caterpillar and mushroom

The little ladies came in the other day with gifts for me. They left the last few flowers blooming in the yard to reseed and found different sorts of gifts.......READ MORE.

Classic Little Girls!

This week we were quite simply girly! The Little Ladies had a ball adding some Autumn accessories to Auntie Robin’s hair. The items stayed......READ MORE.

Stripe Scavenger Hunt!

The hunt for stripes!

Zebra Swallowtail (Eurytides marcellus)


Bumblebee (bombus genus)


Potter Wasp


Monarch caterpillar (Danaus plexippus)


Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucas)


Cicada (Tibicen linnei)- annual type


We couldn't identify this mushroom.


Eastern Black Swallowtail caterpillar (Papilio polyxenes)

Shakespeare's Fairies

I'm working on a Shakespeare unit for the Little Ladies. Of course, being fairy lovers, A Midsummer Night's Dream is the perfect place to start!

Over hill, over dale,

Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,

Thorough flood, thorough fire!

I do wander everywhere,

Swifter than the moon's sphere;

And I serve the Fairy Queen,

To dew her orbs upon the green;

The cowslips tall her pensioners be;

In their gold coats spots you see;

Those be rubies, fairy favours;

In those freckles live their savours;

I must go seek some dewdrops here,

And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.

-William Shakespeare

I read a wonderful article about Shakespeare and the fairies, The Fairy Mythology of Shakespeare by Alfred Nutt. The article includes a list of characteristics of Shakespeare's fairies and elves, which Shakespeare considered one and the same. I found this list very entertaining and have a lot of the same views of the fairy folk. I find it so curious that a writer of the late 1500's still influences our view of fairies today.

a. They form a community under a king and queen.

b. They are exceedingly small.

c. They move with extreme swiftness.

d. They are elemental airy spirits; their brawls incense the wind and moon, and cause tempests; they take a share in the life of nature; live on fruit; deck the cowslips with dewdrops; war with noxious insects and reptiles; overcast the sky with fog.

e. They dance upon the green.

f. They sing hymns and carols to the moon.

g. They are invisible and apparently immortal.

h. They come forth mainly at night.

i. They fall in love with mortals.

j. They steal babies and leave changelings.

k. They come to bless the best bride-bed and make the increase therefore fortunate.

You spotted snakes with double tongue,

Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen;

Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,

Come not near our fairy queen.

-William Shakespeare

Mushroom Spore Printing

This spring we have been studying mushrooms (mycology). Our favorite activity with mushrooms is making spore prints. I can't believe how easy it is to do.

Warning! You obviously want to watch your little ones around mushrooms! Many different kinds of mushrooms are poisonous and can make you very sick. When handling mushrooms please be sure to wash your hands when you are through.

Pick your mushroom and remove the stem so your cap will lay flat. Place the cap on your paper of choice. The mushrooms we found leave dark brown spores so we used a creamy colored paper. Some mushrooms leave white spores, so the color of paper you use is important.

Place a glass cup or bowl over the caps.

Let the caps sit under the glass for about an hour. Tick Tock, Tick Tock.......this part is very hard for Araina!

After an hour, lift the glass and the cap, you should have a spore print. You can make more with the same cap while it is still fresh.

Be careful, the spores will smear! We learned this the hard way. A touch of hairspray or spray adhesive should preserve the prints.

Finding where the spores are located on the mushrooms is half the fun. Morels, for example carry their spores on the outside; slice in half and place the cap on its side to make a print.

Don't bother using those cute button mushrooms from the market; they just are not fresh enough to leave the spore prints.

We felt these beauties were frameable!

Morel Mushrooms

"A good mushroom hunter can hear the mushrooms pop out of the ground," so claims my mom. My sisters and I were raised hearing stories of the days my mom, her cousins, my grandpa and great grandpa would wake at the crack of dawn and go mushroom hunting. This was a spring tradition that they shared together. Mushroom hunting wasn't taken lightly in this family, it was serious business! We love to hear the stories of those days and the folklore that the Hay family passed down through the generations. Hunting for morels has strict rules......

Hay family tips to better your potential of finding morel mushrooms....

1. If you need a coat, it's too cold outside to find morels.

2. Don't take a bag to put them in, or you'll never find them.

3. Go with the intentions of picking redbud blossoms and violets, not for hunting morels.

4. Stop for a rest at decaying Ash trees, you might happen to find some morels there.

5. If you are lucky enough to find a family of morels, don't take them all, always leave the toughest and biggest one behind.

6. Never tell ANYONE where you found your morels! (This one is taken very seriously!)

My mom still hunts morels with her cousin and they don't take anyone else with them. To this day I have never even tasted a morel cooked by my mother, they are usually eaten up as fast as they are picked! I think my mom and her cousin are going to let us tag along with them this year, she has a weak spot for those granddaughters of hers and they want to join in the hunt.

To make the morels tasty she coats them in an egg and milk wash, covers them with cracker crumbs and fries them in butter. My great aunt believes they are better in corn meal, but oh no that's not what my mom believes! For more information on morels and recipes visit The Great Morel.

Should you go mushroom hunting take caution and remember this Croatian proverb- "All mushrooms are edible, but some only once."