The Bunny Saga - an emotional rollecoaster of lost and found and missing.

I have an emotional rollercoaster of a post for you on a Friday.

This is Bunny:

Ezra got bunny in April 2021 (I think Bunny was a present for Lily, but Ezra liked her more)

Bunny has been to Sweden and back.  Bunny has been to nursery and back.

A few weeks ago, on Saturday night, Ezra asked me to get bunny. 

"Where is bunny?" I asked

"I left him at the park" said Ezra.  My heart sank.

Andy went out to the park to look for bunny.  Some parks get really weird at 8pm on a Saturday.  Bunny was nowhere to be found.

The next morning, Ezra and Andy rode to the park to look for Bunny again.  Bunny was not there. 

On the way back, they stoped at our local shop and asked if anyone had handed in bunny. "no" said the cashier, "but there was a post about a bunny on facebook yesterday."  She showed Ezra and Andy this picture:

There was bunny! Right there.  But, bunny was not in the park.  Andy and Ezra put up a missing bunny sign on the wall of the park.  Reward for return of lost bunny.

A few nights later I was doing some compulsive googling to try and see if I could get a similar bunny for a pound or two.  I happened to find that exact bunny for sale on Ebay and Vinted.  The same photos were on each ad.  There was literally one of those bunnies for sale in all of the UK.

And it has been listed 1 day after we lost bunny.  

And they were selling it for £20.

I messaged the seller, just out of curiosity on why that one stuffed bunny was so expensive.  Was it a collectors item? Did I not realize Ezra had been carrying around an expensive limited edition toy?

I got the following weird message

"Hi, I primarily sell for friends and family and this is the price at which I was asked to list this. I do not query their prices and so am unable to answer you as such. Thank you for your interest,"

Andy got back from cycling then and I showed him the message and the bunny and the lack of any other bunny for sale anywhere and the fact that it was posted for sale 24 hours after losing our bunny.  It was all too much! Had someone stolen our bunny?

I decided to buy it on ebay with a fake name and delivered to a third party address, in case this bunny thief was going to come after us.  If it was our bunny we would know from the postage - if it was sent from our town I was pretty sure this was some bunny thief and we would *not* be paying ebay for it! Thankfully ebay has a lot of buyer protection so we felt OK about the purchase.

 It was quickly posted from over 300 miles away.

Obviously it wasn't our bunny.

When it arrived it was not in good condition so I did manage to return it.  We decided it was a learning journey for everyone.  We had not told Ezra about the bunny sleuthing.  He seemed pretty much over it.  I sometimes forget that things that feel SO BIG to parents are quickly nothing to kids. 

A few weeks later - last Tuesday in fact - someone texted Andy that his dog had found bunny in the woods behind the park and he had seen the lost bunny sign.

Bunny seems to have lost her dress, and she obviously needs a wash.  BUT... it appears we might get bunny back tomorrow.  I think I'm more excited than Ezra about this (although we haven't told him, because who knows what might happen, or whether we will actually get bunny back).

That is the saga of Bunny, blogged for posterity.  I know I need better hobbies than going down internet rabbit holes(!!!) after a missing bunny. But also... it's bunny. It will be so nice to get a win.

Also, kids are no longer allowed to take precious teddies out of the house.

Saturday Update - Bunny was brought to our house by a super nice dude.  Since the missing bunny sign offered a reward we gave him some cookies and some dog treats.  Bunny has seen better days but she is now in the washing machine:

Saturday update 2

Bunny cleaned up well.  Ezra was very happy to cuddle a clean bunny and to have bunny home.  So am I.