Although my daughter is only 18-months old, I'm already thinking about homeschooling her. Actually, I've been planning to do this since before she was born. But for the past few months, I've been doing some research online and reading some email lists from local homeschool groups.
So when I heard that a group was planning a trip to the Monarch Butterfly Grove in Pismo Beach today, I jumped at the chance to tag along and see what they do.
I had no idea that such a place existed. In fact, I didn't even remember that Monarch butterflies had such an interesting life... flitting all over the globe as they do. I really hadn't thought about them at all until today, except to say, "Look at the pretty butterfly," to my daughter a couple of times when we saw on in the backyard.
But for some reason, I felt compelled to visit their winter home today. I had visions of butterflies flying everywhere, and my daughter laughing and running wildly trying to catch them. She's way too young for science lessons, but I couldn't resist the possible photo op.
Plus, if nothing else, it would be a good excuse to get out of the house.
Ordinarily, there are thousands and thousands of butterflies at the park during this time of year. Unfortunately, their numbers have be dropping for the past few years, and there were even fewer this year than last year. We were told by one of the docents that this is probably due to the current drought conditions in California. But whatever the reason, we apparently missed quite a display.
We did see several hundred butterflies, though, waaaay up in the tall Eucalyptus trees. You had to really look hard to see them, as they were mostly all huddled together in several bunches.
My daughter spent a few nanoseconds looking for them, and then decided it would be more fun to follow the trail through the park. She met a few dogs along the way, and it seems that dogs are a lot more fun for an 18-month old than butterflies way up in a tree.
We hung out in the grove for a while, then walked the trail down to the beach with a few of the other homeschool families.
Afterwards, we stopped for lunch at a toddler's favorite restaurant: McDonald's. We ran into one of the families that we'd met earlier at the Butterfly Grove, and Mommy (me) spilled her drink all over the floor just to make a good impression.
I still haven't decided if the person who invented McNuggets should be thanked or slapped. At least they're something resembling food that my daughter will occasionally eat.
It was a lovely Mommy/Daughter day, and we got out of the house. What more could we ask?
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