Meet Poonee

Last week, the hottest week of the summer, we decided to tackle staining our deck.  Thankfully in the evenings we get shade on that side of the house and there certainly wasn't any rain, so it was a fairly successful event and the deck looks so much better.  Here are some photos!

The portion on the right is what our deck looked like.  The left side is after a good power wash.

This is the final product!  It took a lot longer than we expected, but worth the effort!

While staining the deck one evening, we found a baby praying mantis.  We have been talking about bugs this summer and reading books on bugs, so the decision was made to catch and keep the baby praying mantis as a pet.  A bug cage and a cricket keeper with live crickets are now a part of the decor in our home:)  A second praying mantis was found and Jacob named the small one Neenee and the large one Poonee.  Now I had read online that praying mantis insects have no shame in eating each other, so I knew we were at risk of this occuring....and sure enough the next morning while we were eating breakfast, Poonee cornered Neenee and had a tasty meal!  Survival of the fittest at work.  Since then, Poonee has eaten several crickets and shed his skin once.  Here's Poonee!