It seemed like a good idea at the time...

I really meant well.

We went to the Science Center last weekend, and I took a moment to steal away to the gift shop while my husband and toddler were busy turning a crank. I found a bag of plastic insects, and I couldn't believe how detailed they were. There were various beetles, a beautiful Monarch butterfly, and a very cool Praying Mantis, as well as some other neat night crawlers. My soon-to-be two year old just loves his plastic animals at home, including a cute little ant that he "won" on a trip to Chuckie Cheese with his grandparents, so I thought that he would just love these, too. I bought the bag of bugs and stashed them in my tote until it was time to go home.

Our little guy isn't always excited about leaving places, especially fun ones, so I persuaded him to go to the car with promises of bugs. He was so excited, thinking about his little ant at home, and he chanted "bug, bug, bug" all the way to the car.

We arrived in the parking garage, but he was reluctant to sit in his car seat. I told him about the bugs again, and he sat like a little angel while his daddy buckled him in. I reached into my tote, ripped open the bag of creepy crawlies, and with as much animation as I could I thrust the first bug I found toward him and echoed his chant: "BUG, BUG, BUG!"

My poor toddler's eyes welled with tears and he whimpered, "NOOOOOO! SCARED! SCARED! SCARED!"

"Bug," Toddler View

"Whoops!" I thought, "That one is a little big. I'll show him the beautiful butterfly. He'll love that one!"

"Butterfly," Toddler View

This, of course, produced the same results.

I terrorized him with a few more creatures that looked like characters in a SciFi Saturday night movie before I realized what I was doing. He finally stopped crying, and I learned a valuable lesson that day--the world looks quite different to my little guy's ever-exploring eyes, and I, sometimes unfortunately, have much to do with what he sees.

Epilogue: Since the dreadful bugs in the car episode, my toddler has made peace with the new tenants of his toy box. He is still very careful around them, but he does allow them out to play from time to time, especially if his loving but sometimes misguided parents are nearby.