LOVELY LUNA Life Cycle Complete!

July 4th, 2010

What a wonderful way to mark the 4th of July!

Independence Day this year is marked by the completion of the Lovely Luna Life Cycle!

It all began on May 1st when a group from Del Tech was netting bats for a study on our local Big Brown Bats. We had the blessing and good fortune of a large Luna Moth getting caught in the net. I took it home with me and it turned out to be a female who laid some eggs over the next few nights.

About 10 days later they began emerging from their eggs and readily started eating Sweet Gum leaves which I had read were a good food source.

After a couple of weeks the caterpillars were eating way more leaves than I could provide so I decided to switch them to walnut leaves which were larger and more plentiful. They made the change easily and kept on eating until mid June, going through several instars. Finally, they started rolling up some leaves to make their cocoons for their Marvelous METAMORPHOSIS!

It seems like forever to wait, but it took about 2 weeks. I went out to the porch this afternoon and there in their enclosure was the first Luna Moth to emerge!

It's a male and I'm calling him my Yankee Doodle Dandy because he was born on July 4th!! I hope to have several more emerge to contribute to the Luna Moth population here in the White Clay Creek area.

Turtle? Tortoise? Terrapin?

Earlier this month, while I was in search of beaver at the beaver pond I came across a creature that I haven't exactly identified. Is it a turtle? Is it a terrapin? I doubt it is a tortoise. It's not a ROCK, and it's not a snapper.... But just what it is, I'm not sure. Take a close look and if you think you know what it is... Let me know. It's not the sharpest of pictures, but the sun was going down and I was loosing light.

Beaver Season

My good friend Ray shared this great picture he got of our beaver recently!

BEAVER Tail Slap

Monday, April 5th, 2010 is a day I'll never forget!
John and I decided to take a ride down to the Beaver Pond
to see if there was any activity and BOY were we surprised!
Not only did the beaver come out; I got some great video clips.
One was of the beaver doing a terrific tail slap!
CHECK IT OUT! I also got a clip of the beaver on patrol.

4 BLIZZARDS -- OFFSPRING OF WINTER

4 BLIZZARDS -- OFFSPRING of WINTER

We have had 4 Blizzards so far this winter.
And it's very possible we may have more!
We're going on 80 inches of snow.
Who could have imagined it!

4BLIZZARDS -- and each one unique...

just like children

BLIZZARD # 1 December 19, 2009
PRECOCIOUS!!! Arriving a few days before the official start of winter. Lots of heavy snow, but welcomed by many to set the atmosphere for Christmas!

Then a break between the 1st and 2nd of a few weeks.



BLIZZARD # 2 February5/6, 2010
BIG andBOLD!!! A sizable child

over 2 feet of snow,
filling up our driveways, decks and roofs;
beautiful in its massiveness!!!

BLIZZARD # 3 February 9/10, 2010

ALMOST A TWIN Coming just 4-5 days

after Blizzard # 2. Massive in size,

almost as big;

a layer of sleet in its middle.

Beautifully dense snow pasting

everything like papier mache!

BLIZZARD # 4 February 25/26...2010

Unexpected SURPRISE

Late Bloomer.....Full of Bluster

Snow - Tiny, crystalline - like granulated sugar

Reminiscent of "March of the Penguins"

Tests our patience

February 5-6, 2010 Blizzard

Big Blizzard February 5-6, 2010





No Grillin' Out Tonight

No Gettin' Out Today

Bo Has a Problem Too



Come Help Shovel

Were You in Ms Thomason's 6th Grade Class?

REMEMBERING THE CLASS

I could walk across the street to get to school!

Memorizing Robert Frost poetry

• The Road Less Traveled


• Stopping By The Woods On A Snowy Evening

Edgar Allan Poe - The Gold Bug

Ms Thomason read the story to the class (You're never too old to be read to)

Gym Class -- Ms Thomason being 'beaned' by a baseball while everyone was yelling "Heads up!!"

Ms Thomason's comment about visiting the Jungle --

"Once you've visited the Jungle you're never the same again" (We all wondered about that!)

Math was hard that year.

Our State reports -- Each of us selected a state to do a comprehensive report on. I picked Arizona and had the pleasure of seeing that state on a cross country trip that following summer.

What do y0u REMEMBER???

What a Baby Costs

What a Baby Costs by Edgar Guest

"How much do babies cost ?" said he
The other night upon my knee;
And then I said: "They cost alot;
A lot of watching by a cot,
A lot of sleepless hours and care,
A lot of heartache and despair,
A lot of fear and trying dread,
and sometimes many tears are shed
In payment for our babies small,
But everyone is worth it all.

"For babies people have to pay
A heavy price from day to day--
There is no way to get one cheap.
Why, sometimes when they're fast asleep
You have to get up in the night
And go and see that they're all right.
But what they cost in constant care
And worry, does not half compare
With what they bring of joy and bliss--
You'd pay much more for just a kiss.

"Who buys a baby has to pay
A portion of the bill each day;
He has to give his time and thought
Unto the little one he's bought.
He has to stand a lot of pain
Inside his heart and not complain;
And pay with lonely days and sad
For all the happy hours he's had.
All this a baby costs, and yet
His smile is worth it all , you bet."

"It is never too early to begin impressing upon our children by both word and deed, the responsibilities of parenthood. Part of the job of raising children is raising them to be successful parents themselves." (William Bennett from Tnhe book of Virtues)

What's Facebook?

What's Facebook? Well by definition it must be a book of faces; so here's mine!
OK, so I'm a little younger than I am now, but this is me! Kinda cute, huh!

I'm new to facebook, and as a __aged new G-mom facebook has been an eye-opening experience. I know it's been around a while, but I was personally introduced to it by my daughter as a way of staying connected to family and get to see all those grand-baby pictures I adore!
(OK, so you guessed by now that this is a picture of me when I was a lot younger!)

A big plus to facebook is you can make friends fast! Which is definitely a plus if you tend to be on the shy side like me. I made 30 friends in 30 days! I've never been able to do that in my whole life! OK, so some of those folks are family, and everyone knows you can't choose your family , but it's nice to have a base you can count on! (I do have a relative who hasn't accepted me yet, but 'Oh Well"!

Another big plus has been the ability to connect with people from your past! You can type in your High School and the year that you graduated and VOILA! there appears a list of former class mates! Only catch is that they have to have preceded you on signing up on facebook!
I was able to connect with a good friend throughout school, including HS and also a friend with whom I had lost touch. She was my very first friend in the whole world! We used to play in the sandbox together! We even spoke to each other for over an hour in REALtime on the phone on New Year's Eve! You can connect with people across the country(probably the world) right from the comfort of your own home, right on your PC! Great! Right?

So is there a down side? Well, it can pull you away from the REAL world, and distract you from your real family and current friends. So much so that some would say it's addictive. I understand that some have adopted virtual lives for their real lives! I think that's sad! There are also games you can play on facebook that can be fun, but you can also get sucked into over-doing that as well!
There's also the potential to get hurt by your friends on facebook; either accidentally or on purpose. People can ignore you, people don't have to be your friends, people can say mean or catty things, and people can accidentally miss your posts, and that can make you sad. So when that happens you find yourself engaging in interactions just as you would in the real world.

So, facebook has to be taken with a grain of salt and kept in balance along with everything else that is going on in your life. It can be a vehicle for easy communication, but it can never replace the time spent in real world face-to-face interactions with family, friends and loved ones.
Nothing can replace having dinner with someone or picking up the phone and talking to someone one on one in real time!

HOPE

Let us all hang on to HOPE in the face of tragedy in the world today!

The news is full of images of misery, agony and tragedy in HAITI.

This rainbow was photographed on vacation in the Caribbean;

what a contrast to the images we're seeing now.

It's still the same Paradise....in Haiti, Paradise Lost!

Let's HOPE that with lots of help and rebuilding that

Haiti too can be part of Paradise...Regained!