When you have eight grandchildren, there is bound to be a request or two that seem a little out of the realm of reality. When I was asked to bring back a baby black bear as a souvenir, I reacted as though it was something anyone would do. I figured I had a week on a cruise ship to figure it out.
And figure it out we did. In Skagway we managed to find a cardboard box just about the size a really small baby bear might fit in. I put a little newspaper in the bottom and then got truly creative.
We had packed some candy to nibble on as we traveled and in the bag was a couple of midget Tootsie Rolls. I stuck them in my jeans pocket while I did my morning walk on the ship. By the time I got back they were warm and pliable. I stretched them a bit and molded them and stuck them to the newspaper in the bottom of the box. Voila! Bear poop!
I tore a hole in the top of the box to look like that was the escape route of our baby bear and readied myself for all the questions I knew I would get when we arrived with our missing souvenir. (In all fairness, I did buy a small stuffed black bear as a substitute.)
The box was received with awe. Not one of them thought I would really get a bear. I apologized for the missing bear saying I had no idea where it went. When they looked inside, they saw the "bear poop" which elicited several "eewwws."
My granddaughter would not be fooled so easily however. Several time she sniffed the box and then stuck her pencil in a "turd" and sniffed it. When she was satisfied, she took a big bite out of the turd and sent her siblings screaming to their mother, "She ate bear poop!"
When they realized it was chocolate, I was afraid they might be upset with me but they looked at me with a twinkle in their eyes. They knew they'd been had but they were enjoying the ruse and besides, now they had a Grandma who could teach them how to make bear poop.
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