Monarch Photo Essay

On day 37 of Alex the Great's lifecycle, we knew that hatching time was drawing near,

his crysalis was beginning to become translucent,

as opposed to the nice rich green he was a few days ago.

This morning the crysalis was completely see through. It was time for the big event.

If you want to see the actual hatching, you can watch the video here.

He then hung upside down for quite a while, as the extra fluid from his body pumped into his wings.

We got him onto a stick as he filled his wings and began to dry. This took a couple hours.
It was also real neat to watch him stretch out his proboscus. This is his mouth part that sucks up flower nectar.
We had to leave for church, and I expected to find him flying around the house when we arrived home and an hour and a half later, but he was still drying on his stick.

I think he was waiting for Mark to show him the great big outside world.

Gracie's caterpillar, Anjolina, hatched yesterday morning. Anjolina was also raised at home from an egg. Gracie was very brave this year while she carried Anjolina outside.....


much braver than she was last year during hatching season.
You can tell that Anjolina is a girl
and Alex the Great is a boy because

of the two black wing spots on the underwings of a male monarch. (This was very lucky, since the kids named them from the time they hatched.)

Mark was very proud to take Alex the Great outside to be released. Alex the Great was very happy to pose for a few minutes so that everyone could say goodbye.

And then, up, up, up he flew. We spotted him for the last time at the tippy top of a tree in the field next to our yard.

Have a happy life Alex, we wish you good luck. We hope you will migrate to Mexico and then come back again next year.

Monarch Success

From a hatchling....

To a fat caterpillar....

To chrysalis...

Today Alex the Great made his adult entrance into the world.

You can watch Alex hatch on the video in the previous post.

Day-38 The Big Event

Please go congratulate...

my niece Jenny and her husband Brad on their first "official" day of homeschooling their three beautiful girls. I am sure the My Three Girls blog will prove to be a wonderful inspiration for all of us "seasoned" homeschoolers!

Pictures of the Day?

I don't know either.

September Author Fiesta-Jim Arnosky

Happy September, and happy Author Fiesta.

We are so happy that this month's author is one of our favorites, Jim Arnosky. His website is loaded with information, included a set of animal coloring pages that we love around here.

I was unable to find a coloring page for our favorite Arnosky character, Crinkleroot, so I put my daughter Amy in charge of creating a drawing suitable for the younger kids to color. Here it is below, click on it, and you should be able to print it out. UPDATE: I guess the link isn't working, so you will have to save the picture to your computer and then print.

If anyone knows how to add a PDF file to a blogger post, please let me know.

Picture of the Day

Toddler School-Stop and Go & Farm Animals

We had some "red light, green light" fun a few days ago. Kim and Luke love it when we are stopped in traffic. They watch for the light to change and yell out "Green--Go!"
So we put red and green construction paper over a state fair paper fan, labeled it STOP and GO and then expected the children to follow the proper "red light green light" rules.

They didn't follow the rules though, so we played....
take turns holding the sign while everyone else ran around and yelled a lot. (Kim and Luke did consistantly get the colors correct-so I guess the colors red and green where reinforced.)
They also learned what to do when Mommy yelled "FREEZE!"
And as you can see, Kimberly is exceptionally good at "freezing."
The barn and farm animal printout proved to be much calmer and also contained a good deal of educational content. I found a great new site called Kizclub, and it contains tons and tons of free, very cute printables for our youngest learners.

You could use it for phonics, and beginning reading. We used it as a prop to accompany the singing of Old MacDonald Had a Farm.
Gracie changed the animal as we sang the song so that Kim and Luke had to name the animal and then make the animal sounds. They loved this, and we have played it over and over (and over) again.

You have got to love free activities to keep the littles busy and learning.

First day of school/last day of summer picnic

Well, we got down to some serious schooling today. Officially we started the new year, and from the looks of the concentration that Grace and Mark were displaying this morning-it was very serious business.

But, we could only be studious for so long, so by this afternoon....
we were ready for some end of summer fun.
First, we enjoyed lovely hors d'oeuvres prepared by Grandma. Even Gracie's dolls enjoyed the goodies.

Then we gathered around a campfire in Grandma and Grandpa's backyard. It was a perfect day.

For the past two years, Grandma has wanted everyone to enjoy cooking a hotdog on a stick over a fire. She has very fond memories of her and her parents doing this when she was a little girl. I did remind her that her family at the time consisted of 3 people, whereas, we would be arriving with 12 people ( make that 13-Matt's girlfriend Alexis joined us)

I guess Daddy didn't feel that the normal, ordinary fire was good enough for this hotdot feat, so he added a "little" kick to the fire.
As you can see, we did it. And everyone is smiling and it was very fun. Gracie kept remarking how happy she was because "everyone" was with us today. As the kids grow-up there are fewer times like this when everyone is available to join us for a fun filled afternoon.

Look closely at the previous photo......
Grandma is a non-stick holding trickster---just posing for the picture.LOL She did grab a stick and hotdog when the congestion around the fire thinned out.

Matt and Alexis were a little late arriving, so they earned their own picture.
Grandpa and Gracie spending special time together.
Luke and Grace walking the "dog".

Youngest and oldest
I just love dirty faces, which is good, because there are usually an awful lot around here.

Hotdogs finished, it was on to s'mores. Matt helping out Luke.

Yummy
Yummy and dirty

Just plain dirty( and quite hyper)
Laura's catch of the day.
Grandpa,
as the fire goes out on another beautiful summer.