dislike them, many of them are cute and I do want all of them to be treated well by humans and loved. So if I don't pet your dog or even look at your cat, don't be offended, I'm so so glad you love them.

Having said that, I too began to look at this dwarf hamster lovingly soon after he came into my home. He is sweet. He is almost affectionate. He is funny and cute and has big eyes and long whiskers. He has a gimpy foot and that makes him all the more endearing to me.

One of Emily's classmates who thought she had two hamsters of the same sex was surprised to find that her two "females" had babies and was offering them up. Emily's teacher took two. It's all Emily talked about for a week.

I remember a friend that had several of them and several cages in her bedroom when I was a kid and I remember a certain smell. To my greatest relief, Erwin doesn't smell, and his poop is really tiny. Emily is keeping things clean and so far I like it. He sleeps in the laundry room in his cage because as you know these little things are nocturnal and when he's scurrying about through his fluffy bedding and jogging around all night on his wheel he was keeping Emily awake.

The only other experience I had with a hamster was a summer Renee and I spent in Tennessee and we talked or Grandmother [Granny] into getting one for us to play with. We kept it in a cardboard box and one day when it bit me I dropped it on the floor and I think it died shortly thereafter. Erwin has been in residence here for almost two weeks and has not yet bitten any of us and that makes me happy too.

We just presented him with his first and very own ball to run around in. Since we are carpet-free, he gets around pretty fast.



So, although we are a large distance away from a big pet like a dog, for us, this is great progress. All the kids are enraptured, Emily is in her own pet paradise for now, and it's been a good thing. I know I shouldn't say never, however, I do know one thing for sure: NO CATS ALLOWED!