WILBUR, MEET SABER

Aaron found some of his childhood toys in his parents' attic recently, one being a miniature farm play set. There are a million little plastic figurines mixed and matched from different sets. Dumping the box out, I wondered how many birthdays and Christmases he must have opened a gift to find another set of plastic farm animals to add to his collection.

We sorted through the animals and army guys, cowboys and Indians, tiny milk buckets and hay stacks, fence pieces and teeny birds that "sit" on the fence. I picked out my favorites and set up this barn-yard seen.

It reminded me of Homer Zuckerman's farm.


Here's Samuel the Sheep


And Gussy the Goose with all her goslings (except I think these are actually ducks)


Fern and Wilbur


And this is my favorite figurine, The Saber tooth Tiger. There wasn't a saber tooth on the Zuckerman farm, but I couldn't leave him out of my scene. After all the other animals went back in the box, Saber found a permanent home on my kitchen window sill.