Leftover pictures from September, in no particular order.
On rare occasions Agnes is tired enough in the afternoon that she chooses riding on my back if I don't have time to get her to sleep in her bed. Wrap nap squishy faces are still the best.
I was cleaning up the front garden bed a little when I heard a faint, odd noise. I looked closely into the clematis vine tower and discovered a praying mantis - fun! Then I noticed it was holding a cicada - cool! Then I noticed the cicada was still moving (that was the noise - its wings were spurting every few seconds in a feeble and futile attempt to escape), and a minute later the cicada started eating it straight through its eyeball while it was still alive. Brutal. But I told the kids anyway and they mostly found it interesting.
I have no idea why I have this picture - I think Edie liked the headband she found at a friend's house. Either way her sweet face and toothless smile is amazing.
When Agnes saw that Edie had pigtails, she had to have pigtails also. This is the start of the looooong toddler phase of "I have to have everything someone else has whether I really want the thing or not." In this case, she did actually enjoy the pigtails I barely eeked out of her top layer of hair.
I should have had Agnes in this picture, because it's a cherry tomato plant that sprouted itself in the garden bed by the street and it is easily taller than and thrice the width of Agnes. I'm not sure if a squirrel or bird or child accidentally planted it, but it has produced more little tomatoes than any plant I've ever planted on purpose.
I have no idea which farm trip these pictures were from but one day Grandma arranged for us to stop by a neighboring farm that is an actual farm that grows things, specifically pumpkins in the fall. The kids each picked out a little pumpkin to take home and a couple bigger ones to decorate Twin Oaks. Agnes had trouble choosing.
She LOVES the spider swing now. She hangs on and wants to swing just as high as Edie, which is super high.
Videos!
Agnes was supposed to be going to bed (hence the darkness with no actual video) and instead was singing "head, shoulder, knees & toes" over and over again in her sweet little voice.
And then she further delayed bedtime with her "I love you" arguing, something she knows works every time.
Random pollinator. We love watching the bees in the Rose of Sharon flowers - they just look like they couldn't possibly be happier to be bees.
Agnes loves to moo at any Moo (aka Cow) she sees, and she was delighted to find one on the buttermilk label. I have no idea what made Edie read it as "Old Hockey Milk".
Catherine's honeybee experiment survived half a season at the farm - yay! The colony she installed in May stayed put in the hive and grew a little (although not a lot). They did not make enough honey stores for her to add a honey super for harvesting, and in this inspection she determined that they probably did not even make enough honey stores to make it through the winter. Boo. We talked to her bee club and determined that in order to give them a chance at overwintering, she needed to move them down to only one brood box so they would clump together more and keep the queen warm, and feed them once or twice so they could make some quick honey stores. She wasn't able to locate the queen on the frames, but all we can do is hope she is still there and makes it through! Basically what we learned this first summer is how much we don't know, but overall the hive is doing ok. Also I learned the bees hate me, I react poorly to stings, bee suits are not fool-proof, and it takes a lot of mental energy for me to stay calm and helpful while bees are divebombing warnings at my suited head that they don't like me by their home. Catherine has none of these problems, thankfully.
The kids and I had just made a quick overnight for a bee check on this trip, but I told them after the hive inspection was done we could go into town for ice cream. We were rewarded by a most amazing sunset beginning to glow on our drive down, so we quickly collected our ice cream and walked to the bridge so we could watch the sunset over the river. It was such a good sunset that even my phone pics are ok.
CYC Volleyball was summarily cancelled. Catherine was disappointed because he 8th grade SMOS team would have included her and at least three other club players, so they would have been very good in the CYC league. Mary was disappointed because she had decided she wanted to try a season of volleyball (she was good at soccer but never really loved it) but that wasn't going to happen either. However the recreation league in St. Louis was still open with various restrictions (mask wearing when not playing and limited number of spectators allowed). Mary decided she was ok with wearing a mask to walk in and out the door as long as she didn't have to wear one while playing, so we signed her up for the Fall session in the learning league, and she did great!
Catherine's club team was also playing in that session in a different age group, and their games overlapped a lot, so I was often sitting between two courts watching two games and a toddler at the same time. Translation: not a lot of pictures. But here are some from one of her early games. It was so fun to watch her play!
She was interested in playing the Winter session as well, but St. Louis County changed their pandemic rules at that time to say all people had to wear masks at all times indoors, even while playing sports. Mary decided she didn't want to do that and I agreed. Hopefully by the next fall season sports will be open again!
September had a lot of lovely weather and we took advantage with a bunch of fun hikes with Dema and Grampy T.
I really can't remember where these pictures are from. I started to type "Salt Lick Trail" because I'm pretty sure it's Illinois and I know we did go to that trail, but I'm also pretty sure I have pictures of the caves from that hike and there are no such pictures here. Maybe it was in/near Pere Marquette? I don't know. But there was clearly a hill to climb because we enjoyed a nice view at the top. Grampy is pointing out some groups of migrating pelicans we could just barely make out on the far shore, and after watching a bit we also saw several rotating cylinders of pelicans flying circles.
Who looks this beautiful after climbing up a giant hill on a hot day? These two.
After the big hike up the hill Agnes needed a break. Long hikes are pretty much the only time she will ride on my back.
The trail system offered a few ways back down so we took a more meandering trail that offered some nice climbing rocks.
Re-energized, Agnes wanted to be down most of the time and did a lot of toddler clambering and exploring of rocks and moss and bugs.
While we were eating a picnic lunch at the trailhead back at the bottom, a bat swooped over us and roosted in a nearby tree. We were all really excited that it stopped and we could watch it for a few minutes, but also I didn't let the kids get too close because bats in the middle of the day seems odd. After reading a few "bats of Missouri" articles I think it was an Eastern Red Bat; it's the right color and they hang out in large deciduous trees. Not a great picture but the kids will be happy to tell you all about it.
Aah! These pictures have jogged my memory. I'm almost sure now it was Pere Marquette or near it. Catherine wanted to stop for ice cream on the way home and we had seen an ice cream shop in the little town just before the park. However on our way to the park we had accidentally ended up in the middle of a yuge Trump parade (cars and trucks on the river road with a long line of boats running parallel on the river) and by the time we were headed home a good number of them had ended the parade in that little town and we didn't think getting in and out with ice cream would be a short endeavor. So I called ahead to Ices and placed an order for pickup (they were still closed inside) and we stopped by to grab our ice cream and headed to Tower Grove to enjoy it in the park. Somehow the kids still had energy for games with Grampy's hat and goofy selfies. Must have been the ice cream.
Be against selfie culture if you want. I love this picture.
