Thursday, August 31, 2017

Mimi's Summer Day Camp, Day Fifteen --- Butterflies

August 10, 2017

We're at the zoo! And it's VERY hot!  I'm glad we came early.  
 Our first stop was at the Butterfly house.  
 Lots of different butterflies and feeders.  You really have to watch where you walk in there, or you could walk on one! 



 Outside there are some HUGE bug statues - a butterfly and a caterpillar! We also found some grasshoppers down the lane.

 We went through the snake house and the aquarium, too!

 Time out for a slushie! Did I mention it was hot!?

Honestly, the zoo needs to relocate this metal hippo statue - that thing is so hot in this Texas sun, I'm sure plenty of little ones get burned hands climbing on it.  There's a sign on it, but how many little kids can read it?
 We found the carousel - this was Joss's favorite thing.  She loved it! She chose the hyena to ride, and KT was on a dragon.

 I had to ride with Joss since John's not big on going around and around, and I didn't want to see him throw up at the zoo! ha!

The girls spent some time in the petting zoo - the animals were too hot to even move.  I don't blame them! 


 KT is a ladybug!

It was just so hot, so we left at about 1pm to go get lunch at McDonalds.  The girls got to play in their playground for a bit while John and I relaxed.


Then it was home for our daily swim.

 We had a little time after swimming, so we did some chalk art on the pavilion!  These turned out so cute!  I love my little butterflies!


Next week we're studying weather. See you then!

Mimi's Summer Day Camp, Day Fourteen --- Butterflies

August 8, 2017

This week we're learning all about butterflies! The girls started camp today by working on a page that demonstrated the four different stages of the life of a butterfly. We talked about the eggs (we glued rice on a picture of a leaf) that are laid on a leaf, then the caterpillar (spiral noodles) that hatches and eats the leaves, and then the chrysalis (a shell noodle) bursting into a butterfly (a butterfly sticker)!
We watched a little video on YouTube of this process as they were working on their worksheets. 


Up next we created butterfly feeders for the yard.  I got two plastic round trays from the Dollar Store, and John and KT went out to drill three holes in each on on the edges.  Then we tied these and strung colorful wooden beads on the strings and tied them together at the top.  John got each of them a carabiner to hand from the trees.  



 Silly girls!
Then we cut up some fruit real thin and laid it on the trays.  The girls then mixed up a thin syrup of sugar and water, and colored it. Then we went outside to hang them up and they poured the syrup in once they were up.



We'll have the best fed butterflies around!
Then we were off for our weekly trip to the library.
After lunch we made hair wreaths with ribbon, silk flowers, paper butterflies and any other little baubles that we could find.  They turned out very pretty!

 Of course, Joss wanted all yellow!
 KT made hers all by herself, even the hot glue!

After our swim (I didn't take any pictures!) we did some face painting - one of KT's favorite things to do in the world!  She does her own painting with a mirror, but I did Joss's butterfly.

Pink bunny
Joss was so tired, she fell asleep in my chair before we left for home!

On Thursday we're going to the San Antonio Zoo to see the Butterfly House, and of course all the other animals!

Saturday, August 26, 2017

Final Tally for Fruit Spring/Summer 2017

We had a pretty good year with the peaches, and have added several more varieties this spring.  The new trees and bushes are listed here along with the established plants.

Bad year for elderberries - we may have pruned them too severely last fall. Ditto for the blackberries. Just a poor year for them.

Still no apples. We planted these two trees in December of 2012, so they've been in the ground for 4 full years, so I'm pretty discouraged by them.  Thankfully they are pretty trees, so they'll stay for shade anyway. Sigh...


Fire Ant Ranch Fruit
Type Variety Pounds Ounces
Peach Rio Grande (4) 59 1 0.4
Peach Loring
Peach Red Skin
Peach Sam Houston
Peach LaFeliciana
Peach TexStar (2) 0 1 0.7
Apple Gala
Apple Pink Lady
Nectarine Suncoast (2)
Plum Methley 1 6 0.6
Plum Gulf Beauty (2)
Plum Santa Rosa (2)
Elderberries York/Adams 0 13 0.9
Blackberries Chester Thornless (1) 0 6 0.3
Blackberries Aztec Thornless (5)
Blackberries Sweetie Pie Thornless (3)
Blackberries Arapaho Thornless (2)
Raspberries Black (3)
Raspberries Glencoe Thornless (2)
Fig Brown Turkey
Mulberry Dwarf Everbearing (2) 1 1 0.8
Mulberry Russian (2)
Pear Orient
Pear Warren
Pecans Choctaw (2)
Pecans Pawnee
Pecans Kiowa
Grapes Various 
Total Fruit 62 9 0.7

Final Tally for Vegetable Garden Spring/Summer 2017

Putting the Spring/Summer garden to bed and getting ready for the fall. I love a clean slate, although I'm going to try to extend the tomatoes and pepper plants into the fall.  We had a successful garden this year.  

Type Name Pounds Ounces        
Beans, Green Jade 7 6 0.1      
Beans, Green Red Swan 2 11 0.1  
Beans, Green Calima  7 3 0.1  
Beans, Green Gold Crop 6 3 0.2  
Beans, Green, Climb Fortex (2) 1 9 0.3  
Beans, Green, Climb Purple Podded 0 14 0.8  
Beans, Green, Climb Red Noodle Yard Long 1 14 0.1  
Beans, Green, Climb Asparagus Yard Long 0 5 0.2  
          Total Beans 28 1 0.9
Beets Chioggia 3 14 0.9  
Beets Cylindra 4 12 0.0  
Beets Detroit Dark Red, Morse's  2 2 0.4  
Beet Greens Mixed 0 1 0.4  
          Total Beets 10 8 0.7
Broccoli Green Goliath 0 13 0.6  
           
Cabbage Cabbage Mix 4 15 0.9  
           
Carrots Dragon (purple)        
Carrots St. Valery Combined Total  
Carrots Tendersweet        
Carrots Sugar Snax 11 2 0.5  
          Total Carrots 11 2 0.5
Celery Utah Tall 3 6 0.0  
           
Cowpeas Queen Anne 2 6 0.3  
           
Cucumber Burpless F1 Hybrid 46 11 0.7  
           
Garden berries Huckleberry 6 7 0.7  
Garden berries Aunt Molly's Gard. Cherry 3 12 0.8  
           
Kale Nero di'Toscana 1 4 0.3  
Kale Siber Frill 2 1 0.9  
Kale Blue Curled Scotch 0 1 0.5  
Kale Lacinato 0 7 0.8  
          Total Kale 3 15 0.5
Lettuce Valmaine 0 1 0.1  
Lettuce Winter Density 1 1 0.4  
Lettuce Baby Oakleaf 1 3 0.2  
Lettuce Crisphead 0 7 0.6  
          Total Lettuce 2 12 1.3
Okra Jambalaya 2 8 0.9  
Okra Hill Country Red 8 6 0.6  
          Total Okra 10 15 0.5
Onion Red 2 8 0.3  
Onion White Grano 7 8 0.0  
Onion Yellow 1 0 0.5  
           
Pak Choy Extra Dwarf (2) 0 3 0.5  
           
Pepper, Hot Jalapeno 1 15 0.3  
Pepper, Hot Aji Golden 2 3 0.6  
Pepper, Hot Aji Angelo 0 13 0.6  
Pepper, Hot Bishop's Hat 0 2 0.5 Total Hot Pep 5 0 0.2
Pepper, Sweet Violet Sparkle 0 3 0.2  
Pepper, Sweet Surprise Green Bell 4 9 0.7  
Pepper, Sweet JR's Orange 0 1 0.2  
Pepper, Sweet King of the North 0 14 0.6  
Pepper, Sweet Yellow Bell 1 2 0.1  
Pepper, Sweet Gypsy Hybrid 11 14 0.9  
Pepper, Sweet Cubanelle 2 3 0.2  
          Total Sweet Pep 21 0 0.9
Potato Red, White and Blue 1 15 0.2  
           
Pumpkin Fortna White 3 15 0.5  
           
Spinach Regiment 6 13 0.8  
Spinach Red Kitten 5 7 0.5  
          Total Spinach 12 3 0.3
Squash, Summer Yellow Crookneck 0 14 0.4  
Squash, Summer Zephyr 1 15 0.2  
Squash, Summer Alexandria 17 6 0.4  
Squash, Summer Bennings Green Tint 13 12 0.1  
          Total Summer SQ 33 9 0.1
Swiss Chard Mixed Colors 2 0 0.0   Most of crop not weighed-fed to chickens
Swiss Chard Sea Foam 4 6 0.8  
Swiss Chard Orange Fanstasia 0 9 0.9  
          Total Chard 7 0 0.7
Tomatillo Amarylla 5 7 0.2  
Tomatillo Purple De Milpa 1 13 0.3  
          Total Tomatillo 7 4 0.5
Tomato Speckled Roman 2 1 0.9  
Tomato Costoluto Genovese 1 2 0.1  
Tomato Blanche Du Soleil (2) 7 12 0.4  
Tomato Dagma's Perfection (2) 8 11 0.5  
Tomato Blueberries (2) 4 1 0.5  
Tomato Mikhalych 13 5 0.7  
Tomato Japanese Black Trifele (3) 17 7 0.2  
Tomato Volunteers 0 3 0.6  
Tomato Carbon 5 9 0.5  
          Total Tomatoes 60 4 0.4
  Total Vegetables 301 1 0.2