She decided to get an early jump on hunting when she spotted a squirrel in the yard a couple of weeks ago. She made Analee keep an eye on it while she ran inside for her BB gun.
(Sidenote: Our yard is lousy with squirrels, and they've proved to be quite the pests. They chewed apart the awning on our swing and the net on our trampoline, among other things.)
After hitting it a few times (she's a dead eye, that one), she finished it off with the shovel and put it in the wheelbarrow for safe keeping until Seth could come home and take care of it for her.
Rebekah exhibited a bombardment of conflicting emotions after getting her first kill. She came inside smiling--but with tears running down her cheeks--to report that she had been successful in her first hunt. Later she asked me if I thought Heavenly Father was mad at her for killing a squirrel.
I asked her, "Why did you kill it?"
She answered, "For its pelt and to eat it."
"Then I don't think He's angry with you."
(I also would have accepted, "Because they're pests.")
She also said, "Now I'm a hunter. Will Dad be proud?"
As soon as he arrived home from work, Seth took the girls out in the shop and talked about hunting while skinning and butchering the squirrel. He made sure to tell them that we don't kill things for fun; we have to be responsible with our hunting.
And then he cooked us up some squirrel.
That, folks, is the smallest frying pan we own. Squirrels don't supply a whole lot of meat.
Rebekah with the cooked squirrel.
Rebekah, Seth and I all ate squirrel that night. (The other girls respectfully declined.) We can all report that it doesn't taste like chicken.
And after the pelt had been sitting in salt for a while, Seth cleaned it and mounted it for Rebekah. After all, if Seth can have an antelope head in the family room, Rebekah ought to be able to have a squirrel pelt in her bedroom.
Rebekah, her BB gun, her dad and Shelly the squirrel (as Rebekah named her).