Our wild kingdom

Nathan has spent a lot of time like this lately:

See, we have this critter called a "skink" that lives under the foundation and sidewalks of our house.  He's an ugly thing that looks like a short snake with legs.  The boys have caught him a few times and Nathan tends to spend most of his days out there trying to catch him.  Well, recently we learned that we have more than one skink living around here.  Unfortunately, we found out because one of the others came a callin'.

One day this week, Andy calls out "why do we have a lizard tail in the living room?"  And of course, there was a logical explanation...that escaped me at that moment.  He found it under the recliner and I remembered seeing the cat spending some time under there earlier in the day.  So, I freaked out  quietly told him to check under the chair for the other half that belonged to the tail.  He didn't find anything.

Fast forward to the next day and the kids were playing downstairs.  Suddenly I heard Rachel yelling something about  "LIZARD!" and "CAT!" and "THE BABY'S TOUCHING IT!" and the boys laughing and a huge ruckus on the stairs.  They found the other half.  IN the house.  On the stairs.  I'm trying not to think about that thing crawling all over us while we slept.  Surely he didn't.  I'm sure he only stayed right under the recliner until it was time to come out and walk down the stairs to be caught.  Here's our new friend.  We named him Bob.

 Then, yesterday we had some pretty good storms roll through that brought lots and lots of rain with them.  Several areas locally were evacuated and roads were blocked off due to flooding.  Since God has blessed us with a house on a hill, we weren't affected by the flooding.  We did, however, end up with a cute, green houseguest late last night.  Even though he was pretty cute, we decided we wouldn't let him come in.

Lastly, or maybe firstly, we have 2 beautiful houseguests that have taken residence on our front entry.  They started visiting us before we left on our trip.  Since we come and go so often through the front door, they didn't sit very long there.  However, we were gone for 2 weeks so they decided they would set up a guardshack right by the front door.  I know, I know, we don't want a bird nest right at our front door.  I haven't checked yet, but I imagine they are laying eggs in the nest and I just don't have the heart to tear it down after they've worked so hard building it for their babies.  Plus, we ARE homeschoolers and that just goes against our nature to remove such an educational specimen.  We have all agreed to leave it there until the babies hatch and the birds move on.  They are barn swallows and really pretty.  They're also fast and it's been hard to snap a picture of them but I finally got one last night.

"..a lizard can be caught with the hand, yet it is found in kings’ palaces."

Proverbs 30:28 (NIV)