Samuel the spoon spider is a very friendly and harmless spider… in fact he loves to make new friends and to dance in the sunshine so that all his sparkles sparkle in the sunlight!

My son is utterly obsessed with spiders. We live in Australia, which is home to a great many types of scary spiders that can make you very unwell if you get bitten! Little ones are taught at a young age to “call an adult” if they see a spider, rather than trying to investigate themselves.

We live close to a forested area and the back of our house looks onto a reserve. Subsequently we have a fairly healthy supply of spiders (largely harmless) that always cause great excitement and shrieks of “SPIDER!” plus enthusiastic toddler pointing. This is always shortly followed by a speedy spider rescue expedition, with an animated running commentary from my son on what’s happening and what we should do. There’s also generally a song or two about Incy Wincy spider.