Swimmy And Waggly and Fin And...

Pets in the house! Pets in the house!

For Darcy's birthday, Michael bought all the components of a small aquarium. We're not going back to the craziness of the marine tank (I only wish! I miss my live rock dancing worms!), just to some tropical freshwater cuties. Of course, the tank had to sit around "cycling" all week long before fish were allowed to enter, but today, we headed to Oregon to a couple of small fish shops to buy the livestock. Really. That's what the creatures that live in fish tanks are called in the biz.

Michael didn't want to overload the tank all at once, so we brought home five cardinal tetras. And a piece of driftwood. And three fake plants. And some fish flakes. The fish seem to have made it home in one piece, although they're not looking too lively right now. We're letting them have a relatively stress-free night and we'll hope that they're all very happy and schooling around in the morning.

Darcy has started to name them. I voted for the same name for all five, being that they're basically identical, but Darcy has other ideas. That one is Swimmy. That other one is Waggly. There's Fin. And I think the other two are waiting for inspiration.

Consider us petted.

Shark Attack!!!

As you may know, Darcy's current obsession is with all things ocean. We play fishy games pretty much non-stop at home, and she had my cousin Tina, her friend, and me all "growling like barracudas" with her a couple nights ago. It's fish, fish, fish all the time.

And so she loves going to our (very small and overpriced) local aquarium. Often. She went with Betty when she was here. And then last week, her preschool took a class trip there. And she's already anticipating going with my parents when they visit starting this weekend. Oh, and she had already been there three times before the aforementioned trips.

One of the highlights of Ocean World is that you can pet sharks. Darcy never has, but she talks about it a lot. She pets the starfish and has touched the anemones, but never the sharks. She will, however, hang out in a great white shark's mouth:

She doesn't seem too concerned about Michael's well-being, does she?

The World Of Fish

Yes, I'm aware that this is a bird's egg, not a fish egg, but in Darcy's world these days, it's all about fish, so I felt I could include another picture of the murrelet egg that shows it's beautiful color better.

Darcy briefly returned to her obsession with the Wright brothers last month, but then quickly moved on to fish and all thing ocean. Finding Nemo was part of the inspiration, but I think the bigger culprit is Crescent City's aquarium, Ocean World. We've been three times now and, as an adult I can tell you that it is exciting three times only for a small child. It is a very small aquarium.

Yesterday, we drove south to hit a sporting goods store for Michael, who has joined a men's softball team for the county's organized league. He had his first practice late in the day and hasn't owned cleats for a decade. We also went to Arcata's art festival, which was a bit of a bust. Darcy insisted that we go back to the phenomenal ice cream shop as we walked past it to get to the car. I had a half-scoop of the almond rose vanilla that was outstanding. Last time, I had lemon poppyseed. Also a revelation in a bowl.

The point of this is that we were in the car heading south and Darcy asked if we were going to Fish Town. For her, the only answer is yes. After deciding that Eureka is Fish Town, she then dubbed Arcata, Octopus Town. So we asked what Crescent City is, and she informed us that it's Shark City.

There was a short pause and then she started naming other places she's lived or visited a lot. "And Las Vegas is, um, um, um, um.....Sea Urchin Town!" Even Primm -- PRIMM -- got renamed as Sea Anemone Town. What I loved best was the um-um-um in between naming the town and deciding on its new moniker.

A mere two and a half weeks ago, I was stopping tears about the thought of moving by promising airplanes on the walls of her new room. Now, we're planning an undersea fantasy.

But we're not stupid. The walls will be a nice neutral blue and we will be using wall stickers for the fantasy. I'm sure we'll be replacing them with the next obsession in a few months.