Five years of butterfly garden growing by trial and error and I finally got a view of some *brown winged monarch fluttering by, no stop overs for feeding yet but at least they where seen in numbers from 3 - 8 weekly for the first time in the neighborhood in five years. Perhaps it's them pesky English sparrows one of my neighbors is long time fond of feeding that hurts there longer closer visits as they ruckus about in my yard as well ( there great bug killers of pest and such and they do bring about some bigger and more aggresive birds as well )I have made a compromise by education to the awfull bird feeding habits that they seem to possess. * brown winged = I can't ID em for certain as Monarchs as the bird feeding thing gets resolved I am hopefull for neaxt season for landings and pics. I also fond your site nice enough to join I have much to learn and will still read along in this forum thanks for the invite.

Thanks-- I get the Bayview catalog by Joe Ghio, and every year he lists irises which he feels are underappreciated. He listed Party's Over one year, and so I bought it. It is very unusual, for sure. Its flowers were a tad bit smaller this year than normal. Thanks for the info on the frog. Funny story: about three years ago one got into the house and at that point I didn't know what they sounded like. I thought there was a wounded animal or a puppy in my bathroom. I was seriously worried about how I was going to handle that, but as I peaked in and saw nothing I determined that the sound was coming from the toilet and then found the frog under the toilet seat. Trust me: if you ever hear one you won't believe something that little could be that loud! They are cute, though ... Mike

Beautiful butterflies minrose. The 3rd one is really cute. Here are mine.

I'm enjoying all these wonderful pictures! Thanks so much for sharing. Jim, what's a lech well? Your mom looks like a fun person. Murraysmom, cute kids! Were you the only girl? I was an only child. Always wished for siblings. Still do! Jem, it's great that you know so much about your family history. That's a rare photo to have. I'm so spoiled when it comes to old photographs. Two of my grandparents were opera singers, so I have their publicity stills from the late 1800s and early 1900s. Plus my dad (their son) was an avid amateur photographer who loved to photograph people. Many of my friends and relatives appreciate to this day the pictures he took back at a time when not many people had cameras, at least not good ones. My mom was his favorite model, but he also documented every bit of my childhood. I have thousands of prints, slides, and negatives. Here I am on vacation in Quebec. The little boy spoke only French, and wouldn't share his crayons unless I asked for each color in French. I learned quickly. ;-) In the "play date" thread I talked about growing up in an apartment building with my two best friends, Pat and Carolyn. Here they are. Here's one of my mom before she and my dad were married. And after. One of my mom's sisters And my grandmother on stage (in a dark wig).