Caterpillars, Kids, & Other Critters

We now have 8-10 caterpillars in our milkweed. This is the first real "crop" of caterpillars we've had naturally since last year's fogging massacre. The monarch mama(s) preferred the young plants and laid most of her eggs there.







































2 of the 8 caterpillars Uncle Ron gave Danielle for her birthday made it all the way to butterfly-hood. We were lucky enough to finally watch one eclose today. I didn't realize the wings were that small when they first eclose! In just a matter of minutes the wings expanded to full size. We let her sit in the sun to dry her wings, and she was flying around a little bit several hours later.



























































Danielle and I are experimenting and trying to "train" our hummingbirds. We are trying to get them to perch on a bowl in our hand. There is one bird, a juvenile male, that seems very comfortable with us. He will eat from the feeder even though we are less than a foot away from it. He almost perched on the bowl the other day - I felt his wing graze my hand. Even if we don't get him to land on it (but we will), it is really neat to get such a close up look at him. These pictures are from when we first started a couple days ago. He gets much closer now.






















One of my cousins got married this weekend. It was cause for the kids to get dressed up, which they enjoy. (I do not.) Aren't they pretty, er, handsome?
























I saw this cicada at the park on Saturday. I didn't realize they were so colorful. His wings look a little tattered, but he was making plenty of noise with them!
























This is our last week of summer vacation. I had the kids make a list of all the things they still wanted to do (or wanted to do again) before going back to school, and we are trying to fit them all in. So far we've gone to the pool and to "Rocketland". We still need to fit in a butterfly/frog catching trip, another trip to the waterpark, a trip to the giant inflatables place, an evening program at the metropark, and a hot air balloon festival. (Some of those were on my list.) The way I figure it, we have just enough time. Have I mentioned how much I dislike school?? It really gets in the way of life!