Friends and Bees

Last week my friend Margo was in town. She doesn't come into town very often...so I get to see her about once a year. Fortunately, she was able to get together on Monday (my ONLY free day!). Synnove, who remembers her girls, Abby and Norah, was excited to have visitors. And thank goodness Soren is well-adjusted to being the only boy, because that situation seems to happen often.

As usual, Margo and I chatted while the kids played. We had few meltdowns, and only a smidge of whine (pretty good if you ask me). Abby, Margo's oldest, is quite the "pretender" and got the kids together to create a party with snacks and games for Margo and I. We played "toss the plum" and "find the plum" and had a mini scavenger hunt.

Self-portrait

Toeheads =)

Later that day, Adam planned on spraying the massive yellow-jacket hive above our garage. We only discovered it a couple of weeks ago and were shocked at the size!! I wish I would have had my camera out when Adam went on the roof to spray it. Adam didn't want to get stung so he put on a white "Hazmat-type" suit (something he inherited from his old job), two pairs of gloves, and a motorcycle helmet with a full face cover. OH MY GOODNESS it was HILARIOUS! He looked like an under-puffed astronaut. He didn't kill all the bees with the 2 cans of spray so he's gonna have to go up there again. Maybe I'll get a picture next time!!??

Spider Overload!

I don't know about ya'll, but I've had about enough of this spider craziness! It's reminiscent of a horror movie outside. I can't even walk though my front door without being "webbed" every morning. I have never in my life seen such and explosion of garden spiders! The other day, while making an attempt to clear the outside of my house of creepy crawlies before guests were to arrive for Soren's birthday party I even spotted a fluorescent yellow one with large black stripes. Ugh! Gives me chills just thinking about it! I'm not super freaked out by "garden" spiders but I certainly don't like them. And I especially don't like them in my house! Imagine my disgust when I found this lovely garden spider and gigantic web in my house this morning....

I sprayed it with hairspray :)

Utterly Disgusting...

One night, about a year ago (shortly after we moved in), I got up from the couch and headed to bed. I didn't need to turn on the light, as I had already put my jammies on and washed my face and brushed my teeth. I went to jump in, when I saw a shadow of something on my pillow. I had a hunch at what it was...but didn't really think it could be real...so I turned on the light to disprove my prediction. Unfortunately, my prediction was right. Every hair on my body stood erect as I screamed for Adam to come save me from the peril that lay still before me.

THIS is what I saw (wasn't this big, but close)....

I couldn't believe my eyes! I was, for lack of a better word, flabbergasted! I had NEVER seen such a thing in "person" and didn't think that they existed anywhere near our neck of the woods. Mammoth moths, lizards, and now giant millipedes!!?? I had NO idea HOW it had gotten into our house or HOW it had gotten on top of my PILLOW! Ew, ew, EW!!

Anyway, I hadn't seen one since...until today. Even though I haven't been feeling well, and feel even worse today, I decided that my carpet was in desperate need of a quick vacuum. In one of the many corners of my house I found what looked to be a pile of dead bugs under a spiderweb. It WAS a pile of dead bugs, but there was no spiderweb to be found. Not one, but TWO of these dead bugs were small millipedes! Yuck! Yuck! YUCK!! Ugh...gives me chills every time I think of it.

Apparently, they are quite harmless...but I don't care...they are gross.

Lizards, Cars, Trees, Eggs, Rubber Chickens, Etc.

I'm just playing picture catch-up from the last few weeks...

NO, this is NOT a salamander!!! This LIZARD was in my HOUSE!! I had to catch it with a wad of baby wipes and toss it outside myself (Adam was at work). I have never seen a lizard in this area of Oregon before...but here it is! It was probably 8-9 inches long.


This is Soren's newest best friend..."bokka bokka." It's a small rubber chicken that he carries around and makes nests for, kisses, and hugs. He's got it in October while at Deals Only (a local discount store) with my mom...it used to be a key chain. In the pictures, the infamous chicken is wearing a dress that I put on it from one of Synnove's miniature Barbies.

Notice the "nest" happens to be inside a play cooking pot...ha ha.


Here's a couple of photos from Thanksgiving. My grandma Barbara always has toys stashed for the kids to play with. Soren found a box of cars and even the "big" boys got in on the fun.

And here's another great shot. Sleeping...wrestling...typical after-feast activities.

Here's a shot from when we tried to burn some of our brush-pile a couple of weeks ago. We invited Chris and Elise for a hot dog roast.
Last Sunday we went to Beaverton for Samantha's (my niece) 8th birthday at the Oregon Gymnastics Academy. I didn't really get any good pics...but here's one of Synnove anyway.

I thought I'd snap a shot of some of our eggs! Our hens have not been laying in the last few months, but recently we've had 4 hens starting up again. The eggs on the top are from our Old English hens...they're like cute mini-chickens that lay cute mini-eggs. This is probably a weeks worth of eggs from 4 hens.

Adam decided to give the kids their own trees for their rooms this year since we have a bunch we'll be getting rid of anyway around the property. They decorated them last night. Soren loved the "Tigger-Pooh" ornaments, as he calls all Winnie the Pooh characters. You can also catch a glimpse of the awesome 70's carpet!

Synnove really got into it, despite her sparse tree. I couldn't get her to stop being silly to get a good picture =)

Moth Sightings Part II

I thought the first moth we found was a one time deal, until I was taking out the trash the other day. I happened to look up and see this strange thing hanging from an eve. I thought it was some weird debris falling out of the gutter or something. I honestly had to stare at it for a good 15 seconds before I realized it was another cool moth! I called Adam out to try to get it down. He was obviously successful. This one was a reddish color and a bit smaller than the other, and had a striped body. It's so fun finding new and interesting wildlife!



Soren didn't like it when the moth jumped on him...he was a bit upset =(

Check out this moth!

Adam found this moth fluttering by our front door late Sunday night! He kept it in an empty red vines container until he could show the kids the next day. Look how big it is in porportion with the container and Adam's hand!