Bug Collection

Presenting the Doodlebug Ladybug Fall 2012 BUG COLLECTION!

I was reading a while back on this great blog post about how the average American kid can identify thousands of corporate logos, but can name less than 10 plant or animal species indigenous to their area.  That inspired these parents to learn about native species by doing a leaf collection with their kids. 

The Doodlebug/Ladybug, however, aren't so much into leaves.  But do you want to guess what they are into?  BUGS!  My kids are endlessly fascinated with creepy-crawlers. 

We kept running into bugs on the farm all summer, and it turns out there are some really nasty looking bugs that won't hurt you at all.  For instance, there are bugs that are disguised to look like bumblebees so they can steal all the bee's food and nobody will bother them.  Apparently this kind of chicanery is rampant in the insect world.  Seems like a handy thing to know, right? 

The Doodle making his first catch:

 We've been pinning the insects to a piece of cardboard so we can look at them carefully and look them up to read about them. 

We realize this makes us supremely dorky parents, but the kids love it.  They run up to other kids on our walk and announce "We're looking for INSECTS!"  It's very much the cool thing.  :)

SeptemberFest

Last weekend we went to SeptemberFest at the Governor's Mansion.  I posted about this last year.  We had so much fun.  Here's Franny going down a giant inflatable slide.  Now, this girl isn't afraid of anything, and she has been on inflatables and giant slides on numerous occasions.  So when someone asked if she would be okay on this 25' slide, I was like, "Are you kidding me?  She's got this."  Well, wouldn't you know it, she got to the top and was scared to come down.  I had to go up and get her.  

Here she is going down another one.  After the first, she was good to go!

There were some FFA kids with a little petting zoo.  They had lambs, chicks, a turtle, a pony, and the sweetest little piglets.

The Ladybug milking a cow.

The kids both got to ride horses.  They've ridden ponies and donkeys before, but I think this was their first time up on a full-sized horse.  You can't see Atticus' face that well in this picture, but he was absolutely positively beaming the entire time.  He was thrilled to be riding that horse.  

This is such a cool event to take kids to.  There was so much to do, and there were short lines for some things, like the horses and the inflatables, but I don't think we waited more than five minutes for anything (except maybe hot dogs).

 

My mom's friend at the State Department of Agriculture showing us their gardens.  Instead of flower gardens out front, they have these cool gardens with vegetables and Oklahoma commodity crops like cotton, canola, and soy.

Anyway, so fun!  People with kids should definitely check it out next year!

Summer Catch Up

Hi, there!  We're back.  Back to town, back to school, back to wireless internet access at home.  Here's a quick catch-up post from this summer.  

First, we had an absolutely wonderful time back in Stillwater.  We spent hours and hours out at the farm working on the little house.  The kids pretty much had the run of the place while Craig and I were working, so they were as barefoot and dirty as any kid would want to be in the summer.  

When we got tired of chasing the kids, we found a great way to hold them in one place.  :)

 Here's the Doodlebug pretending to be Little Boy Blue (under the haystack, fast asleep).

Franny-girl was a kitten for about half of the summer.  Oh, and she finally decided she likes letting me braid her hair.  :)  I've been absolutely itching to braid it for almost a year, but she would never sit still.  I'm loving it!

 

The last week we were there, our (most wonderful) nanny had to go back to school, so I stayed home in the mornings with the kids and we went exploring.  So much fun.   

When I told the Doodle that I was going to stay home with them in the mornings, he got so excited and said, "You mean like a babysitter?!!"  ::facepalm::

What else?  Atticus is in preschool four days a week in the afternoons, and is doing great.  He had to get four shots at his doctor appointment and shed not a single tear.  Lady Frances is finally out of diapers at night, and is doing so well.  Her brother still comes and wakes up daddy when he has to use the bathroom at night.  Ladybug gets up and goes by herself, and if she can't get her underwear back on, she just goes back to bed without it.  We moved both kids out of their toddler beds this summer and into twin beds, so the kids think they are pretty big time now.       

Stay tuned  because I have lots more things to post and actually time to do it.  And an internet connection (!)