This weekend the children had to say ‘goodbye’ to a family pet and ‘Frosty the Snowman’. No doubt you will pick up from previous posts that the fact the Frosty stopped working and the garden centre had no replacements brought some Christmas cheer to my mind! We no longer have a tacky poor looking skiing snowman outside our house!

The second goodbye was somewhat sadder, especially for Joe.

Batman, the ‘more adventurous’ partner of his Batman and Robin duo of gerbils died. I returned home on Friday to be told that Batman had escaped. I looked at the cage and thought way’ and decided to have a look around in the peat of the tank when all children were away from the probable discovery I would make.

Joe was very upset. These were his first real pets. I am always, however, struck by the depth of Joe’s faith and understanding for a 6 year old. He asked if we could bury Batman in the back garden. I dug the hole and Joe placed the carefully wrapped (albeit in newspaper!) dead body of his little friend in the hole n then lovingly covered the hole with the dug out soil. He then found two small pieces of wood to make a cross to mark the grave.

We then stood in silence for a little while. When I asked ‘What do you want to do now?’ he asked to go inside and get on with life! As I said, a simplistic and uncluttered view of life and faith. Yet another example of what it is to be ‘as little children’.