Spiders! Why? I Have No Idea!

So in Cima, we could spy migrating tarantulas on the road from twenty or thirty feet away. They were big, they were hairy, they freak most people out. I kinda like them. Here, our slugs are giant and can be spied from a long way away, but our spiders are not that impressive, usually. They're mostly small and we're lucky that many of them spin their webs in places where we can watch. Darcy and I watched a spider spin its web strand by strand. It's pretty darn cool.

Occasionally, however, our spiders -- I don't know -- throw parties? I have no idea, but here's what they do:

We saw this line of spiders on the outside wall of our garage. I was pretty impressed. Each of them was probably about three inches across with those long, long legs. I was watching them and then noticed their friends:

Three Views Of Darcy

Daddy might have gone hairclip happy on this day. But she sure is cute and I sure was mostly asleep before realizing I hadn't yet blogged for the day!

Running With Scissors

The park recently opened a new hiking trail -- the first in about a decade. Invitations went out for a dedication ceremony. We went and joined about fifty people gathered at the dedication site for the Lady Bird Johnson Grove, where we listened to a number of short speeches, met some of the trail crew who built the trail, and then walked a short distance to the trail head. Where there was a ribbon. That needed to be cut. With giant scissors.

You might think a Park Ranger would know better. A supposedly all-grown-up Park Ranger at that. But no. If you put my personal Park Ranger around an oversized pair of scissors, the end result is pretty much inevitable. Those of you who know him well will not be surprised:

A Fairy House For A Tired Birthday Fairy

Well, it's about 9:30 on a Saturday night and I am surrounded by fake fall leaves and flowers as I prepare to make a fairy house for Darcy. Luckily, we have a great fairy to live in it -- thanks, Auntie Ev and Liana!

Darcy and I spent the day having a birthday adventure that (mostly) went very well. She danced to a great band at the Arcata farmers' market, visited a fish store AND a toy store, went to the craft store to get fairy-house-making stuff, went out for ice cream at the most-excellent organic Arcata Scoop, and then went to a playground. Unfortunately, some other kid was having a birthday party at the playground, which made Darcy very aware that her party is NOT happening on her birthday. There were tears, quite a few of them. But then she fell asleep in the car and everything was better.

If we survive the fairy house decorating tomorrow, I'll try to take and share pictures. It should be beautiful.

In Which Darcy Is Kind To Squirrels

Several weeks ago, we went camping outside Brookings, OR, at a state park campground. It was a pretty cushy camping trip because every campsite had an electrical hookup. We took our aerobeds. There was this great snag at our site that Darcy enjoyed playing in. So did a squirrel as we were setting up camp.

When we went hiking the first afternoon, we walked under a lot of oaks with loads of acorns on the ground. The following morning, Darcy woke up quite early and I took her for a walk. Which she didn't want to do until I suggested we collect acorns to tempt the squirrel back to our tree. We took a bowl, she walked all the way back to the trail, we filled it up. On the way back, she kept talking about how she was going to fill up the squirrel's basket. And so she did:

There are a couple cups of acorns in that little nook, along with the leaves she kept putting in my pocket as we walked around camp and hiked the trail. She tried hard to be patient and watch from a distance to see if the squirrel would come get the nuts, but she just couldn't stay away:

Is This Cheating?

I don't really have energy to come up with a blog post tonight. I forgot to do this earlier and now I'm a little more than half asleep. Not good.

Darcy ended up choosing to be a very brightly colored rainbow from head to toe for her preschool pictures today, but decided against the fairy wings at the last minute. It will be interesting to see how they turn out. I'm sure one will show up here.

And that's really all I've got. I'll try to do something fun and exciting and illustrated tomorrow.

Photo Day Tomorrow!

Darcy's first class photos are being taken tomorrow morning and she is very excited. I foolishly asked her (on Monday afternoon) what she wanted to wear for the picture and she said, "Fairy wings!" I dutifully asked her teacher if she strongly objected to fairy wings for the individual picture (not the full class!) and she gamely replied that if we didn't mind, she wasn't going to object.

So today, Michael asked Darcy what she wanted to wear, and got the same response: "Fairy wings!" He pointed out that she had to wear some clothes with the wings and she named her rainbow striped pants and her "cake shirt", a peach shirt with various petit fours and cakes on the front. I think they go together reasonably well in terms of color, but the pants alone are busy on the eyes and a decorated shirt seems over the top to me. I am, however, willing to let her wear what she wants as long as it is weather appropriate.

But it doesn't jive with Michael's idea of good fashion. He is mulling over choices and is prepared to use the wings as bargaining chips to get his choice of clothes on our small fairy. In a few weeks, when the picture "package" (seven 8 x 10s! sixteen 5 x 7s! 49 wallet size! circles and arrows on the back of each one!) arrives at school, you'll get to see the results. Stay tuned!