Backyardigans

When we bought our house six months ago, I could hardly contain my excitement with finally having a big yard. I grew up in North Ogden on about an acre of property. Now that I'm 30, I have a better perspective of acreage. When I was seven, that acre of property might as well have been a jungle. I can't even explain how much I love watching my kids exploring on the half acre we live on now. At least once a day, Tyton will ask, "Dad... can we go on an adventure?" I've learned when Tyton says "adventure" he just means "walk around and look for something cool to do".

Right before we moved in, the seller decided to tell us about some things she didn't like about the house. Most of them involved the various animals she's had to deal with in the back yard. Her least favorite were the garter snakes. The idea of having garter snakes, raccoons, squirrels, weird breeds of water rats, and other miscellaneous creatures just made me more excited. My wife was excited, too, until a raccoon (we think) climbed into her car window in the wee hours of the morning and ripped open 3 ranch packets that were left in a Burger King bag on her front seat. Ranch and raccoon hair on black upholstery do not a happy wife make.

So, we were all outside about a week ago and I was moving around some hoses that littered our hill and were also semi-concealed under some tall grass. I caught something out of the corner of my eye and immediately thought it was a mouse. I called my boys over and told them to look closely as I continued to move things around hoping they'd catch a glimpse of the same mouse or rat. I picked up a large tree branch and, again, glimpsed about 5 inches of what appeared to be a rats tail. At this point I started to get a little nervous because this could end up being a very very large rat. I told my boys they should probably take a few steps back just in case the rat decided it wanted to get even and go after them. Well, surprisingly, they remained... undeterred... until they heard my wife say, "Oh I see it. It's down here. It's a snake." You would not believe how fast my kids can move when they think there's a snake within 50 yards of them. And they didn't just scream once, like my wife does when I hide behind the bathroom door. They continued screaming the entire time the snake was in their field of vision. My wife was eventually able to calm them down and, though it hurts to admit it, she was the one who eventually caught the snake by the tale while simultaneously holding Season with her other arm.


I put the snake in a small container to allow closer inspection by my children. After they saw me pull the snake out of the container, they became much more comfortable and began handling the snake themselves. Since then, Tyton and Boston are almost always on a "snake search" whenever they go into our backyard... and they've found them on more than one occasion. It makes me love my house and yard even more.

PS There's a good explanation for what sounds like Betsy nagging me on that short video clip. Betsy didn't know I was taping when my neighbor requested 8 additional feet of hose for a sprinkler system repair. I was purposely ignoring him since I was preparing to capture the "snake chasing" on video. I have since promised Betsy I would tell her when I'm taking video so she doesn't look and/or sound stupid. Sorry, honey.