speaking of caterpillars...

no, they haven't hatched yet - but they get checked on multiple times per day...

that's not our news - this is... well, a little Eeewier 

Yesterday we  had a little cookout at a local campground to celebrate M.O.T.H.'s birthday - it's a tradition...  I pack up all the food, we drive up there.  He cooks all the food and makes his own dutch oven dessert and everyone eats.  We pack the leftovers back into the car and we come home.  Sometime the next day I get around to finishing the unpacking...  sometime.  

To keep myself entertained on the trip up I packed a book (or two) even though it's a quick drive.  I didn't read too much - but today I wanted my book and I went to grab it from the bag.  

There was a hitch-hiker.

I'm not sure it was THIS very caterpillar - but they were closely related... you can tell because they have the same eyebrows.

The campground was a veritable goldmine of all things outdoorsy and natural.  The table we were doing food prep on had to be brushed clean of caterpillars so that we didn't squish them with the cutting board... but on close inspection we realized that the entire underside of the table was covered in cocoons.  All of them are the uglier silky white cocoons that we have in our little butterfly treehouse - which makes me wonder if maybe it should be re-named the Moth treehouse?

Shhh... don't tell the girl, she won't know the difference (hairy antennae vs. smooth antennae) and she'll still call them silly frilly names like "pretty pretty" "pretty face" and "pretty" (yes, that's what she named the caterpillars before they spun their cocoons).

I was only slightly freaked when I found the hitch-hiker about to crawl onto my pillow - but I calmed down long enough to get M to get it outside for me :)  Hey, I don't always rely on my youngest daughter to get bugs for me... but the boys weren't home!