Updates

Wow!  I can't believe how quickly the summer passed this year!  Here is a little update.

The girls loved swim team!  They both did well, and their swimming skills have greatly improved.  Hailey is indeed more comfortable in the water after spending some time at the pool this summer.  She did take one session of swimming lessons, but spent most of the time saying "no, thank you" when asked to participate.

The frogs were indeed bull frogs.  Daisy did not make it very long after she completed her metamorphosis.  Ribbity-hoppers was doing quite well, but recently met his demise.  I actually think one of the girls' friends may have gotten a bit rough with him.

We had TONS of Monarch caterpillars on our milkweed this year.  There were so many that the milkweed is now bare.  Unfortunately we did not have very good luck getting them to become butterflies this year.  The first 2 we had successfully became butterflies, however we did not have any others that we brought inside successfully eclose.  I think there may have been a parasite issue.  We have had to settle for watching them in the wild this year.  The girls have missed being able to release them, though.

Unfortunately we also lost 2 very special pets this summer.  Our 7 year old chow/shepherd mix, Maggie, passed away very unexpectedly at the end of July.  It was quite a shock to all of us.  She had been with us since Madeline was 5 months old, and they essentially picked each other out.  A couple of weeks later our guinea pig, Abby, passed away as well.  She was almost 6, and had clearly led a long, happy life.  The girls have a lot of happy memories with both pets, and miss them both.

Hailey and Maggie

Maggie on a hike with the girls and me.  She was always our "protector."

Abby

We have, however, added a new member to our family.  We adopted an Australian Shepherd puppy, Addison.  He is very loving and playful.  He is neither timid nor aggressive.  He seems to have just the right personality for our family!  He plays well with the girls and is ready for any adventure.  The girls have taken on the challenge of training him, and have done some reading and learning about how to train dogs.

Madeline and Addison

Addison on an adventure with the girls.

Addison also follows our other dog, Wrigley, around everywhere she goes (although he does not nap nearly as much as she does).

Addison and Wrigley

So, all in all it has been a very eventful summer.  We are now getting settled into a fall schedule.

Tadpoles!

On one of the creek days we found and brought home a couple of tadpoles.  One was quite large and had small back legs.  The other was a lot smaller, but I was pretty sure they were both bull frog tadpoles.  They have been hanging out in a tank, eating lots of boiled lettuce, and growing.

The larger one, which the girls named Ribbity-Hopper, now has all of it's legs, and its tail is almost gone.  The larger one, Daisy, now looks like Ribbity-Hopper looked when we brought them home.  It is large, with rear legs.  One really interesting thing that we discovered was that both of Ribbity-Hopper's front legs did not emerge at the same time.  In fact, I thought for a while that we were going to have a three-legged frog, as the second front leg emerged a few days after the first.  The both look great now, though!

Here are a few pictures that were taken about a week and a half ago.

Ribbity-Hopper

Daisy