Family Day Butterfly Fly By

"Oreo the skunk and Rucker the North American barn owl are among a menagerie of animals who will celebrate Family Day weekend at the Niagara Parks Butterfly Conservatory".   The Butterfly Conservatory reopened this weekend after being closed for several weeks for pruning, rearranging and restoring the tropical environment.   The Conservatory is home to more than 40 species and 2,000 butterflies. In preparation for our visit, I have sought out a few butterfly jokes. What do you get when you eat Caterpillars? Butterflies in your stomach Why was the butterfly not invited to the dance? Because it was a moth ball Who said I'd win that giant butterfly contest? Me and my big moth How do you make a butterfly? Flick it out of the butter dish with a knife Why did the boy throw the butter out the window? Wanted to see the butter fly Which insect is the ruler of the insect world? The monarch

Expressions of Twelve

How do expressions come about?  Why is twelve a dozen?  I summarize Wikipedia's explanation: A dozen is a grouping of twelve. It is a derivation from the cardinal number douze or twelve.  The dozen may be one of the earliest primitive groupings, perhaps because there are approximately a dozen cycles of the moon or months in a cycle of the sun or year. There are many themes to words within words. I found a list of 12 words with their letters in alphabetic order.  There must be a large following for these things as I find many variations, articles, etc.  Here's the list: effort abhors ghosty accent beefily billowy biopsy chintz almost access bijoux aegilops These come from buzzed.com I thought you might enjoy the visual results that came up when I searched on this.  This looks like a beloved area in teaching, learning, and in games and puzzles. To reproduce this do a search in google for just images, and then scroll through the many creative representations.  Today our word lists are sandwiched between rust on a dumpster.

Between Christmas and New Year's

Here we are at the holiday between the holidays, starting with Boxing Day.  This has become a secular holiday that seems to have extended into Boxing Week with the advertising that goes with this.  

The tradition started in the UK about 800 years ago. It was the day when the alms box for the poor was opened so that the contents could be distributed to the poor.

In the 1600's we would be servants and tradespeople and would receive gifts today, known as a "Christmas box".  Our Christmas Day would have been busy, waiting on our masters.  This is the day that Good King Wenceslas looked upon the Feast of Stephen.  St. Stephen's Day is celebrated as the 2nd day of Christmas.  The Germans had an original tradition - horses would be ridden around the inside of the church during the St. Stephen's Day service. 

We are into the Twelve Days of Christmas.  This is the twelve day period that starts with Christmas day and ends on Epiphaby (Jan 6th).The 'true love' who gave the gifts was meant to represent God, the true love of the world.  On the "first day", the partridge in a pear tree is Jesus who died on the cross.  The two turtle doves of the "second day", are the Old and New Testaments of the Bible.  The three French hens are faith, hope and love - the three gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Today's image explores the countdown of the 12 days through the language of urban grunge.