Jim sent me this the other day.  It is Oliver M. Chappell, who
was Toliver Chappell and Mary Mink Chappell's boy.  He was
born in 1872 or 1873 and died at 11 years of age from unknown
causes.  His records were lost in a courthouse fire. 

He was Great-Grandma Hattie's brother.  This picture was from
1880 when he was eight and Grandma Hattie (Happy) was 6.

Peeta looks very much like him!  And I thought Peeta was all
Gagliardi.

Bill decided to turkey hunt this year.  He talked his very pregnant wife
into coming to Fernnook two weekends in a row.  He heard turkey, he
saw turkey, he shot at turkey...but alas, he didn't bag a turkey.

In between the visits, he and Stacey left the kids here.  So counting
the time they were here with mom and dad, and the time they were
here without mom and dad, the kids and their cousins and Kent and
I had a glorious Cousin Camp.

We played and had a sleepover and the kids walked back and forth
through the field to visit each other every day.  That is the new and
very exciting thing that the little'uns do...walk through the field to
Grandpa and Grandma's house, or back to Joel and Natalie's house.

Tyler and Jenn are looking forward to when Adeline can walk through
the field between their (future) house and ours.

Adeline is 4 days old now and just an adorable little person.  She has lots
of hair and it seems to be starting to curl.

On the last day of Cousin Camp, Wilbur and I were spending a little time
together.  We walked to the big pond and then back to the yard to play
on the trampoline.  As we were walking down the driveway, Wilbur
asked why there were meatballs on the driveway.  They were really
gumballs from the sweet gum tree, but on the driveway they get smashed
by the cars, and they really do look like meatballs.  I just never noticed
it before.

Tyler found a lovely little bunch of morels and fried them up for us.  Boy
Howdy!  They are scrumptious.  I have yet to find my first morel ever.  But
now he has a secret spot, and maybe I can go with him next year to find
some for myself.

He also found some false morels which he threatened to eat.  They are poisonous,
but my Missouri Mushroom book says that whole families of Ozarkians grew
up eating them.

I know that is true because my good friend Liz grew up near Warm Springs,
AR and sure 'nuff, her family grew up eating false morels.  Her parents thought
the true morels were the poisonous ones.  You just have to know how to cook
them, I suppose.

No excuses...just very busy and so sleepy!

I'll toss out a few snapshots of what we've been up to here at Fernnook Farm.

First, the kids came running in with this one evening.  I had no idea what it
was, so we put it in a bug cage and watched it for a week or two.  After a few
days it began to wiggle around, if it was disturbed at all.

I researched it, and came to the conclusion that it was a luna moth chrysalis,
and I kept hoping that it wasn't dying.

Then one day, while Kent and I were sitting at the table we heard an odd noise,
and turned around to see that Mr. Moth was emerging.  I tried to get the kids
down before it came all the way out, but that Moth was too fast for me.

Anyway, they did get to see its wings get bigger and stronger.

Here it is fully developed.  Unfortunately one of its wings didn't fill all the way out.
So, I am afraid that it might have become a meal for the cat or a bird.  Luna moths
only live one week after emerging and do not eat or drink during that week.  They
only mate and (if they are female) lay eggs.  One of their preferred trees is sweet
gum and I have a lovely one (under which the chrysalis was found by the kids), so
I will look for more of these next year.

One day Colyn spent the day with me and he wanted to cook bread.  We needed
more Lord's Supper bread at church so we made some.

Colyn enjoyed the whole process, even the kneading.

So did I.

The eight loaves we made for church.

And, the one we kept for supper.