A long while back, Arrow declared she was ready for pets of her own.

To test the validity of that claim, we gave her a challenge: clean her room for 100 days.

It took about a year to get that puppy done. Some days she was highly motivated and kept it clean for days on end. Then there were periods of disinterest that eventually blended into plum forgetting about it.

But she did it!

…only to be met by a long period of deciding on what type of pet she could have. It turns out, there were a lot more restrictions than any of us realized.

Based on our tiny square footage, arid climate, and budget, it really came down to a small rodent of some kind. Which she did NOT want. No, she wanted a tortoise or snake or bird or any kind of animal that needed space to roam, which we unfortunately just don’t have.

So she sat on it for months, hemming and hawing,

Well, the day finally came, and she decided two little mice would be just right.

Introducing the newest members of the family: Missy and Cheese Thief!

It’s kind of funny how much prep went into bringing these pets home. $100 in supplies for two baby feeder mice! Meanwhile, Junior happily kills field mice and leaves them on the doorstep for me to enjoy.

That irony didn’t stop Taylor and I from checking on the mouslings at midnight last night, puzzling over a leaky sipper bottle. (These water bottles are just as bad as from my childhood days of keeping hamsters 🤦‍♀️)

Safe to say we are big fans of these two mice. Especially Arrow 🙂