Jack Update

Well, I have an update on Jack (Eli's Rabbit).

Tim came in from taking the trash Sunday night and said to me, "Jack's dead." I said, "Jack who?" He looks at me and says, "the rabbit." We'll tell the boys tonight and try to get him buried before it gets dark.

We figure that he had internal injuries from his episode earlier in the week, click here for details. He did have some fur that was missing on his hind quarters where maybe the dog had gotten ahold of him but he had gotten away.

So now we have another rabbit to bury. I wasn't really very excited about feeding the rabbits in the cold of the winter, all winter, but this is definately not what I wanted. And our neighbor has never called to check on the rabbits, if the boys are okay with seeing their rabbit(s) die, to see if we need a new cage or anything. I'm actually pretty disappointed in that. Not that he can do anything about it or that I would expect him to, but to not call and ask the questions, seems very rude. But they are just rabbits, and the boys don't seem to think it's that big of a deal, so I guess it's all fine.

Goodbye Jack. You were a fiesty, somewhat shy, but spunky little rabbit. We'll miss chasing you around the yard when you would get out after Noah would forget to shut the cage. We'll miss you Jack. I'll miss you Jack.

Jack is Safe

We got home today and Tim had already found Jack (Eli's rabbit) hiding under a bush in the front yard. Tim didn't have any trouble getting him and carried him around for awhile and then got the cage put back together enough to keep him safe...unless the dogs get out again (see what happened yesterday here).

We hadn't buried Superman yet so Noah goes over to him and asks him if he's okay, and then says, "Well, he's not moving." So we had to talk about what being dead means again. And Tim tried to explain to them that we don't pet dead animals, which was hard for them to understand.

Eli said later, "Well, I don't know if God is going to make Superman come back alive again or not. 'Cause he can, but I don't know if he will or not." I said, "I think if God was going to make him come back alive, he would have already done it, so I think he'll stay dead." We need to get that rabbit buried, and quick!

I do love the faith that my boys have, we tell them God can do anything and they believe it. It's hard because I want them to continue in that faith, but I also don't think Superman is coming "back alive", so I need to balance that for them so they understand it's what God wants and not what they want. That's a hard lesson, one that I still struggle with as an adult.

So we're thankful today that Jack Rabbit is alive and well, and only a little worse for the wear. We're thankful he's a wirey, quick little thing that the dogs couldn't catch. And we hope he won't be too lonely without his brother.

Goodbye Superman

When we were pulling up to the house last night I noticed there was a dog standing in our driveway.

We don't have a dog.

The dog had something in it's mouth. It was white. As we got closer I noticed it had some black spots, Superman is white with a few black spots on his back. This dog had Superman in his mouth, I'm thinking, "How the heck?!?"

I got out of the car and called to the dog. He dropped what I thought was Superman and he came running. He had a collar, a tag and an electric fence receiver thing on his collar. He was very friendly. Then he went and got the white thing and brought it to me.

It was Superman. He was still alive but not moving. I told the boys to keep the dog away from the rabbit and I ran in to get a towel. Running around to the back door I see the rabbit cage torn apart and no sign of Jack. On my way back out I saw Jack hiding in the weeds in the courtyard. By now the dog had moved Superman again; the boys were not very effective in protecting him.

I picked up Superman and wrapped him in the towel like a baby. Noah says, "He's our baby." We found a lid to a box to put him in and left him in the kitchen. Then we went to catch Jack but the dogs were chasing him so we ran the dogs off (oh, there were 2 dogs by this point). And then we couldn't find Jack, so we don't know what became of him. Our hope is that we just couldn't see him since it was dark and he's black and that we'll find him today.

I called our neighbor with dogs, but theirs were in the house with her. I didn't know of anyone else around that had big dogs.

I called the animal shelter but a recording said to call 911, but since the dogs were gone so I didn't call and started cooking dinner. Meanwhile, Noah is carrying around the lid with Superman in it saying, "This is my baby. Mine baby." It was too sweet, but I was afraid all the carrying would make him die.

Then out the back window I see the dogs are back and are sniffing around for Jack. I called 911 and they said they would have someone call me. By this time I get Tim up and he helped us tie up the younger dog so at least it wouldn't be after Jack again (if Jack is still alive).

The animal shelter people called me back and I gave them the tag numbers for the dogs and it turns out they are our other neighbor's dogs, and we didn't know they had those kind of dogs or we would have just called them (we only have 2 neighbors and they both have over 50 acres so it's hard to know the goings on of them). So then we felt kind of stupid since we could have just called our neighbor, but we didn't know and, they did tear apart the cage to get to the rabbits.

Next a police officer showed up to make sure the animals weren't vicious and that the shelter had contacted me and was contacting the owner. Then Tim called our neighbors and they had been out on their 4-wheelers and stuff trying to find the dogs. Apparently someone left their front gate open and their electric fence isn't working so the dogs got out. Once the gate was shut the dogs didn't know how to get back in so they camped out at our house.

When we got back inside, Superman was no longer alive. I told the boys that he had died, and Eli says, "But his eyes are still open." Like, see Mom, he's okay. Even after I said he was dead Noah wanted to carry him around and was picking leaves off of him and uncovering and covering him. He's so caring (although maybe not so observant to notice the object of his affections had passed on). Eli asked if we needed to send Superman on to heaven. I told him if Superman was going to heaven, he was already there, we just had his body.

Here's to you Superman. You were a rowdy fun-loving rabbit who loved grass. We'll miss you.