10. Toasted coconut. My new favorite one-ingredient snack. That's all it is. Coconut flakes dry toasted in the oven for about 5 minutes. Simple. Healthy. Crunchy. A little bit sweet. So good.
9. Groupon. If you haven't tried it, you definitely should. There's zero obligation. If you don't like any of the offers, you can just ignore them. But I have found some amazing deals with just a few mouse clicks. Well worth the little bit of time it takes to browse through the offers every now and then.
8. Science experiments with Macy and Grace. I'm pretty sure I enjoy them way more than they do, but they're good sports and play along nicely. ;-) Recently we made elephant toothpaste and grew some geodes. Pretty fun.
7. Ok, kind of a long story, but... Several weeks ago, Jared used a new kind of "cleaner" for our koi pond, which very clearly stated that it was safe for all kinds of fish. The next day all 3 of our koi fish were dead. (!!!!!) I suppose we can't really prove that it was the cleaner or that we didn't use too much or whatever, but that will be the last time we use that stuff for sure. Anyway... we have hesitated to get more fish before we do some research just because we want to make sure this doesn't happen again. BUT--just last week, I noticed FOUR BABY KOI FISH in there! At LEAST four! It's super loaded with lily pads right now, so there may even be more, but I've seen 4 all at the same time swimming around the edges, so I know for sure there are at least that many. I guess the eggs survived whatever killed the big guys. Happy!
6. A few weeks ago, I had to go on a scavenger hunt to find a dragonfly or two. But they are EVERYWHERE now. And I love them.
5. Morning sunlight. There's nothing quite like it.
4. Red-tailed hawks circle around in the sky above the golf course behind our house all the time, but this massive dude landed right in my back yard about a week ago. I couldn't believe he was so close. Amazing!
3. It's just a little at a time at the moment, but we have all sorts of fresh produce coming soon right from our back yard. It ALWAYS tastes better this way.
2. Ok. I know I'm weird, y'all. But I'm SO EXCITED about this! One day last week I was outside watering my plants, and I noticed that they all looked really good and healthy except for one, which was almost completely leafless. (Weird.) But THEN I found THIS DUDE:
And I am perfectly happy to sacrifice that one plant in order to get to watch his metamorphosis. So cool! Fortunately, it was a potted plant, so I just brought the whole thing inside. I've been covering it with a mesh hamper at night so he can't run away, but it's fun to be able to watch him during the day. Mostly, for the first few days, he just ate and ate and ate. He was SO HUNGRY! ;-)
While he spent his days eating and eating and then eating some more, I did some research to make sure I was giving him everything he needed. I learned all kinds of things about these crazy little creatures. Right before they become ready for pupa stage, their aortas start working so hard, you can actually see them pulsing in their backs. I tried to capture it in this video. You can see it if you look closely:
Another thing I learned (which I had never ever heard of) is that these particular caterpillars actually burrow underground for their pupation process. Which he did. Shortly after I took this video, he started digging in. So now we wait. If my research is right, he should emerge as a massive moth in about 2 or 3 weeks. Pretty cool.
1. I believe this with all of my heart, and some days I'm so impatient for it, I can hardly stand it.
