7 Monarchs

We had 7 chrysalis turn dark last night. We've got 6 out so far and there is one more to emerge. 7 total!! That's more than we had all year last year. So fun!

I guess it's kinda work too though. I woke up at 2 a.m when Natalie woke up and needed help finding the bathroom. Since I was awake, I went to check on them and two were missing. I looked and looked and finally found them, one under the built in drawer in a tricky spot, but got it, and the other was under the closet, but luckily not out of reach. Those little stinkers. I should probably get a mesh cage around them to help me avoid this problem. Big caterpillars are the hardest part when they wander. Butterflies are easy and fun, like all that "hard" work paid off, if you can call picking milkweed a lot of work. So we've been taking out the butterflies and hanging them on the hammock to dry - and it's a nice breezy place for them to fly away when they're ready.

4 girls and 3 boys. You can google that to see how to tell them apart. The one with the wings open here below is a girl.

Sorry if I've been posting too much about the butterflies. Mel got a few fun pictures of a butterfly on her nose as a mustache and above her eyes as a unibrow and on her head like a bow, I'll try to get one of them to share, it was fun. Monarchs are a fun way to pass the summer. So, not much else going on here. Just kids making messes. Today Natalie got into her older sisters' sculpy clay. I saw her working hard squishing together the pink and black, doh! I doubt your sisters will be able to separate those... oh well, too late to do anything about it now.

As I scolded her for getting into her sisters' clay, she said she just wanted to make a bracelet. She showed me the picture of the bracelet she was working on -

That pink and black one there. Well, I thought that was cure. She got the right colors, so that's a really good try, you cute little 4 year old. You keep working. I'm going to put away the rest of the clay but you can keep working on that one.

And another lazy summer thing - Wes and I have been working on this puzzle just for fun. 500 pieces that we picked up at the dollar store. I can do the edges easy enough. That's when Wesley came in to help. He and I sneak downstairs to work on it now and then.

Puzzles have been on my mind since Sunday. One of our neighbors shared his testimony that for each of us, our conversion to the gospel is like a puzzle. We all have our own story of how we put it all together and the things that we're able to figure out. So I've been thinking about that but I had the additional insight that some things are easy - the edge pieces are easy to see and figure out! Those are the "Light of Christ" things in life - the right and wrong that are plain and simple. If we have the light of Christ, it's easy to get the edges and then we know where the puzzle is and the parameters we need to work within. Oh, and the box is the plan. I couldn't find the box at first and thought I'd just throw it all away, cause even if I could find the edges, It was really hard to figure it out without the box and the final picture giving me hints and direction. So there's a little spiritual thought - if your life is confusing and you can't figure it out, go find the picture/plan on the box (in the scriptures!) Happy weekend.