The other day I was in the living room with Ella and noticed outside the window a 2 foot tall dandelion and mentioned to Ella, “Look, there is a giant dandelion in our yard.”

She ran to the window and to see, but kept saying “where?” and I would say “right there in front of that bush”. She kept not seeing it, which happens with her sometimes she simply cannot see something right in front of her. (Yes, something Erin would say she got from me.)

It was raining outside so i just dropped it and figured i would take her outside to see it when the sun came back out.

A few minutes later she climbed in my lap and started asking me questions about lions. I am sure you see where I am going with this, but I did not make the connection at all!

“Daddy, are lions friendly?”

“Daddy, if lions are out of their cages will they eat you?”

“Daddy, if you touch lions pointy teeth will it hurt?”

“Daddy, if we pet the lion real nice will he bite us?”

I decided it was best to answer these in the least scary way, so I said lions are friendly, they do have pointy teeth and are dangerous, but they are not mad at us so they won’t eat us.

Apparently that calmed her fears and she excitedly said “OK, lets go outside and pet that giant lion in the backyard then. Does that sound like a plan?” (Yes, she says “Does that sound like a plan?”)

So then it all made sense to me, she thought I was talking about a lion in the backyard, so she was very disappointed when I took her out to see the weed I was actually referring to. What a sweet child.

I did mention to her, just for the sake of better-safe-than-sorry, that she should never ever pet a lion!