The missing piece

For Christmas the boys got a train table. It has 8 thousand pieces that refuse super glue, hot glue and crazy glue. Next step-- screws and bolts. Anyways, they love it, but I spend more time putting it back together than they do playing with it. Yesterday, it was truly a disaster, and after I rounded up the pieces and proceeded to re-build the complicated tracks, I discovered we were missing a piece. A large elevated red bridge piece. So I told Judah to look for it in his room, and we scoured the playroom. No such luck. I checked the bathroom, Canaan's room (which is spotless), in the couch cushions, and in every toy bin we own... nada. I lectured Judah about taking care of his toys, and the importance of stewardship, blah blah blah. I said we could give away toys if we have so many that we can't even locate this largish RED piece... I was beyond frustrated, and I told them until we locate the bridge piece, we can't play with the table. He dutifully cleaned the playroom, and no luck. Just about then Kevin got home, and I left for an appointment. I filled him in on the situation, told him that they weren't allowed to play with the train, and to be on the look-out for the missing piece.

5 minutes later, I got a phone call from him. Apparently, he conversationally said to Judah, "I hear you lost the red bridge piece to your train table." Judah said, "No, it's not lost." And then he trotted into his room, opened his closet, and fished it out of the trash can in closet. Kevin grinned and gaped at him, and asked him why he threw it away, and Judah shrugged and said, "It was broken."

Okay, we literally spent about 30 minutes looking for this piece, discussing this piece, and then having a consequence for losing it, and never once did it occur to him to "find" it in the trash, until Kevin got home. Maybe I wasn't clear...