BUG MUSEUM, ANYONE?

Tyson had the HIP idea of hosting a BUG MUSEUM.  All summer long he was collecting BUGS and he intended to charge $8 admission for people to come see his bugs.  Emmett was all excited about it, too.  Mitchell even made some deluxe bug catchers out of wood & mesh netting.  As the summer came to a close we realized on the last Saturday before school started, that if the Bug Museum was going to happen, it had to be NOW OR NEVER!  So we pulled it together and thanks to our friends and family, it was a smashing success!

It was hot and Emmett was NOT in the mood to pose with Tyson while wearing the cute bug museum hats that they made, so he marched off and went inside.

 

 The first ones there were Grandparents & Caden, and our friend Devin! 

 We had an amazing turn out of more friends, neighbors, and family!

 The little kids seemed to be just as fascinated with the ugly, stinky bugs as my kids were. : )

 

 

 

 We had Tyson tell as many facts as he could remember.

 

 We borrowed books from the library and did research, and we had some facts written out on the table for our guests to read.  Tyson's favorite bug in the books was called a "whirligig".  Whirligig beetles happen to have eyes that are special.  The top half of their eyes are made to see things above the water and the bottom half of their eyes are made to see clearly in the water.  AMAZING!  Some other fun facts we had on the table:

 

• A person who studies bugs is called an entymologist
• There are over 300,000 known species of beetles
• Only female bees have stingers

 

 Mitchell lost sight of the amazing facts we had going on with bugs, and he decided to teach the children how to use a magnifying glass in the hot summer sun to start something smoking.  *Sigh*  The blazing hot summer sun really was miserable that day.

 A dead stinky millipede who had been eaten by worms.  YUCK!  This one was donated by Mitch as an amazing find from working on a house.

 A GRUB

 

 (this pic makes my stomach turn just to remember that it was eating the insides of the millipede.  This is obviously a close-up...the grub was really small, but he still GROSSED me out!)

 

 

This is a stink bug and 2 Colorado Potato Bugs from Grandma Carlene's house.  The stink bug stayed alive for THREE WEEKS by eating the other two beetles once they died!  YUCK! It really did turn into a quality sort of Science experiment to have all 3 of these babies in a jar together.  We learned first hand that some beetles eat other beetles as well as beetle poop.  That's what scavengers do.  Fortunately for me, I now have fond memories of curling my hair while these beetles would crawl in circles in the jar in my bathroom.  Oh! This is the joy of having BOYS who love bugs in my household.  : )

 

 

Grandma Tenney donated the bumble bee that she found on her porch one day.  It was standing up, perfectly hardened, and dead, with shiny wings.  Also, this cicaida was donated by Uncle Hebes who caught it with finess and ease one night after it flew past my head and into the house.  I may or may have not given a little scream when that happened.  Tyson also took the cicaida bug to school for show and tell the first week of school.  : )  Love it!

 

It's probably a good thing that we collected bugs throughout the summer, because if we had done the museum the first week he thought of it, there would have only been a couple ants and dead rolly-pollies from the backyard on display.  But because it turned into an on-going process we found some amazing additions to our bug collection.  I'm really glad that we "seized the day" when we did.  We have been intending to get around to have another Bug Museum in the Fall, but the Fall Break has come and gone, and I'm so glad that we made the Bug Museum a reality in August.  Sometimes as a parent it's hard to find a balance between planning for things, and just going with it.  There's a balance between seizing the moment, and putting in extra effort to make things special for your kids.  In the end it's all about memories when you can, but so often that's easy to forget.  The squeemish side of me said "NO WAY!" to the Bug Museum idea the second it was mentioned, but what do you know?  Now we have a totally fun memory...we still have some jars of bugs that I still want to get rid of, but holy cow, do we know more about beetles than anyone else on our block. : )  It was so worth it and I'm so glad to all of the people who helped my boys feel special and humored us by coming to our Bug Museum--complete with coloring pages to take home and "bug juice" Kool-Aid to refresh you in the 116 degree heat.  Never in my life did I think this would happen, but I NOW have a part of me that has grown to like bugs simply because my little boys do.