“Moms! Moms!” The clamor of 3 sets of feet running up the basement stairs and excited shrieks alarmed Helen Belden.

“Moms,” gasped Brian. “We got skunks.”

Moms spun around and stared at her three young kids.

“Where?” she gasped.

“They’re in the basement window well,” explained Brian.

“Peter!” yelled Moms in a panicked voice that brought him running.

After a quick explanation to their father about the presence of the skunks, the five Beldens ran down into the basement and stared into the window well where five babies tumbled and crawled around. They could see the mother skunk anxiously hovering above her babies. They noticed that she would climb down and carry a baby out, but then that baby would follow her back into the deep recess when she tried to bring out another baby. Trixie slipped her hand into her mother’s hand and looked up at her.

“Can we keep them?” she asked. “They’re so cute. They could live in that dollhouse Aunt Alicia gave me.”

Moms, horrified, shook her head violently. “No. We need to get rid of them and we need to do it now.”

“But how, Moms?,” asked Mart.

The five stepped away from the window and began discussing how to safely remove the skunks.

“I don’t have a gun,” murmured Peter. “But I could back the car up to the window, start it, and let the exhaust take care of our problem.”

“I think that would take care of all of us.” frowned Moms.

Helen, Peter, Brian and Mart returned to the kitchen and debated various methods of removing the odorous critters. Trixie continued to traipse back and forth between the kitchen and the basement window.

“Hey Daddy,” she called out. “Maybe if you used the ladder to Brian and Mart’s bunk bed, they could climb out.”

Mart sneered at his little sister. “Dumb idea!”

“Hmmm...that might work, Trixie,” her father said. Mart’s head snapped up as he stared at his father in disbelief.

Peter cautiously walked out to the barn and searched until he found a long plank. He cut some grooves into it and then carefully carried it towards the trapped skunks. His family watched from the confines of the kitchen as Peter quickly slid the board into the window well and backed away. The five Beldens ran to the basement to see what the skunks would do. They held their breaths and watched as the mother skunk led the five babies up the plank, through the garden, and back into the woods.

“See, I told you that would work,” shouted Trixie gleefully as Mart scowled at her.

Peter rubbed his daughter’s tousled curls. “Good thinking, Trixie. You did a great job solving our problem.”

“Thanks, Daddy. I didn’t know solving problems could be so much fun. I wanna do this again!”

“I think that’s a good idea, Princess.”

“Yes!” Trixie shouted as she pumped her fist in the air.