Mercy of Mercies!

          Did you miss me? I want you to know that I missed you! Even if I can't write I still think about you... wondering if you're going to miss me mostly. But really. Do you miss it if I don't write a letter-blog on the weekend? Or do you only think about me when a letter-blog shows up in your inbox or as a notice on your Facebook feed? Be honest. Someone missed me. Went looking for me — several times as a matter of fact — before giving up. I love that. What I don't love is having two weeks' worth of picture and stories to crimp into one.

          Our kids came for a visit. That's why I didn't write last week. I was busy enjoying their company. They were here Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. They left Wednesday late morning. I could write a letter-blog about the week before they got here. I could write another about the time they were here. I could write a third one just about that handsome and oh-so-smart grandson of ours, Andrew. And I'm sure I could write another about the days since they left. Oh, and let's not forget I still have one in queue containing just pictures.

          Oh mercy of mercies! However am I ever going to deal with all of this!

          "Peg. It's just like you tell us all the time. How do you eat an elephant?"

          I know, right! One bite at a time. That's how. One bite at a time.

          I was so excited to hear the news that our youngest and very handsome son Kevin would be bringing his family 17 hours across three states to visit.

          "Three states?" you ask.

          Yeah. Well I wasn't counting Missouri, the state they started from even though they probably had a four-hour ride until they hit the Illinois state line. Then there's Indiana, Ohio, and I didn't count our state of Pennsylvania even though we're five hours or so from the border.

          So let's take a bite, shall we? We'll call this first part:

Before

          Mike and I spent the week before getting ready for their arrival but also I took walks with Ginger.

          I have some huge Milkweeds. They're almost seven feet tall with leaves that are 14 inches long. These are by far the tallest Milkweeds I've ever had and I wondered if it's because they've never been cut. From the first year they've grown here we've never cut them.

          Monarchs are not the only butterfly that like Milkweed. This is a male Tiger Swallowtail. If he were a girl he'd have a splash of blue on his tails.

          I noticed the Milkweed leaves had a couple of little holes starting. I flipped the leaf over and found a baby Monarch caterpillar. I was thrilled! In years past I hadn't been able to find any.

          Encouraged I started checking other Milkweeds. My big ones have caterpillars on them too. But that's not all I found. Are those eggs? I wondered. But looking at them closer I see they're not. They're aphids. I didn't think it would be a problem and I went out every day to photograph my little caterpillars hoping to document their growth. They'll be caterpillars for about two weeks before they start their transformation into butterflies.

          I missed a couple of days and the next time I went out the leaves were shiny. I flipped them over and got sticky stuff on my fingers. I looked and looked for my caterpillars and finally found one. He was dead. I Googled it and found out what you probably already guessed. My Milkweed leaves were coated with honeydew, or in simple terms, aphid poo. Aphids secrete sugar, which I'm guessing creates a hostile environment for my Monarch caterpillars. Although I've found aphids on most of the Milkweed plants on our property, none of the others had half so many on them as the big ones do and none of the others have shiny leaves. Why? I wondered. And, Should I cut them down and burn them?

          I don't have the answers.

          Since I have been watching the caterpillars I've seen other critters too.

          Hey! What are you doing on my Milkweed! These are Milkweed Beetles.

          Ants like honeydew and will even protect the aphids.

          Ladybugs are one of the few natural enemies of the aphids.

          Another beetle called Ladybug. This one is called a 14-Spot Ladybird.

          Nymph of the 14-Spot.

          A wasp. Is he hunting? I wondered and hoped he was eating aphids. I was mad cause they killed my baby Monarchs. The only thing I can find on Google about wasps and aphids is sometimes they eat the honeydew and only a certain parasitic wasp will lay its eggs on the aphid.

          I noticed an ant leaving the area and saw he was carrying something. Is it an aphid or some other nymph? I don't know. Ants don't usually eat aphids but if one shows signs of being sick the ant sees it as a threat and removes it from the colony.

          Queen Ann's Lace. This wildflower often has a deep purple center flower. It's said to be a drop of blood left by Queen Ann when she pricked her finger on a needle while making lace.

          Queen Ann's Lace is also called Bishop's Lace, Bird's Nest, and Wild Carrot. You can eat the root when it's young but it quickly becomes woody. The flowers can be dipped in batter and fried. A cool thing you can do with freshly cut Queen Ann's Lace is put them in colored water and watch them change color. I was surprised to learn that the seeds have anti-fertility properties and have long been used as a contraceptive and abortifacient.

          Ginger waiting for me on the other side of my Bergamot patch. Because the Bergamot patch is another place I've been spending a lot of time.

          Humbees! That's what Momma called them. And you can certainly see why this guy is called a Clearwing Hummingbird Moth.

          Two Tigertails! I mean, two Tiger Swallowtails!

          I watched as the male zeroed in on the female, getting closer and closer as she sipped nectar from the Bergamot.

          Then they were fighting! Yeah. That's what they were doing. Fighting.

          A Great Spangled Fritillary! I haven't seen many of these yet this year.

  

          Ginger found a snakeskin at the pond. She killed it every day for the next three days.

          This is a little Azure butterfly. They're about as big as your thumbnail. I've seen them called Spring Azure, Summer Azure, Blue Azure. All are different varieties of this little guy and so similar in appearance it's hard to tell them apart. Let's just call it an Azure.

          This is a Sulfur Butterfly.

          I found some old packets of flower seeds, took a chance and planted them. The Zinnia came up. I love the flower-in-a-flower design. Who comes up with this stuff!

          Michael enjoyed the fair at Hughesville so much that when the Troy fair opened we went to that one too.

          Road pictures anyone?

          Going down our mountain into town we see the guys from the cable company are removing a tree that came down on the lines.

          The first section of the bridge finished and they're moving everything to the next section.

          "Did they take the tire off to keep people from stealing the sign?" I asked Mike. "They do that, you know. Steal signs and change the words."

          "Maybe it was flat," Mike guessed.

          Mike is fascinated with these trucks. "I've never seen any like that before. I can't figure out what the tanks on the side are for."

  

      

          Cows!

  

          Then we were there.

           I didn't pick out many pictures of our drive to Troy to show you but I'll show you a few more on the return trip.

          We missed the signs for the fair and drove the whole way through Troy. I had to call Miss Rosie to find out where it was.

            Once I saw the sign, I wondered how we missed it.

          "My favorite things to get at the Troy fair are the Cactus Fries near the grandstand and the milkshakes at the diary barn," my friend Jody told me.

          The Cactus Fries are thinly cut spiral sliced potatoes deep-fried. Yeah. I love anything potato and how can you go wrong when you deep-fry!

          We didn't find the ice cream Jody told us about but we did find ice cream. A chocolate milkshake for Mike and peanut butter swirl in a cup for me.

          We knew that our local TV station was going to be on-site that day. When we saw the vans pull in we thought we'd say hello to Kurt Aaron, the chief meteorologist for channel 16. Not only that but he's a step-nephew to the Kipps. We hung around for a bit but got tired of waiting and never saw him — until the news that evening. Then we saw him on TV at the fair.

          I took a lot more pictures on the way home, more than I want to show you now. I'll pick out a few and move the rest to the Just Pictures folder for a future posting.

          I thought this one was interesting. Who hangs a deer head outside? See it. Turns out it's not a deer head, it's just the way stuff lines up.

          In other news, the Kipps have a new dog! It's been months since Maggie, their Bernese Mountain Dog had died. Joanie, my ray o' sunshine, reposted a dog video from the local animal shelter. When I saw it I thought of Trouble, the dog the Kipps had before Maggie. "Rosie, wanna see a dog at that animal shelter? He's two, likes cats, and is housebroken. And he reminds me of Trouble."

          "Sure."

          Rosie liked what she saw and they went the very next day to interview him for the position of Kipp Dog in the Kipp House — and they brought him home!

          "I'm thinking of calling him Tux because he looks like he's wearing a tuxedo," Miss Rosie said.

          As it turns out the shelter lied. Tux is not housebroken but they're working on it. And Tux suffers anxiety when they leave him alone. Rosie and Lamar went for groceries and left him in the house. They came home to a destroyed kitchen. Tux dumped the water bowl all over the kitchen floor, got up on the counter, tore the curtains down, knocked everything off the windowsill, then went in the bathroom (the window in there is on the same side of the house as he saw them leave), knocked down Flannel Kat's sun shelf, and broke the Dangly that hung in the window.

          Oh boy!

          But Tux is good with the cats and even though he pesters my little girls to death with his kisses, he doesn't hurt them.

          And Tux is learning to turn up our driveway when the Kipps are going past on their walk.

          We have a driveway beeper. As a matter of fact, we have several to cover the front and back entrances. Depending on the number of beeps, we can tell if someone's coming in the front or back. I never thought too much about it until we were sitting on the front patio and the beeper goes off. We could hear it with the door open and the screen shut. Ginger got up and trotted to the edge of the patio and watched the driveway. I never before realized she knew what the beeps meant. However, in this case, she was wrong. The number of beeps suggested it was just a deer going past the back sensor. When she does see the Kipps coming she'll run down to greet Tux.

          So does Smudge.

          Tux gets a little frustrated that my girls won't return his affection and jumped into Daddy's lap for a little comfort. "It's a good thing he's only 30 pounds," and Lamar laughed.

          Oh Spitfire! The Mighty Hunter brought me a grasshopper.

  

  

          Oh! Here's an update for you. Guess whom I saw drinking out of the cat fountain. Yep. Molly. Only once, but still, it's progress.

          We picked a day and went to Sam's Club to load up on all the kids' favorite foods and snacks.

          Road pictures?

          I must really like these insulators because besides this picture there's another one that's almost the same from a different trip sitting in the Just Pictures folder waiting to be posted.

          They're fixing up this old barn. "I wonder if it's going to be a wedding venue," I wondered aloud. "Barn weddings are a big thing right now."

          This is what it looked like January of last year.

          At Sam's Club we bought tons of groceries.

          "Peg, if they stay a month they can't eat all of this!" Mike admonished.

          "I want them to have whatever they might want while they're here," I justified.

          "And we're going to take them out to eat while they're here too," Mike pointed out.

          Did it slow me down? No! But in my defense, Mike did the same thing when it came to touring the sights. They could stay two weeks and wouldn't get to see everything Mike thought of or eat in all the places he wanted to take them. 

           Next time: They're Here!