We're all a little Nutty

Today I helped in Kindergarten and before leaving, the teacher asked if I'd watch the kids while they were at recess. I was touched by the kindness in some of the things I watched the kids do. First, there was this little boy who has captured my heart because he is so not catching on academically. However, even though he is in his own world when it comes to learning, he is a sweetheart and the kids look after him. I watched as one of the other boys pushed him in the swing and they both smiled big smiles. Then there was this other boy -- one that you think would be a "tough guy." He sat there watching a group of three other kids running around pretending to fight bad guys. I asked him why he wasn't playing with them and he said that he didn't know how to play what they were playing. Further inquiring on my part led to him revealing how afraid he was to ask to play with them and how uncomfortable he was with pretending, especially pretending something he...

All summer long, I've been watching this spider in our garden. It spins a beautiful perfect orb web and has grown from the size of a fly to the size of my thumb. That means it has been working hard to reduce the number of pests in my garden...I'm hoping it mostly eats grasshoppers. Yesterday when we went out to pick tomatoes (that's the downside to this beast as it is attached to one of my tomato plants and makes me a little fearful to pick the tomatoes on that side), it was snacking on a bundled bug in its web. While we watched this nature show, I noticed that there was a praying mantis nearby. At first I thought the mantis was caught in the web, but then I realized he was just sitting there watching and waiting. Lo and behold, today there is no black and yellow spider, nor is there a neat web. The info I found online said they eat their web each night and rebuild it the next day, but I can't help but wonder if the mantis caught him off guard and had a snack of h...

Usually I don't pay for school pictures because they never turn out well. But, this year I decided to do it because I didn't have the energy to take the kids to get new ones for the wall in the family room. So, for the first time ever, we paid attention to what they were wearing and really combed their hair, etc. Lizzie changed clothes 3 times and then even curled her hair. When I picked the kids up from school yesterday, Lizzie said, "Mom, I don't want you to get mad, but I forgot to take my jacket off for my picture today." I was not pleased. If you could see her ratty brown jacket that she wore over her cute turquoise shirt, you would know why. Grrrr. At least there's always retakes. Not like I can actually trust the photographer to take a good picture if they can't notice things like, "hey kid...are you supposed to be wearing that awful jacket for this picture?"! Good grief.