School shenanigans

I'm so excited to be back to school! I'm having a blast in preschool most days, and we've even had two butterfly releases. The open one, above, had about three days of containment before we let him go, and of course, his neighbor had erected the chysalis right under the zipper of the container we needed to open to release the first one! And when we removed the remaining Very Hungry Caterpillar to use his container to corral the first butterfly until we could get him outside, said Caterpillar made a break for it. Fortunately, everyone ended up where they belong and it looks like our caterpillar is done gorging himself and is now upside down, contemplating his perfect spot on the roof of his container. Here's hoping the temps don't drop tremendously during the two weeks he's doing his thing out of sight before his release....

Here's me on my first day as a preschool aide. We've decided to take it month by month as there's a lot of moving parts like kids who need one on one attention now who may not later, thus shuffling personnel around. For now, I'm thrilled to be part of this team, loving on these kiddos, and having a ball singing songs, supervising lunch, lamenting that children don't always want to nap though adults usually do, helping with crafts, reminding that we go UP the ladder and DOWN the slide, and so on. It is a LONG day for small people. Don't forget to tell a teacher how much they are appreciated! There really are heroes without capes- I work with a bunch of them!

"First" day of preschool!

 

Springtime loveliness

I love the flowers at our house. These are Japanese meadowsweet, I think- some sort of butterfly bush. If I was a bee, I'd hang out on these with my friends and giggle about being tickled. Don't they look like such fun!?

This gorgeous moth had me fooled. I thought he was a leaf and I bent to swipe at him before I realized he was holding on tight in the cross breeze through the garage. He stayed put all day before heading off to adventure elsewhere. Such a fancy friend!

Blackberry blossoms, above, are beautiful! I had no idea! And the photo below is also some kind of berry blossom. I must have missed them blooming before, because I was unaware that they were growing in a spot on the side of our property until all of a sudden there were white blossoms but not where our black raspberries are... yippie!!

 

Easter snippets 2017

Easter was hot, sunny, and windy. You'll be able to tell by all the squinty eyes in the pictures and the way our clothes are flapping around. Pap came to visit, helped with the hidden Easter basket clues, and contributed to general shenanigans. 

Do you see how charmed Damon is by the butterfly sitting on his shirt in the picture above? It was the second time it had landed on him. 

"I solemnly swear I am up to no good..." All they need are wands.

Summer in the city. Just kidding.

Spring finally got around to the whole let's-settle-down-to-business thing. The trees have budded up, the flowers are showing up, and the weeds have decided it's high time to take over the world. Here's some greenery (and other colors thrown in for good measure) to kick start your Monday:

Cute tiny spider above and cute tiny butterfly below.

There's one of Carrie's froggie friends on top of the pond "fountain", which clearly needs de-gunked, again.

Missed the irises at their peak, but the colors are still lovely even if the blossoms are dilapidated. And check out those vigorous fingery weedy things. They have little suckers on them and hold on tight when you're yanking them out. Then they hold on tight to YOU.

Lots of these guys are garden-bound. We went to a FFA sale to get a jump start on our veggies this year since our grow lights and seeds didn't happen. We bought some tomatoes, an eggplant, a brussels sprouts, assorted herbs, and then the boys and I went a little crazy on the flower side of things since we can't resist color. Betcha can't guess who picked out the cheerful yellow citrine flowers.

Muggin, these are those vibrant lilies you were so impressed by last year. The hummingbird really liked them, too. They're not ready yet, so I guess this post is to be continued!