Absolutely fabulous! Your pictures are better than the ones in my butterfly calendar! I never even noticed the spots on the bodies until now. Thanks for sharing.

Great pictures Sandy. Always glad to hear of your travels to different lands and so the different butterflies. But here you go bringing the thrill of leps back into my heart after my absence. Unfortunately the tails are tattered that mimic the stem of the leaf, but they still show well how cryptic this group is and how closely they mimic dead leaves. That is until they open their wings and flash the bright colors common on most species (their tool to suddenly surprise/scare would be predators). The Charaxinae are some of my favorite tropical butterflies, so I spent considerable time doing them (especially in Costa Rica and Brazil). Naturally I pursued the Memphis species because they are mostly irradescent blues and greens, but also both Zaretis and Consul (yellows, browns, reds) as well. I did most of the other Charaxinae too and they also mimic leaves, but many don't have that tail that completes the deception. BTW, the Memphis especially only live in the forest canopy hundreds of feet up and seldom come down to ground, so they are a real challenge. L.

silvekelt, thought I'd post about my ox-eye daisies. They were really small divisions planted last year to be little in-betweeners, and they did take over. I actually lost some plants that they overran, and I'm wondering if they are waterhogs because those that did make it near them were doing pretty poorly. My patches were HUGE! I ended up having to remove all of my ox-eyes from the garden. I still love them, but I'm hoping when we move I'll be able to do a meadow-type garden with them using other meadow plants that are equally as enthusiastic in their growth. Let them duke it out for space while I enjoy the wonderful flowers. One nice thing about the ox-eyes this year is they had a really long flowering period in my garden. I don't know if that's normal or something about this year as I don't have enough gardening experience, but they were certainly ready for some encores as the days went on. I'll be interested to hear your experience with them in your garden and how it compares to mine.

I'm so glad to hear back from you! Thanks for the great closeups and the information about the installation process. I, too, never cared for the way the sink was originally installed, but figured there must be a reason. After seeing the finished apron front, I guess the only reason was that the owners didn't want to cut into the window framing, so mounted the sink with the backsplash just underneath. The cabinets are also lower and less deep than those built today, but I think that was pretty common a hundred or so years ago. I do wish I could find out what year this sink was made. The bottom of the sticker was gone and it wasn't printed anywhere on the sink. If I could find that out, it would help figure out when this house was really built, as there is some discrepancy with the dates. I have changed some of the planning on our install, based on your photos... DH was going to extend the window sill by the few inches needed to get the apron to line up with the countertop just behind the curve on the side of the sink. The shelf was to go straight out from the sill, then straight down, filling in the entire area between the corbels on either side of the window. I really like how your shelf is deeper than the box and rounded on the ends. We are going with that idea now instead of a straight shelf across and straight box down! Thanks also for the paint info. I know what you mean about liking, but not loving, the paint color. That is how I've felt about my current green paint since day one, and that was a couple years ago! I like it on cloudy days but not when the sun is bright or when the lights are on in the evening. I've also put off repainting because I remember how much work it was! Now, I've resolved that I will be painting immediately after this kitchen and the remainder of the butler's pantry is completed. If only I can find that perfect green :) Terry