The Great Callapilla Experiment, Day 12

We have been collecting callapillas like crazy people. The only way we can get Carys to take a walk in the evenings without protests, is to give her a bug jar & let her have at it.
We've collected about 45 or so - all Eastern Tent Callapillas, which are rampant around here!

The callapillas have started to disappear (aka build cocoons)- so I thought it would be nice to find a picture online of the beautiful butterflies her callapillas are turning into. Something to look forward to, if you will...
Imagine my dismay when I found out we're fostering ugly brown moths. MOTHS!
Oh well, she'll be just as excited.

These little things can EAT!
We feed them leaves from the Bradford Pear trees,
which seem to be their fa'bite.

Carys, checking out her cocoons.
Once the callapillas spin their cocoons
(Carys calls them sleeping bags - which is true, I guess!),
I move them to her bug house so she can see them better when they hatch.

Standard size Eastern Tent callapillas...and a baby one!
Do you see it? It's tiny!!!
If you look directly under the callapilla on the top,
you'll see a little one. I don't even think he's 1/4" long.
We stole him from out neighbor's house - they had a nest hatching.
Very cool. Kinda gross too, but very cool to see.

This is an actual butterfly callapilla - making a crystalis.
At least I think it will become a butterfly.
I can't find anything about it online.
It was different from all the other callapillas...
and it's not making a silken cocoon. It's a hard black shell.
We'll be interested to see what it becomes.

Crazy little things - they've started building
cocoons on the top of Chateau du Callapilla!They can demolish some leaves. I've never seen anything
eat faster that they do. Well, maybe Carys....

And onto some non-Callapilla inspired shots


Carys, helping Cailyn eat her skettis.
It was the first time I let cailyn free with pasta. She LOVED it!

Look Mommy! Cheerios! Would you care for some? NO? You say you don't like slobbery Cheerios? It's a fine cuisine. You don't know what you're missing. More for me, then!

Cutie Patootie Smiling again, with all her might.

Carys really is a sweet little girl. She blows me away almost ever day.
Take this little dialogue for example:

Carys: Where is my daddy?
Me: Remember, daddy has to go to work....
Carys: Hm. Why?
Me: Daddy has to go to work to make money.
Carys: Oh. Why don't you go to work?
Me: My work is playing with you & Sissy all day. I have the best job, huh?!
Carys: Yea. .... Call Daddy to come home now. I have lots of money in my closet.

What a sweetheart. I didn't have the heart to tell her that her Piggy Bank can't make a mortgage payment ;) But it was so sweet for her to think of her Daddy like that.
She is so sweet.