Spring 2012
I haven’t talked about my family a whole lot yet, but family is pretty much the whole reason for the move. This is probably my favorite photo of my three loves. My husband (who is the most private person I know – bless his heart for not collapsing when I told him about the blog) was being silly with the girls one morning and I captured this sweet moment. Lucy was about six months old and Penny had just turned three.
Speaking of the girls, we finally told them about the move last night. The first words out of Penny’s mouth were, “I’m not really that excited because I don’t like walking in Michigan….they have worms!” Not the response we were expecting, exactly, although it wasn’t entirely out of left field. Last summer when we were there, Penny was freaked out by all the bugs.
In the backyard. (No bugs.)
To her credit, they were kind of creepy, especially when they crawled up from the dirt and onto the hot stones of Nana’s deck or concrete sidewalks of the neighborhood. They would writhe around, flipping and flopping, and if they couldn’t find their way back to the earth, they would eventually shrivel up and die. There were also lots of beetles and bees and other flying insects. We rarely see bugs here, even in our backyard.
Image Credit: http://www.thedailystar.net
I feel her pain. Bugs make ms jumpy, too. My gross-out Michigan bug moment was during my early evening runs. Every couple of blocks, I would run through a swarm cloud of tiny bugs in a funnel formation (what were they doing? And what kind of bugs were they? I would Google it, but then I’d have to look at buggy photos). Every once in a while I would inhale one. I got to where I could spot them up ahead, and whenever I reached a swarm, I would flail my arms in an attempt to keep any bugs from entering my nose or mouth. Sometimes I’d let out a battle cry while doing it. Preeetty sure the locals could tell I wasn’t from around there.
Penny and I have some manning up to do, for sure (she’s been talking about worms all morning), especially since I plan on composting and planting an edible garden. I’ll let you know how it goes down.
Pointes of View 
LOVE how you’re embracing gardening!! I love it, too! Liz once asked me if everyone in the Midwest knows how to garden. I told her I think many of us do because it’s so exciting after winter to plant and bring color to our world.
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Yes, I think you might be right! At the first sign of spring this year, I remember seeing people out planting perennials.
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I loved Michigan when I was a kid. I would love to take my kids to Mackinac Island. So many beautiful lakes… finding agates on the shore of Lake Michigan. I don’t really remember bugs, but I grew up around the Great Lakes, and have always taken having some bugs in stride. Scorpions in the laundry basket, though! Dang!
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Thanks for stopping by the blog! I’m excited to take the girls to Mackinac someday (I’ve been once). And I’m so glad to hear you say you don’t remember bugs. Maybe I’ll stop seeing them after a while. But the fishflies…. Eeeek!
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You’re like a tree to a bug, enormous and scary. Worms are really, really good for the earth and the soil. You garden is blessed to have worms. My kids would rescue them and put them back on the soil if they got stranded. We don’t have a lot of sympathy for gypsy moths or grubs, though. Or mosquitoes. Or black flies.
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Or snails? (they can be very cute in books, but sure to eat up plants). I would love to make friends with the “good” bugs! I’m going to try, at least.
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I’m more likely to run into a slug than a snail in my garden. If you are overrun with slugs, you can leave out a beer bottle with a little left in the bottom, and they will all slither to their ends.
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Poor slugs. (although I would likely try this if it gets crazy)). Thanks for the tip!
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We discovered it by accident. Someone (not us) have thrown a beer can into the woods near our garden and it was full of slugs. Yuck!
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Very nice photo…and good for your husband to bite his lip when you told him about your blog :-) Great writing and photos we would have missed had you not started blogging. Leaving SF for Michigan…hmmmmm.
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You really have no idea.. SO private. But he’s also my biggest supporter, which is pretty great, especially considering that fact. Yes, hmmmmm indeed. We’ll see…
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And thank you for the Follow!
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Eh you are still a Hawaii girl!! Don’t you remember those big b52 cockroaches? And geckos, spiders, and centipedes? You’ll be ok. And girls will adjust, bugs and all :)
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I still have dreams about roaches!
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I bet you know who anonymous is…
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Yup!
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I guarantee it won’t compare to the bugs in Texas. Call me if you need a pep talk! There was a live scorpion in my laundry basket a few months ago.
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Yikes! I don’t know…Michigan was pretty buggy this summer.
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Got gnats in your teeth did ya? Those swarms are always tough to see though. The bugs are one of the two biggest issues my wife had with Michigan. The other being the near constant overcast. She being from California, couldn’t take that climate anymore after eight years.
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I thought those might be gnats. And nooooo, don’t say that about the bugs and the weather!!!!
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One of things I clearly remember noticing the first month after I moved to SF from Chicago was : hey…. NO BUGS!
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I’m starting to really freak out about those darned bugs.
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