A couple of weeks before school started we received a letter from Evan’s teacher saying that we should start collecting bugs for a project they would be doing.

My husband created a “kill jar” and we have been plopping all kinds of bugs in there.

I have to admit that I’m not overly fond of horseflies, bees, and wasps. One day we were in the pool and a horsefly was tormenting me. He was just asking to be placed in the kill jar. I kept going underwater hoping he couldn’t find me and would move on to some other victim. Somehow my husband, without his glasses on, managed to cup him into his hands and tried to drown him. He had him under the water for almost 10 minutes and the thing would not die. I know, we are really cruel people. Hey – we were told to get bugs and that’s what we were doing. LOL!

After I got out of the pool that day a bee was buzzing around me and being the bee lover that I am I swatted my towel at it and it ended up being dazed on the ground. Todd got it and that was just one more for the collection.

Yesterday’s adventure with bug collecting was interesting. I decided to take Abby for a quick walk around the block and came upon a caterpillar. It was a bald green one about an inch long and pretty thick. I thought I’d just pick it up and take it home. As soon as I picked it up it peed in my hand. There was actually a little puddle there. At that point I had to keep Abby’s leash in the other hand while I kept transferring the crawling caterpillar between hands, arms, and fingers. I was very careful about getting him home and not dropping him. Of course I found him early in the walk so I’m sure all of our neighbors were wondering what I was doing with my hands while walking my dog.

I managed to get the little guy home and while waiting for Abby to do her business in the yard I looked up to see what she was up to and then looked back and the caterpillar was no longer in my hand. I looked down and there it was on the ground in a little puddle. That guy sure had some major bladder control problem. He could have used a very teeny tiny Depends at that point. I took him inside and placed him in the kill jar. I did feel kind of bad because they are cute except for the peeing part.

When Evan got home from school I told him there was a Daddy Long Leg spider in the bathroom that I kept an eye on until he got home. I figured he could pick it up and put it in the jar. He wasn’t really wanting to do that. So here I am trying to grab one of his 8 legs and finally got him into the jar while Evan is telling me that they are harmless. Oh yeah – then why didn’t you pick it up?

So we are coming up with a great collection. I’d really prefer to just find a dead bug so that we don’t have to kill it. I’m really not into that at all. But sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.