RIP Stripey the Duck

One day Tanner came home from mutual with a box and said close your eyes. We knew it would be good! Kaydence opened up the box to find a tiny duckling! She fell in love immediately. Tanner found it on the side of the road with no mama in sight. We kept it in the bathroom that night and left food and water in a box for him. Kaydence said "Mom, wake me up a whole hour early so I can play with Stripey before school". That night, she even went to her bedroom while she was supposed to be getting ready for bed and she made a drawing of stripey. Kaydence woke up and got ready for school in record time and went to play with Stripey outside. Afterwards, we put him back in the box and we went to school/work. I got a call from Tanner a couple hours later saying Stripey died! I was heartbroken, even more so knowing how heartbroken Kaydence would feel! It killed me all day because I couldn't tell her until I picked her up from my Mom's house after work. After I got off work, Tanner and I decided to bring Stripey's body over with us to my Mom's to add him to the animal graveyard in their backyard. When I got there, the first thing Kaydence said was "Mom, let's go home right now so I can go play with Stripey!". My heart! Ugh! I side-stepped it and waited until we were out by the car to break the news. I told her and she was in shock and started balling. We had a very nice burial for him and she said some nice words for him. She said "even though I didn't know you longer than a day, I love you so much!". To this day, she still thinks of stripey and gets emotional over it. She is such a tenderhearted little girl.