Pete the Parrot

Sometimes the silliest things give me the most laughter. Holly received a gift from her Grandma called "Pete the Parrot" for Christmas, primarily as a joke and a reminder of a good laugh that the two of them had doing Christmas shopping the day after Thanksgiving. As the story goes, they first saw the toy hanging in a Walgreen's. It takes a snippet of something that you say and repeats it back at you twice, much like the proverbial 'Polly want a cracker' parrot that mimics a phrase or two.

It seems that Holly and my Mom spent a good deal of time in front of this bird, talking and laughing as it repeated everything they were saying. Holly opted not to buy it because it really wasn't anything she needed, but my Mom (being a very observant and thoughtful shopper) went back to get it as a final Christmas gift.

Holly started laughing as soon as she opened the gift and began telling us the story of finding the toy when she was shopping. Wanting to share the excitement with all of us, she put the batteries in and turned it on - sure enough, it started to repeat phrases that she was saying, which made us laugh, which made Pete the Parrot laugh, which made the dogs bark (remember - we have the Christmas Daschunds there), which made PETE bark - pandemonium then ensued.

I will admit that we got a good laugh out of this gift and will probably never be able to look at Pete again without thinking of poor little Freckles (he is the larger and more anti-Pete the Parrot of the two doxys) going after him, determined to shred his feathers! Doggy want a parrot?