Friday, July 28, 2006

Bug walking and a vulture speck

My good friend Kim invited the girls and myself to an "Insect Jamboree" at Woodland Mound Park today. The rain was a downer, but the kids still had fun. They each got a cup with a beetle in it to observe, a nice lady read "The Very Hungry Caterpillar", we went on a scavenger hunt in the Nature Center, they got to drink "bug juice" and we stepped outside for a 5-minute bug hunt. Nice, and okay for $3, but I think that the girls could have learned more just by walking out our back door and turning over some rocks.

The kids also got to do a craft, thankfully with no glue. If you will let me brag about my kid for a minute: Isabelle could have been the Bug Lady for this little program...she has every insect in her field guide memorized. And to recap: She's FOUR.
(Yes, Lorelei's name is spelled wrong on her nametag...is she destined to always have to spell her name for people?)
Aidan with his fancy butterfly
Maura didn't make a craft...her job is to sit and be cute. A job she does well.
Okay, my token bird picture for the day: See the speck to the right of the lightpole? That's a turkey vulture. In my defense, I was driving at 65 mph in heavy rush hour traffic. I really need to do some serious birding...and I need a scope. (See Bill of the Birds' post about his trip to Africa) I could be getting great pics like that.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey, at least the nature center is trying. You can see that some thought went into the planning of the program, and not every kid has the benefit of parents as nature savvy as you are! It's difficult to put together a theme program like that when you're not sure how big your audience will end up being, both sizewise and in age. (Can you guess I've had to whip up things like this myself? :) ) Cute kids!!

Susan Gets Native said...

jemkagily: Point taken. I think that in the future, I have to take into account Isabelle's level of knowledge and put her in classes for older kids (and lie about her age, I guess) :-)
The Nature Center did its best...the original plan was to spend most of the time outside, but the rain got rid of that plan.

Anonymous said...

When Miss Isabelle organizes an "Insect Jamboree" sign us up. By the way, I thought the program was cute and something different from what we do everyday. And for $3, it was a bargin compared to other programs. Plus, it got us out of the house on a rainy day.

Anonymous said...

Are you sure that bird isn't an Ivory-billed Woodpecker with long-range wing tanks?

Oops, gotta run, here come the orderlies with my medications!