'Old Familiar Faces', Pt. 2 - Nature Journal, July 2015

July 3rd, 2015 Friday   Garden Center Creek
I feel like I should give the creek a nicer name than just 'the garden center one'. It's really my favorite spot at work, and it deserves a nice name. 'Gardenside Brook'? I wonder if there is a difference between 'creek' and 'brook'...

Lead of a weed.
They've got sinister
dark splotches in the center
of the leaves.
Color is perhaps a little more
dark blue-green.

Must identify these plants I draw!

July 10th, 2015 Friday   Garden Creek
The sun is out, and the sky is blue! This week has been wet and rainy. Really, the whole 'summer' has been miserably wet.
Yesterday I went home early because it was constantly drizzling. I've been parking at the garden center so I don't have to walk far in the rain.
Today's high is 76*F. I don't think it's hardly gotten in the 80's this year.
I'm surprised at how long some plants can keep on living in the squares and pots, even though the soil is practically all roots instead of dirt.
Found out that canna lilies are not perennials. You have to dig them up & replant in the spring, if you want to make sure they survive. This confused me, since out cannas came back every year, on their own. Jeanne [at the garden center] says they must have been in a good, protected spot.
Almost regretting getting rid of them.
The new flowers we put in seem to be doing well! We really need to weed, though.

July 16th, 2015 Thursday   Pymatuning Lake Campground

Here we are, once again, at Pymatuning Lake! Our camping spot is different, though, because some eagles are nesting where we used to go. We are still next to water, though!

There is a crabapple tree two or so spaces down. A walnut tree, too? There was a strange sight on that tree -- hundreds of fuzzy white caterpillars! They covered the surface of leaves and branches. They were black-bodied with white fuzz.

July 17th, 2015 Friday   Pymatuning Lake

It is cloudy and chilly today.

There was a tiny caterpillar on my tent this morning, green-bodied with white fuzz.

Dad and I saw duck, too -- ten of them! I just call them 'the brown kind', I don't know what kind they were. I certainly have a lot to research when I get home!

Heard that weird yowling bird, but of course didn't see it. I will find out what you are!

The 'black-bodied'

caterpillar --

actually white

w/black spots

For some reason, one of the trees

had random clumps of leaves that

had turned red. Some had dropped.

Very waxy, shiny leaf.

July 18th, 2015 Saturday   Pymatuning Lake

It thundered and rained a bit last night. Later in the afternoon the clouds cleared a bit. Wore a long-sleeved shirt, and jacket most of the day.

This morning is much brighter & warmer than yesterday. It was actually warmer Friday night than Thursday night.

There was the 'green-bodied' caterpillar on my tent again -- it's actually an off-white, with a greenish tinge, with yellow spots on its sides and black spots along the top.

There was a goose with something wrong with its neck that like to stand on one of the logs out on the water. The feather on its neck were gone -- scratched a lot at it, and there were sores. It also cleaned its feathers almost obsessively. Mom said it might be a nervous habit; she said she doesn't see why animals wouldn't have that, like people.

The water is murky brown-green. There's a film on it in the morning, but it fades later.

Farewell, Pymatuning! Until next year!

'Old Familiar Faces', Pt. 1 - Nature Journal, July 2014

The title 'Old Familiar Faces' comes from the poem by Charles Lamb. It popped up a few times in my college class study on Frankenstein, since the phrase is used in the novel. I'm using it here because July of last year and July of this year were very similar. Looking through my nature journal, July's studies were from the little creek at my job at the garden center, and from camping at Pymatuning Lake. I'll be doing a second post, with the entries from July of this year.

I've tried to copy the format of my journal entries here, and added a few [bracketed] phrases for clarification.

July 1st, 2014 Tuesday
Half of the year has gone by!
We will go camping this month, on the 17th & 18th, at Pymatuning Lake. I will definitely have to bring this [journal]. Last year we saw so many neat things!

Twig from a

tree by my

lunch break

area

The berries

have a thin

fleshy layer,

and then

a hard

pit

July 2nd, 2014 Wednesday

I know this isn't a true statement, but it seems the only color in summer is green!

Let me list what isn't green:

-Brown of dirt

-Brown of bark

-Blue of sky

-White of clouds

-Gray of storm clouds

-Yellow of sunlight

-Clear-blue of water

-Rainbow of flowers still blooming

So, it isn't all green, after all!

July 3rd, 2014 Thursday

Much cooler today!

There's a grape vine growing

on one of the trees

by my lunch area

July 6th, 2014 Sunday

Dad put out a double-hook stand for the bird feeders out back. So many birds go to it! Cardinals and mourning doves and purple finches and house sparrows and goldfinches and red-winged blackbirds and starlings! Squirrels like it, too, of course. Most of the birds browse under the feeders. Interestingly, I don't see any robins at the feeders. I guess they prefer soft, juicy worms to nuts and seeds.

Stevia rebaudiana

grows 10"-12" (shown is about half of its height)

edible leaves are very sweet

July 17th, 2014 Thursday

We are at Pymatuning Lake! We got the exact camping site we had last year, right by the water.

It hasn't been very warm today (it started out rainy), cloudy and a bit breezy, maybe 70*. Jeff and I went swimming, anyways.

Before we went to the camping area, we went to the Spillway, where you can buy bags of bread and feed the giant carp. Hundreds of gaping mouths, bodies swirling in a mass - it's a sight to see! We threw chunks in the air for seagulls to catch - sometimes they actually caught them!

6pm, we got a fire started. It smoked a lot; I think the magazine shreds were to blame.* The fire is absolutely mesmerizing to watch. *No, some of the wood was damp.

At night there were fireflies and bats fluttering around. The lights across the lake made for a pretty scene.

Dad burned one of his magazines, and it made the flames green!

At night Dad shined his flashlight into the water. We saw a few crawdads, tiny fish, and HUGE spiders! Dad slipped on a rock and ended up in the water! Thankfully, he didn't land hard on any rocks.

We didn't see any little sharks, like we saw last year.

July 18th, 2014 Friday

Whenever a boat passes on the lake, a series of small waves splash at the rock with a gentle sound. Sometimes fish splash up in the lake for bugs and leave a ripple. A few times really big ones halfway leap out of the water.

A nice warm morning, no clouds in the sky!

Dear Blogger... -- Narration for Anne Frank's 'A Diary of a Young Girl'

Tuesday, 7 July, 2015

Dear Blogger,

I have been reading Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl. I've always just called it 'Anne Frank', though. It's really hard to understand that it was the diary of a real person. I've read historical fiction diary-type books before, so it's hard to see Anne as real.

I was surprised how soon she and her family had to go into hiding. In real time, it was a few months; but reading it, it's only a few minutes. I like how she remarked, "What's it like to disappear? I'm not really sure, myself, yet."

Obviously, they must be very quiet at times, but life goes on fairly normal. Anne even has friends over to stay the night in the "Secret Annexe".

I suppose I didn't explain the events well, did I? It seems like on of those books where everyone knows the main story already. Anne and her family, being Jewish (during Hitler's time), go into hiding in the back of an office building. It's called the "Secret Annexe". They are living there with the Van Doon (Daan) family -- a dad, a mom, and a son named Peter. Anne's family is Daddy, Mummy, and her older sister Margot.

Like I said, things are pretty normal. Anne even does school.

Anne seems like such an easygoing, yet sensitive girl. She's called a chatterbox, yet her entries are thoughtful. No one seems to think her very bright, yet her entries are surprisingly insightful. Anne understand herself as a person, and just wishes everyone else would see her that way.

That's all I have to share today.

Yours, Lee

(Phrases in parentheses are later edits on original narration, for clarification and correction. Narration is mimicking Anne's own diary entries.)