NaBloPoMo 29: The return of Fred

Since I'm missing a post and I'm a little anal about not actually having 30 posts in 30 days, here's a quick one.  Then I'll post another one.

I've talked before about Fred.  He's a toad that keeps showing up at our house.  We find Fred in the strangest of places.  This year, he didn't show up at all until last month.  It was a bit surprising since we've seen more frogs and toads this year than almost any other year.  One frog, which our kids and some friends were watching in the sandbox, promptly hopped out and directly onto Melkamu's nose!  I kid you not.  A little green tree frog.  It stayed there just long enough for Melkamu to say "AAAGH!!" and then hopped away.  Once Kamu got over the surprise, he thought it was really funny.

But of Fred, we saw nothing until early October.  Then I happened to be looking out of the dining room window one day and saw him on the tiny little window ledge there.  I figured that was our Fred sighting for the year. 

Less than a week later, however, I happened to lift up a flowerpot on our back deck railing and lo and behold, we found Fred.

And this year, he brought a friend!  The two of them lived in the flowerpot for about a week.  Fred's friend hopped away on a lovely fall day, and a few days later Fred had also left. 

It's always fun to see where and when Fred will show up.  The weather is cold enough that I know we will not see him before next year, but we will look forward to the First Fred Finding of 2011!