A gift of freedom.

After out trip to the zoo we really wanted to give our Yurtle, The Turtle the best gift ever. As much as he (yes, we think of him as "he", not "it") was surely enjoying worry free meals of juicy earth worms, flies, spiders, and occasionally dry pellets, we had a feeling he would rather take care if himself.
When we picked up this tiny hatchling last fall, barely moving across the road, then spent close to $80.00 to set up him temporary winter headquarters, we knew we would set him free next summer.
We have been really enjoying Yurtle's company as much of a company as the snapping turtle can provide. There was someone waiting for us when we came home. His snout was clanging against the glass of the fish tank almost talking to us, something like turtle's Morse Code...tap, tap-tap-tap, tap... I had someone to complain to when I had a pile of dishes to wash and he was there to listen.
Yurtle doubled in weight, his shell hardened, his claws grew longer and sharper, he became more alert. These are all the signs that we've been taking good care of him.But the truth was much too obvious. He would rather be free.
He needed ultraviolet light so that his shell grows strong and hard. He needed to learn how to hunt. He needed to enjoy his freedom in the summer before the days get shorter and colder and winter would be around the corner.
We took pictures together with Yurtle to remember him by, put him in a bucket and took off to a Sunny Hill Lake. Even the name of the lake vibrates with happiness, opportunities and life full of adventure. We call that lake "our lake", since we've been spending a lot of Sunday afternoons fishing, boating and relaxing.
The water was very warm. We put Yurtle on the big rock sticking out from the water and waited. Anxious to see what the turtle would do. We didn't have to wait for too long.
He stretched his very long, quite disproportional rubbery neck, sniffed the air, went along the rock and disappeared under the water.
The water was pretty clear and it was easy to watch him. All the girls were excited to see him, but in a while the mud disturbed from the bottom of the lake by those little feet hid our pet from us. Everybody had to step back and wait for the water to become clear again.
And there he was, happy and content, browzing around, getting stuck in the weeds and easily releasing himself.
We spent a few minutes in the water, were very glad our Yurtle liked the Sunny Hill home and decided it was time to leave. EEEUUU!What an upleasant surprise! EEEUUUU!EEEUUUU!
We had to pay a dear price for Yurtle's freedom! With our own blood! EEEUUU! We had leaches already attached to us and busy sucking. Mirek got 4, and I, luckily, only 1. The girls were spared!

We were going home and were very happy for Yurtle. And we knew that if he could talk, he would thank us.

A trip to the zoo.

A dinosaur is giving us a ride.
Milana is busy bringing the food to the sheep.
Ivana is feeding an apple to the Lori parrots.
Leona is giving a giraffe a carrot treat.

Trully enjoying the summer.

We have been enjoying the summer to the fullest!
Right after breakfast we have been heading out to the lake, packed up with our swim gear and towels, snacks and drinks, camera and something to read.
We like the lake in the mornings the most. The mountain air is fresh and crisp, the beach is just for us and we can't stand to spend even a minute inside the house when the sun is out and the weather is beautiful.
Ivana is enjoying the swimming and the jumping part, the other two are pretending to be the scuba divers, and their "bratik" keeps me busy with his exploring of the beach and the water.
Only when he goes for a nap I can read a bit or scribble something in my notebook, or play with the girls "cooking", or my favorite "the let's take a nap on the beach" game.

Water baby.

He made it into the water this time!
Oh.. a little secret to share. The hat he is wearing has flowers on the front, so I turned it around. Now you can't tell it's a girl's hat! Wink...

Playing "house".

Good night, sleep tight... She seems to be pretty comfortable sleeping on that bed.

Beach baby.

I just can't keep him on the towel anymore. All he wants to do is play with the sand. Thank goodness he is not shoving it into his mouth yet, but he has discovered that there is more fun going on in the water when he sees the girls splishing and splashing.
He started crawling towards the water today so fast I could barely catch him!

A day with curly hair.

What do you do when it rains outside? You could do a lot of things, like bake cookies, draw, do arts and crafts, play with the toys, watch a good movie, sew, play a board game, write a letter, and, of course, read. What do you do if it has been poring for days already and you have done all those things mentioned before over and over again?
Then you need to come with new ideas! And that is always an exciting thing in our house! As we've been reading L. I. Wilder's "Little House on the Prairie" series, we came across the cloth strips being mentioned to make the hair curly. And then I remembered that's exactly what we used to do when I was little and the girls begged to make their hair curly. So, the fun began!
We ripped some old shirts and rapped newspaper strips around the cloth to make it sturdier. The trick for the curls to last longer is to dampen the hair locks with beer, that's if you want to go "all natural", without adding any modern conveniences of hair sprays and foams. The girls couldn't wait for the next morning to finally take the cloth strips off and see their curls. Leona felt uncomfortable on the pillow, feeling all those bumps, but still did not want to take them off.
And the next morning it stopped raining, and it was a gorgeous sunny day, full of opportunities to take the pictures of our girls with their new look. I was like a mad woman running with the camera after them, snapping a shot here and there. They were so cute that I couldn't stop. And now we have a whole folder of pictures named "our curly summer day".