Yard Attack

We lost Gigantor last night, a name I gave our largest and first pumpkin.  It almost looks like an opossum got him, so this morning I was researching ways to stop that from happening again to our other pumpkins. And additionally, there's another mysterious thing affecting the middle portion of our pumpkin plants.  Not sure what it is, but we had a friend over to tell us about actually using soap and water on the leaves, wiping out potential squash bugs.  Interesting tactic.  Also interesting is the deterrent for opossums:  garlic.  Apparently, one way to drive opossums away is by spreading garlic all around the growing pumpkin.  Garlic not only repels vampires, but opossums too.  We'll see if that works.  Still, it's been a bummer.  We're not farmers, and yet we're somewhat invested in our little pumpkin patch.  I was down there earlier with my salt gun, knocking down the relentless wave of juro spiders that just keeps pouring in from the forest.  Our neighborhood is plagued with them, although our yard is clear of them largely.  I have shot down hundreds of them.  If I had a little marker and put notches on the salt gun, I'd have hundreds of tiny little lines all over it.  There are that many of these invasive creatures.

On the plus side, our hibiscus plant is blossoming now, and the hummingbirds actually do come up to it for a sip.  They still fly to the feeder, of course, but they also like the other blooms around in our yard.  We have a tremendous amount of bird visitors though.  It's a mostly predictable lot lately, and even the time they visit can be right on schedule.  But it's a good variety, and it's nice to see them coming by.

We had taekwondo tonight, and Nana and I missed it to do some grocery shopping for Mom.  We'll catch Maddie tomorrow, but she was helping with the younger class, and then in her leadership class.  Each day they're learning new things in leadership class.  It's been invigorating for her. 

After that, we were home just in time for small group.  Camille wasn't there yet - she just got married Sunday - but Lauren hosted, and it went on for some time, and that's okay.  She's helping, sharing, praying and learning in this online small group, one of the best things to come out of this pandemic.

We were watching "Light and Magic" while she was in small group.  It's a documentary about Industrial Light and Magic, and it's been amazing to watch.  Some of these guys are behind-the-scenes legends, and there's a lot of new things I've learned watching this about the creation of some of my favorite movies growing up.  

Tonight we closed the evening out with a quick reading from "The Prisoner's Dilemma," which we're nearly done with.  We said our prayers after that, and soon after that... we were all fast asleep!