Author: laurie

We had out annual open house this weekend. I helped with the archery program and then it started to POUR. We had a fun time hunting for bugs in the rain with friends. We met some new 4-H youth and recruited a few to archery. Our annual awards banquet was also a blast. B got to help MC. Our Insect SPIN club won club of the year for the SPINs. We are small but mighty!

We took the AHA Heart Saver class at the Pinellas Park Fire Department. We learned how to do CPR, how to use the AED machine, how to do basic first aide and more. It was really cool to see the dummies. They are super high tech and can tell you if you are doing the CPR correctly. I was shocked how much of my body weight I had to put into it! I have been enjoying baking fun surprise cakes lately. This washy 4th of July cake! Grandma Susie came down for the holiday and we just hung out and didn’t really do much! My cake reveal! We cleaned up the walkway. It was super overgrown from the spring and early summer. I went to camp at Joann’s for a few days and learned about decorating. Also, I am back at karate. B is taking sometime off but I am hoping to advance a belt by the end of the year! 

I just loved bug camp so much this year. I learned a lot and really want to keep learning more and more. We were happy to have Dr. Baldwin back at camp this year. I love all the staff but she is my favorite. What a great group of people! We had a big combined age group this year. There were lots of college student helpers as well.
I really enjoyed the Santa Fe River trip. The water was so wonderful because it was super hot outside! We caught a lot of hellgrammites again this year. The bees were so much fun for me. I didn’t like the bee suit at first but then realized how much it protected me. So excited to work the hives. We got to see several hives in action. I loved working with Sebastian to see the bees. I wasn’t brave enough to hold the frame but he was, so I got a good look!  I learned how to hot knife the honey. YUM! I think I ate my share and more! Learning how to use the decapper too. It was fun in the urban pest lab as well. We learned all about cat fleas with Professor Koehler, the cat flea god! Look alt all those egg casings for fleas!!!! I loved holding the hissers.

Dissection was NOT my favorite but I did enjoy it. The smell was a bit overpowering for me.  I did a great job but ick! We walked over to the Florida State Collection of Arthropods for a tour. It is just about 3 blocks from the UF campus. We got to tour the facility and get a sneak peak into the collections. What an amazing day! Sadly, cam came to an end. I had my ups and downs at camp but I learned a lot, made friends and had a blast! I can’t wait for next summer! 

My night blooming cactus bloomed! It only blooms ONCE a year! We just happened to get home from the trip a few days before it bloomed. I had 2 beautiful blossoms!  I think I am still 2 sometimes. I love to ride in the giant Costco carts. Thunder is loving having his people back. I insist that I need a hat rat/coat rack. This is my serious pitch as to why I need one! The cats have taken over the house! I am enjoying making my baseball I bought at Custer State Park in South Dakota. I hope to finish it…someday! It is a LOT of work!

Since we left Page early we got to break up the drive with a stop in Amarillo, Texas.

We had some seriously frightening weather coming in to town and when we were hooking up at the campsite but it calmed down quickly. We had a nice pizza dinner out and avoiding the famous steak place.

We started out with a very muddy trip to Cadillac Ranch. It is an art installation with 10 Cadillac’s planted nose up in the ground. One night it was secretly moved to a new location because tourists were kind mistreating someones property. We stomped through the mud to get out to see the cars. We stopped at the “Cadillac Ranch Museum”took a few photos and left. Everything was so expensive, t-shirts were at least $30! Up next was the RV museum! This was a total hit. We loved seeing how the old RVs looked and all the fun things that they had on display from each time period. The highlight of the stop was the Gornicke bus from the movie RV starring Robin Williams. Checking out a few more before the need to explore nature set in. We stopped at the Amarillo Zoo. FYI mom got stunk by a Tarantula Hawk Wasp after pumping gas on the way in to town. This is now how she feels about them! The zoo was small, the animals didn’t look great and I felt it wasn’t a healthy place for them. We wandered around for 20 minutes and left. We also took a trip out to Palo Duro Canyon State Park. We drove through the parka nd took a few small hikes to see the overlooks. It was really pretty but we are currently jaded after Black Canyon and Grand Canyon on this trip. The rains were coming and we needed to kill more time while Dad worked. We ended up at the Don Harrington Discovery Center for the afternoon. We had a fun time playing in the hands on exhibits and participating in a robotics class. Back to the motorhome, laundry and bed! We all are ready to get home!There was a delay in laundry since the campground lost water for a while. Mom and I hung out int he laundry room to make sure we got first shot when the water came back. I played with all the quarters for a long time until we were done! B was back in the motorhome working on his SPC classes, he has had to work in the evenings and odd hours to keep up all summer.