August 10, 2008  

     On July 25th we went back to Matt & Crystal's to help with the cabinet doors again.  (Actually an excuse to see River again.)  Here's River on her tricycle, reading, pointing at an airplane, and just grinning.  Here's her cool dad.
     As part of the church renovation, Keith Danskin and I replaced one of the windows.  The last step will be to add fish-scale shingles to match the original ones.
     At home, I built some stairs in the woods.  (You can tell the deerflies were bad.) These lead up to the point of land that overlooks the brook.  
     Some animal pictures:  While looking out the picture-window wall, Lynn and I saw a deer down by the brook.  Some deer have been nibbling the trees in our front yard.  I hung some netting on the maple to discourage them.  A swarm of miniature bees (1/4-inch long) were all over some veronica in the garden.  The Greater Fritillary butterfly is frequent visitor to Lynn's flowers.  Here's a picture with his wings closed.  We found a striking black-and-white moth in the house.  I found a very small insect crawling on me—a zelus assassin bug nymph.  Each year Japanese beetles attack the tender new leaves on our elm tree.  They don't seem to have any natural predators, but a couple days ago we saw three birds descend on the beetles and try a few.  I guess weren't tasty because the birds soon left.
     Some flower pictures:  They're slow in coming, but we have morning glories finally blooming.  A lily is sporting some 8-inch- diameter blossoms.
     I guess I have to mention the rain, which we've seen two out of every three days for the last six weeks.  We got six inches in July—twice the average rainfall.

Feature: Total eclipse of the Sun

Quote: "Judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement." — Simón Bolívar

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