Ten Little Celebrations – July 2017

A lot has happened this July…and it was easy to pick 10 little celebrations to highlight:

A successful first road trip. I finally got a road trip in my Prius Prime. I didn’t celebrate the blow out that happened on the original start to the trip (I did celebrate that the blow out did not cause an accident) but the trip that re-started the day after was so enjoyable that thoughts about by car turned positive again.

A morning walk at Mt. Pleasant Farm. I’ll get around to posting about this walk because it was so enjoyable: temperature perfect for hiking, a flock of gold finches bathing in a riffle of the Davis Branch, dragonflies everywhere, Monarch butterflies in the meadow, a ground hog ambling out of the path ahead of me, a riot of vegetation – including ripening blackberries. It was very much a celebration of summer.

Great Blue Heron interaction with a dragonfly. Sometimes being in the right place to witness the interaction of two very different organisms is a celebration. I could photograph this one. It was a juvenile Great Blue Heron it is seemed perplexed about what to do when the dragonfly perched while the heron was looking for lunch. Eventually the heron moved…the dragonfly moved. This went on for a few minutes before the dragonfly got the idea to find another place to land.

Summer camp photographers at Mt. Pleasant. I celebrated another group of 5-12 year old photographers that took excellent pictures. I have a post planned for early next week about the adventure from my perspective. One of the counselors commented that the campers seemed so engaged with the activity. There is something about having a camera in hand that is almost magic.

Milkweed bug instars. This time of year, I am always thrilled to find a plant with a lot of instars of milkweed bugs. It almost always happens in July. They start out very tiny and almost all red and go through several stages getting larger and larger and ending up as adults that are orange and black…and with wings!

Our street. I am celebrating that the street repaving in front of our house is complete…and it wasn’t too traumatic while the work was going on.

Melons. We are getting melons from our CSA – always worth celebrating so rare we have gotten sun jewel melons, cantaloupe and yellow watermelon. Hopefully we’ll get some red watermelons in August.

Then there were celebrations associated with volunteering a Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy exhibit:

Butterfly laying an egg on my ring. OK – I’ll admit it was a very confused butterfly. But it was magical to have a butterfly become a part of my ring temporarily! I transferred the egg to the host plant afterward.

A 90-year-old birthday girl in Wings of Fancy. The lady was in a wheel chair but thoroughly enjoyed her family’s outing to the exhibit. Everyone that was in the conservatory celebrated with her!

Hummingbird moth at Brookside. I had been seeing the hummingbird moth on the walkway up to the ticket taker for the exhibit…and finally managed to get a picture. Celebration!