The monarchs returned in a gigantic wave on Tuesday, and they were scattered liberally all over the neighbors’ bushes, along with several other species of butterfly:
This picture gives a good idea of the concentration of the butterflies.
A mourning cloak butterfly was also enjoying the nectar from the bushes.
There is a cute little pair of house finches that like to visit the feeder, and they almost always come together.
Three at a time!
The grackles that love to come to the feeders are not so cute. They are also greedy and eat twice was much as the littler birds. They don’t let any other bird on the feeder while they are on it, so while they are eating a line of four or five finches and sparrows forms on the swing set, waiting for the grackle to finish.
Joseph helps me water some lilies I transplanted last fall.
John plays with one of the many snakes that like to sunbathe underneath the black plastic in the garden.
Daniel making mischief helping in the garden:
More crocuses:
To get a really good idea of how different this spring has been from past years, I went back and looked at pictures of this same group of tulips in full bloom. This year they started blooming on April 1, and last year thy were blooming on May 7, and the year before on May 15!
This bulb grouping has been a great success. I planted four tulips and two daffodils in the fall of 2007, and now there are over twenty tulips and nearly thirty daffodils!
Interesting mushrooms Joseph found in my garden.
Doing a little weeding in the garden, a small splash of yellow caught my eye. I looked down and was astonished to see that it was a flower no taller than my thumb.
I was wondered for a moment where it had come from, then suddenly remembered the crocuses I had planted last fall. I have been waiting for them to come up for several weeks now, but I had been looking for them on the opposite side of the garden!
I got this bird feeder as a Christmas present from Mom and Dad. Even though Landon and I set it up immediately, all through the winter no birds came to it. But as soon as the weather turned spring-like, it became very popular quite suddenly. A combination of sparrows, grackles, and finches are on it almost all of the time, and often there are two or more perched on it. It has been very amusing to watch the birds’ quarrels over who eats first. Sometimes there is a line, with the larger birds on the feeder and smaller birds perched on the swing-set waiting for them to leave.
When I was taking this picture, a pair of cardinals flew into one of our trees. (The first cardinals ever in our yard!) They didn’t stop at the feeder, but I had the camera ready to take a picture:
We spent the last weekend of February in Minneapolis. Dominic was pretty excited about the hotel where we stayed, and he crawled over every inch of his new territory.
When we arrived at the hotel, we had Chinese food delivered to our rooms. (Daniel ate as he was getting into his pajamas)
The next day, we went to the aquarium underneath the Mall of America.
We petted starfish and sea urchins, and neither of them felt like I expected. The starfish were velvety and squishy. Sea urchin spikes were not sharp and pointy, and they were much softer and more pliable than I thought they would be.
Daniel was way too scared of the starfish to even put his hands in the water, but he was very impressed by the sharks, manta rays, and sea turtles we saw.
Here is the link to the local news article with Mom and Dominic’s picture: Sign of the Cross Marks Lent.
This afternoon we went to Ash Wednesday mass at the Cathedral. An Argus Leader newsman was taking pictures, and he snapped this one of Mom and Dominic. It went to be a part of a collection of pictures of Ash Wednesday being celebrated around the world on the Denver Post!
Dominic is feeling pretty proud of himself.
This week he figured out how to crawl.
But looking back at past pictures, I see that Dominic is over a month behind Daniel, who not only was crawling by this time…
But was doing this as well!
And this!
That’s all right, Dominic, I’d rather not be chasing after you climbing up the stairs.
I was very busy in January, and the month sped by faster than lightening (thus the lack of posting.) In the beginning of the month the whole family took advantage of the +55 degree weather (WOW!) and went on a walk at the Outdoor Campus.
The third Saturday of January, I woke up at 5:00 in the morning to go to Huron to compete in the annual Science Bowl. Our team ended up doing really well, and we landed in 6th place.
January was also spent practicing for the one-act play competition. Our play was about superheros pretending to be insane to hide their true powers. Landon was a superhero called Brainstorm with weather powers, and I was ‘Mental’ and could read minds and erase memories. It was a lot of fun, and we ended up taking 2nd place at the competition.
Tapioca starch makes the sauce of this classic dessert luxuriously silky and thick. Double the filling and put in a 9×13 pan with a streusel topping for a great crisp.
5 granny smith apples, some skin removed and chopped into 1 inch pieces
3/4 cup sugar
3 T sour cream
3 T Tapioca starch (the key to the perfect sauce)
1 t fresh ground nutmeg (fresh makes all the difference)
1 1/2 t cinnamon
Pie crust in a 9 inch pie dish, plus extra pie crust for on top
Preheat oven to 350. Mix first five ingredients together until smooth, then pour into pie crust. Top with second crust and cut several steam vents. Cook 45-50 minutes, until crust is golden and you can see boiling through the steam vents. Edges of the pie crust often need to be covered with tin foil halfway through baking to protect them from burning.
