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26 July 2009

Wildflowers!

Back in late March and early April, they were doing wildflowers at The Outdoor Hour and I was all excited about finding some of the early spring wildflowers that Barb was talking about. But in spite of several trips out looking for wildflowers, we never did find any. They're blooming now. I guess that Barb is considerably further south than we are. Also, I looked in some different places. We recently discovered a bike trail that leads right to our "big garden," avoiding nearly all of the traffic between here and there. As if that wasn't wonderful enough, it goes through the local tech collage grounds and they have some lovely grassy flowery stuff to ride through. Here are some of the things we saw on our most recent trip through our trail and to the big garden.


Tall grass with Queen Anne's Lace, or wild carrot.


Here's a close-up of the tiny blossoms that make up the flower head.


And this is the very striking flower bud.



Then there's this dainty little cluster, which I don't know the name of, though it's very common around here. Grows along the edges of all sorts of places.

And we've got some wild daisy-sunflower looking things. I haven't had a chance to look these up either, but it's on the agenda. Once I know what they're called, I can have a look at the Handbook of Nature Study and see if there's anything in there for any of our flowers.


Our new bike and trailer have been great for getting out there and finding the flowers. We would likely never have found the little nature spot at the Tech had we not had the bike. There's quite a bit to explore back there.

Already, I'm beginning to see how the awareness of nature is becoming a part of Monkey. When we got to the garden, I was tired, so we sat for a few minutes on the picnic table, and Monkey saw this feather underneath. It took several tries for him to communicate to me that there was something interesting under there that he wanted to show me, because when I looked I just didn't see it! But finally I found the tiny feather that had caught his interest, so we took a picture for his nature book.

One of the pleasures of the garden is the raspberry patch that is sort of a free-for-all patch. Monkey approves.





While we were there, Monkey showed me a cloud, so we took a picture for his book.

7 comments:

misskate said...

Fabulous pictures :) That's super exciting that you found a better way to your garden space, with a sweet sweet nature spot to explore too!

I'm always fascinated by the intricacies of flowers and buds.. they're so delicate and beautiful. Heavenly Father is a Master Architect indeed.

mormonhermitmom said...

That's great you and your monkey can get out there!

Keeley said...

My good gravy are you good at taking photos!! Absolutely beautiful, Ritsumei.

Jeannetta said...

Great Photos!! I was going to pick a favorite or two and couldn't :D
I've said it before, but I really REALLY wish we had started homeschooling earlier in live, you are so blessed to be able to do this. We are blessed too, but earlier is better :D

Ritsumei said...

Thanks, guys! I'm pretty pleased with how things are working. It's really exciting to me when he starts doing like he's doing and asking me to take pictures of rocks and clouds and things for his Nature Book. He's getting there in his reading too. I'm seeing more and more signs that he's more ready to do that. His daddy worries sometimes, because we seldom sit down & "do school" but I'm happy with how things are right now, because he's learning to be observant, and he's learning his letters and he "counts" quite well - lists numbers to about 12, with the 1-to-1 correspondence developing, and he's got his letters & their sounds, and good stuff like that going on. So I'm very pleased with how things are going, and glad that we've started so early.

Keeley said...

Ritsumei, I gave you a Queen of All things Awesome award. Because you are, indeed, that. =)

Ritsumei said...

Keeley, you're so sweet!

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