The Crazy Key Family: Waiting room

If your husband ever begs you to let the kids have a fish, and you finally give in because he PROMISES you that he will take total responsibility for the fish, and said husband is in the Army, don't fall for it. Bless David's heart. He started begging me to let Jessa have a fish when she was about 3 months old. Every time we went to a store with cups of Bettas, he would pretend to be baby Jessa and say, "pwease, mommy! I wanna fishy!" I finally caved when Spencer was about a year old. I have blogged about our fish exploits here and here.

So what I am trying to tell you is IF you are married to a soldier, and your family has a fish, no matter how much your soldier may want to help with the fish, just face facts and add fish care to the list of stuff that you just have to handle.

Our fish each have a 1 gallon tank. I think they must spit water out of their tanks when we are not looking because they need more water pretty often. And about the time the level is getting low, the water looks cloudy, so I prepare to clean the tanks and give them fresh water. As with most everything in my life, I like to change the fish tanks in a grand and dramatic fashion. And I have a system that I have developed over time that must be followed. I fill a huge plastic fish bowl with 2 gallons of water and treat it with the magic-keep your fish alive-droppy-juice. I also fill a small plastic fish bowl with water and treat it with the magic juice. Then, I let the water sit over night. This is the way I make sure the temp is just right. It becomes the same temp as the tanks they are swimmin' in. (aren't I clever?) This way the actual changing water stuff goes pretty fast.

So last Tuesday, I got the water all set up in the staging area to get all room temp and ready. And finally, late on Wednesday, I was ready to actually fix our fish friends right up. I transfer the fish from their tank to the small fish bowl with the pretreated water, dump the tank, and set about the task of cleaning it out. My sweet boy wanders into the kitchen.

Mind you, this is the way I have been changing fish water for literally years. And both children have seen me do it a couple times a month. You'd think they had noticed the process before. OK, so maybe they noticed, but Mr. Spencer apparently has not ever thought about it before.

Spencer heads straight for the counter. He puts his little nose right up to the plastic bowl with the somewhat confused Betta fish swimming around in it.