Puzzling mystery solved

After a perfect day yesterday, it was a cold, rainy day today.  While Emily was at preschool, Lincoln hauled out all of the wooden board puzzles.  Sometime last spring I noticed that all the animals (except the elephant) had mysteriously disappeared from the nice Melissa & Doug zoo animal puzzle.  Since then, many other wooden puzzle pieces have gone missing.  I was pretty sure I knew where they went because one day I caught Lincoln trying to stuff the elephant in the slot of the radiator cover (it didn't fit).  The covers are a huge pain to remove, so I've left them alone.  However, after painfully digging out six pieces a couple weeks ago at the same time as the pacifier incident, I decided to see exactly how many were in there.  After struggling to remove painted-on screws, I discovered an additional 21 puzzle pieces.  We now have all the pieces back for all the puzzles.  At least for now...