Leo Belnap’s parents have learned a valuable lesson when it comes to hiding their savings.
When Ben Belnap received season tickets from his parents to see his beloved Utah Utes, he decided to pay them back, according to NBC News. So Ben and his wife, Jackee, began saving up a stash of money to hand over to his parents as a token of appreciation for their gift. The couple kept the savings in an envelope — which, once they were finally ready to pay Ben’s parents back, had mysteriously disappeared.
They desperately looked for the money and overturned many items in their home, all in the hopes that the envelope had accidentally slipped underneath them. But everywhere they looked — whether it was under the rug or the couch — the couple came up short.
That is, until Jackee looked inside their shredder, where $1,060 in cold hard cash had been turned to bite-sized strips of paper.
“I’m digging through the trash and she hollers and says, ‘I found it,’ ” Ben, from Holladay, Utah, told NBC. “She’s holding the shredder and she says, ‘I think the money is in here.’ We started laughing. We were just baffled that this could happen.”
The culprit? The couple’s 2-year-old son, Leo.
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“As devastated and as sick as we were, this was one of those moments where you just have to laugh,” Jackee told ABC 4.
“Honestly in my heart, I said some day this is going to be really funny,” Ben agreed.
But not all is lost, though, as the couple said they have been in contact with the U.S. Department of Treasury, who told them they may be able to replace the money that was ripped to shreds.
“Most people they say oh, a kid drew crayon on the wall or something,” Ben told NBC. “I’ve never heard of a kid shredding a grand.”
Of course, Leo will likely hear about the funny story for years to come — especially when he asks why he can’t use the shredder.
“We have a lot of Leo moments,” Jackee added. “Most of them are just funny, and we laugh about them for days and big jokes, but this was one of those moments that wasn’t his greatest, but we love him.”
