Sometimes I Just Hurt When They Hurt

Areyna has become quite the bug/critter expert. Well, let me rephrase that, seeing as how they all end up being dead bugs/critters. She has become quite fond of God's little unique creations. We have had so many "pets" over the past couple of months in this house. Only a handful have survived, but they have all been deeply loved. The bug catcher has a permanent home on the desk in Rainy and Zeke's room. When the green sign goes under the door and the kids come walking down the hall Zeke always has his bubby and a bag. Areyna always brings her bug catcher to give an update on the livelihood of our newest family member.

A couple of days ago I found a baby tree frog in my garden that I caught for her. She absolutely LOVED it! He was pretty cute if I may say so. She carried him around the rest of the day and then he took residence on the desk through the night.

When Areyna walked down the hallway the next morning with tears in her eyes I knew we had a problem. She didn't say a word. Instead she just handed me the bug catcher with a shriveled up baby tree frog inside. I don't mean just a little shriveled up. I mean, he was about half the size he was the day before.

I mean, who knew tree frogs needed to be kept in water?!

All this just days after I accidentally smooshed her praying mantis while trying to re-catch him after Zeke knocked over the bug catcher. The critter-loving life is not a life for the tender-hearted. We have had too many losses to be able to bear.

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Zeke loves tools. He loves when Josh gets his own tools out to fix something. He'll run to his room and search out the same tool that Josh is using and go to work. He even comes out with the appropriate safety attire: goggles, hard hat and gloves (snow gloves, ha!).

Well, Josh has been slowly tackling the eyesore in our front yard this week and Zeke has been "helping". Zeke's gotten so into it that he'll get all ready to work in the yard before Josh will even get home from work. As soon as Josh walked in the door yesterday Zeke asked Josh to help him cut the tree some more=)

This picture were taken just moments before Zeke realized that his tools weren't cutting it...literally. He was absolutely devastated when his saw wasn't even making a dent in the limb. He kept saying "It's not working" through his sobs. It was SO sad!

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I know it may sound silly, but these seemingly small circumstances to us are huge to them and I can't help but hurt with them.

How much more do you think our Heavenly Father hurts over our hurts with us, even the little things.