Nice Nature Pics, Rock Painting, and More (Mar. and Apr. 2016)

This was neat to see these two different spider species sitting in our garden tub.  The cellar spider (Pholcus Pholangiodes) was no surprise.  It's all I can do to keep them out. But the fishing spider (Dolomedes tenebrosus)
I didn't much like to think about where it had been before it got into our tub. Cree-py! At this point, though, we've seen so many different creatures in our tub.  Welcome to the woods.  Haha!

It's been sooooo nice to see an abundance of deer again in our yard and across the road, since Atlas has been gone. Atlas is a good dog, but he was not the right kind of dog for our liking.  I love, love, love seeing wildlife, and that dog kept it all away.

This was so neat!  William described what I thought might be a snowberry clearwing that you might remember my identifying in the past.  Trusten took me out to try to find one, though, and I saw this!  I knew it was some sort of moth.  It's abdomen reminded me of a yellow hornet.  Well lo and behold, it's commonly called a hornet moth (Sesia apiformis).  These two pictures are the best I could get of the fast-flying creature.

 Chubby ol' groundhog! (Marmota monax)  I LOVE these pics I got!

I wanted so much to get a decent turkey(s) picture this year.  It was my top priority nature photograph.  Well, technically I did get a "decent" one.  This is it.  I wish it was better.  It was very far away, and I zoomed to the max.  I do not know whether it is female or juvenile.  I don't yet know how to properly identify turkeys, unless it's an adult male.

I just thought this scene in our yard was absolutely gorgeous.  There was that beautiful stormy-blue sky background, all that greenery, and the magnificently beautiful purple irises (Iris sp.).

 This. Color. I'm in awe.

 Mesmerizing.

Remember these mushrooms when not dried out, and they were covered with silken web?

 A tumor or a mutated leaf?

A pair of mullein! (Verbascum blattaria)

 Stars-of-Bethlehem (Ornithogalum umbellatum)

I always see at least one four-leafed clover.  These were my first of the year, a pair right next to each other.

I didn't buy any plants for my pots this year.  I planted seeds, and Trust and Liv helped me.  I showed them how to add different collections of soil and such that I had in different containers.

My hens-and-chicks that my friend Shana gave to me three years (or four?) had once again outgrown their pot. I moved them to my widest container.  I sacrificed three to five of them, and I had to separate others and spread them out.  They're all doing very well again now.  Such hearty plants!  They're perfect for me.

Dianthus?  I'd have to look this up, but I think that's the name of these flowers.  Anyway, these are offspring of the plant I had last year.  They lived all through winter and then started blooming this spring.  I'm impressed.  We had a mild winter, though.  

I decided it was time for us to paint rocks again.  I got down my collection from a bag that was collecting dust on top of the refrigerator.  I cleaned the rocks and let them dry.  Then we waited a few days.  

This is my male mallard duck.  I have no idea why I used orange for the bill and not yellow.  I will add a white ring around the neck when I get white paint.  

 These were Elizabeth's and maybe Olivia's, too??? 

 Bianca spent the night with the kids, and these two are hers.

This is William's puffin, which will look really great once we get white paint!  He really needed the white paint on there at the beginning.  What a shame we were out of it.  

 Nathan's birthday ice cream cake.  

 Beef pepperoni (I slice summer sausage) and mushrooms

 SO good!  Taziki's Greek restaurant recipe for their chicken lemon soup.  I ran low on liquid.

One Saturday we ate at a friend's restaurant and then went driving down Butler Hollow in Seligman.  I wanted to go down there.  

Nathan was engaged, talking to his friend Dave the electrician.

How I wished I'd taken my camera!  Ugh!  But I didn't, so these blurry pictures are what I got.  This is how much of the road that got washed away.  Then the picture below shows what is to the right of this.  You can see people on four-wheelers driving down there.  We were in Nathan's truck and took a muddy route on the other side of the road and came out on the other section of the road.  This is more damage from the December flood that washed out a great deal of our yard and the bridge on the highway (that they're just now fixing, as of May 28). 

When Bianca spent the night, I took them all to the park before taking Bianca back home.  They were thrilled.  Poor Elizabeth did not want to leave.  She loves sliding.  She enjoyed swinging, too.

 William got buried in the sand!

 Girls playing with puzzles in optometrist's waiting room.

Wow!!!!!  I'm actually CAUGHT UP!  FINALLY!  Ok, so in a few days I will post May's post and then just review what we did for school and what summer plans and fall plans are. 

Until next time...

Winter Beauty, Speech Therapy, Delicious Food (Jan. and Feb. 2016)

January and February were full of getting used to a new routine, taking Elizabeth to speech therapy on Tuesdays and Thursdays and later adding occupational therapy and taking her for a psychological evaluation, as well as doing plenty else.

Quick pictures to cover these two months, and I think I will also write up a review of 2015 soon, and either in that or my March or April post I will detail this year's plans—educational and otherwise.

I love nuthatches!  (Sitta carolinensis)

We get a lot of cellar spiders (Pholcus phalangioides) in the house.  This one is in a bucket from the garden tub, draining a ladybug.  Look at its eyes shining!  This up-close shot displays the design on the spider's abdomen.

We had a mild winter, and on some days the kids wore short sleeves or even less.

I never tire of these breathtaking views.  I love this.

It's too bad those small branches were blocking the full view of this beautiful bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus).

This is my first picture of a juvenile bald eagle. 

Trust and Liv watch their Supercharged Science videos together, and Elizabeth normally sits and watches with them.

Elizabeth finds it to be no trouble to keep herself busy simply exploring the ground and other things outside.

I think I must be reading in my chair in my bedroom, and here the boys are choosing to do some school on our bed.

Olivia spent some of her money she received from family back on her birthday on getting her ears pierced.  She had kept going back and forth for a long time on whether she wanted to get them pierced.  She ultimately decided any pain was her gain.

I do apologize once more for the pictures posted that I took with my iPhone.  Maybe one day I'll go ask how much it would cost to fix the camera in it.  It really frustrates me that it stopped working the right way.  I now rarely take any pictures with it, besides screenshots, which look just fine.

Speaking of screenshots, here is one of William's CAT 6 test this year.  He was doing mainly 9th grade level work during this time, but he was working through his 7th grade math, so I tested him on 7th grade level (I tested him on 6th grade level last year).  Whereas last year he was overall slightly below average on math and well below average on a subcategory of math, he scored average on math this year, so I was happy to see his progress there.  Next year I will test him again, but since he will have by that time be just starting 9th grade math (he will be doing his 3 math credits in years 10-12, rather than 9-11, like I did in school), I will test him on a 9th grade level, even though he will be doing mainly 10th grade level work at that time.  The GE column on the test results lists the grade equivalent at which he scored.  He was on "high level" on vocabulary, testing like someone who has graduated high school, whereas on total math he scored like a seventh-grader, which corresponded with his doing average in the 7th grade level math he's been working on (but at 6th grade level in a subcategory).   He will start 8th grade pre-algebra during the summer, only doing lessons 2 days a week while Elizabeth is in therapy. 

Trusten and Liv share quite the hate-love relationship.  They do a lot together and are interested in some of the same things, but then Trusten will be hateful and Liv will be upset at him for being so ugly.  Here, though, reflects one of the times Trusten was sweet to her.  He drew several pictures, and she taped them to her bedroom door.  If I remember correctly, I think that's Nathan, Trusten, and Olivia in the truck, but I don't remember which kid is in the bed.

I was doing spelling with William, and Trusten was working on his social studies or his writing.

One night William made pizzas for dinner.  It was so nice to get a break!  He did a great job.

Oops!  Ninabess decided to give Dinosaur a bath.  I wrapped him in a towel.  Doesn't he look cute?

Ninabess brushing her teeth. I, of course, brush them afterward.

This is the lobby of Children's Therapy TEAM where we take Elizabeth.  

❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

Mmmmm...some of the mouthwatering delights I made.  Well, ok, pecan pie doesn't make my mouth water, but Nathan sure loves it.  The cupcakes below are marbled, gluten-free (coconut flour).  That was only the second time I'd made them, the first being for Elizabeth's first birthday.

And to end this post, I present to you a screenshot I found on my iPhone.  I let Elizabeth play on my iPhone or iPad, and I sometimes find screenshots of things like this when I get my device back.  It cracks me up!  Olivia screenshots things, too.  She has screenshot the same recipe from a cooking game over and over.  I think she must be trying to send me a message. 

Until next time...