Burning ants

Hayden came to me the other day while I was on the phone with Tracy and he wanted to burn some ants.  I told him that I didn't think that was a good idea.  He said he would be careful and he wanted to talk it over with dad to see what he thought.  It must be a boy thing because Tracy said he used to do that with a magnifying glass as a kid and he didn't see the harm in that.  We don't currently have a magnifying glass so Hayden was going to heat up the end of a stick to burn them with.  I told him to make sure that he just heated the stick and didn't start it on fire.  I told him he had 10-15 minutes to burn ants and then we were done with that.
Katelyn came in the door a few minutes later and asked where Hayden was.  I told her he was out back burning ants for a few minutes.  She happily ran out to join him.  I told her I would be out to get them both in a few minutes.  Five or Ten minutes passed and I went out to check on the kids.  Just as I step out the door, I hear Katelyn say "don't worry Hayden, you don't need to hurry back, the fire is going REAL good".  I could then see the trail of smoke rising from the side of the trailer.  I ran over there and sure enough, they had got twigs, old pine needles, old grass, etc. and had built a nice little fire on the concrete by the side of the utility trailer.  Although the fire was really not going to go anywhere, I made a huge deal out of it and told the kids that the fire department would probably be there anytime and we would get a big fine for starting a fire.  The kids grabbed their glasses of water and hurried and put the fire out so we didn't all get in trouble.  I grabbed a shovel and scooped it off to the side of the concrete and made sure it was good and out.  Hayden apologized for what he had done, his understanding about not lighting the stick on fire wasn't the same as mine.  They learned a good lesson and made me have a good chuckle.  I wish I would have gotten some pictures.