"The first guy in my world"

So my daughter has an obsession with small. tiny, miniscule items, be they beads, plastic animals, chips of sparkly sequin, pebbles, and basically anything smaller then a dime. This magpie tendency wouldn't bother me in the least if her toy de jour wasn't so darn hard to keep track of. For example in a brief moment of Norah being asleep and Seth resting trying to rid himself of the cold we've all had Abby and I had an opportunity to take Asia for a nice walk. And it was a great long trek of a walk I let her choose the directions and pick the corners to turn and we circumnavigated our little corner of Spokane over a period of 45 minutes.

I'm thinking Great! 49 degress outside, sunny, no rain, fresh air excercise and she is still clutching her little metal toy froggy in her hand showing him all manner of trees and leaves and sticks and such. This particular froggy is an old necklace charm of mine that was given to me by a friend on my 13 ish birthday, I found him the other day while looking through old boxes and gave him sans necklace chain to Abby. ( mostly because she has a habit of trying to chokle herself with anything resembling a rope, string, chain etc.) . He is a well travelled little metal froggy, and made it around the block and most of the way home.... most.....

So I've finally convinced her to climb the porch steps and head toward the door when the inevitable question arises " but mommy, where's my froggy?".... crap.... seriously? I mean I warned her and told her and tried to put him in my pocket and her pocket and have him 'ride' in my mitten but no... she had to hold him and now I have 4 blocks worth of cement including leaf piles, moldy grass, drains, ditches, mud puddles, and cracks to search for a frog the size of a dime. Not to mention the fact that he is black and green mottled with just the right amount of orange thrown in to look exactly like a leaf on the ground.

Great, okay here I go, down the driveway.. no frog... around to where she picked up a stick.. no frog... mud puddles ( am I really going to put my hand in there? ) well she is following me crying her eyes out bawling " But he was the First guy in my world mommy! that little froggy guy" okay great hand in puddle... no frog.. not by the light pole... not by the mailbox... anywhere on the muddy driveway? fat chance of finding him on the gravel, as he blends right in even on the bright red couch .'okay Abby let's look up here, by the house' ( and not to be fooled, my daughter who is wise to my gently prodding her closer and closer to the house so I can smoothly usher her in the door before she realizes it walks the othe way entirely). SO as she pelts down the driveway calling for "froggy guy! where are you??" and I resign myself to another 20 minutes out here looking for the damn thing I glance at the porch ;

And there by the house, looking as smug as his little froggy face could possibly look is that damn frog on the FRONT PORCH no less, beside the door. Seriously. ANd you should have seen her face, the adoration , the content knowledge that "of course mommy found him ,that is what mommies do". SO am I super mom because I found this stupid frog overs acres of territory? or am I just plain dumb for not looking around my own feet before trekking all the way back to the dirty house around the block with all the toddler luring garbage and mud puddles for a front yard?

No more small shit. only big big big shit. Like maybe I'll buy her a pony.

And when I can pry the little thing out of her grasp I'll take a picture for you all.