Snail Tales

Forest attended a science camp at our church this year and about 2 weeks before camp they sent out an email saying that children with small pets (particularly frogs, lizards, and snails) were encouraged to bring them for show and tell.  I’ve mentioned here before, and those of you who know Forest know that he struggles with extreme shyness bordering on selective mutism. Recently he’s made enormous strides and has even started initiating conversations with strangers so I thought rounding up some snails to bring to camp might be a good icebreaker for him to get some conversations started with his teachers and classmates. 

The 4^thof July was super stormy here and rainy days make for excellent snail-hunting weather.

 

Forest got a little distracted while snail hunting....

We ended up with 4 pet snails (all named Gekko, because PJ Masks is life and who can tell one garden snail from another?), and have learned all sorts of fun things by observing them for a few weeks. 

1) Snails like to cuddle. We got 3 from the same plant and 1 rando guy and the 3 from the same plant are always huddled together. 

2) They sleep most of the day but seem most active in the early mornings and around bedtime. 

3) We’ve tried various foods (Blueberries, spinach, cucumbers, carrots, tomatoes, and strawberries) and cucumbers are by far their favorite dish, but they also enjoy strawberries and spinach. 

4) Snails build their own shells so they need lots of calcium rich nutrients in their soil. We got coconut bark soil and also put an egg shell in their terrarium. 

I’m not sure how the actual 'Show & Tell'  went but Forest said he told his teachers all about his snails. In the hallway before camp started, he was chatting up all the kids about his pet snails and he and a frog-owner were comparing their pets and how they went about acquiring them (Forest told him we almost had a pet baby frog but he kept hopping out of our hands and also we didn’t want to have to feed him bugs). 

 It was really amazing to watch him be so comfortable being the center of attention and had me wondering if our little shy guy is actually turning into a bit of an extrovert (*gasp*). Well, that might be stretch, but we love our introverted guy and all we want is for him to navigate social situations with confidence and without anxiety and I think he’s really turned a corner lately. Praise God! 

There is a praise song called ‘Do it Again’ by Elevation Worship that I’ve been listening to on repeat lately. It mostly just talks about how God is capable of miracles (even if they are on His timeline), and if you would have told me a year ago Forest would be thriving socially, I wouldn’t have thought it was possible. But through prayer God has given us peace and reassurance in our most anxious moments. Seriously, as soon as I made an appointment with F’s pediatrician to get a referral for an evaluation, I picked F up from school that day and his teacher said ‘Forest spoke in circle time for the first time ever today!’. Later that week he spoke in BSF class for the first time and the next week his teacher said he sang the loudest of all the kids during music time. 

We still have hiccups for sure, but still, he is lightyears beyond where he was even 6 months ago so I’m hopeful (and prayerful) we will be able to tackle some of the remaining hurdles during his Pre-K year before he gets to Kindergarten.   “I’ve seen you move the mountains and I believe I’ll see you do it again. You made a way when there was no way, and I believe I’ll see you do it again.” 

As for the snails, we will be releasing them back into the wild soon, but they love this certain plant in our yard so I have no doubts we will be visiting Gekko, Gekko, Gekko and Gekko there frequently.