Irene!

I am so thankful that we were spared from the brunt of Irene! When we finally made it to SDS yesterday afternoon, I had the best surprise. One of our chrysalises was open, and the butterfly was out. He is a little early, but I attribute this to the less than ideal place where he settled down. I am guessing that the wind and rain encouraged him to come on out. He was a beautiful sight there, amongst the toppled plants.

Here is a picture of the remaining chrysalis. It is hard to see, because he is in the right place, tucked away, under a leaf. I circled him with yellow. It is fascinating to see how he suspended himself with two thin fibers, which must be very strong to have withstood all of that wind!

I love the roly poly and little cricket who sneaked into the picture too!

All in all, we were okay through the storm. I was surely worried that something would happen to our playground before we could enjoy it! The only problem we had was a good sized limb fell and broke our fence. We should have it all fixed by Thursday though.