Feathers

Here are a few feathers I've found over the past few months.  I think the first one is from a jay (found in CA); the second from a gull (also found in CA); the third from an owl or hawk (found in TN).

Dark-Eyed Junco

Mushrooms

I'm certain that I still enjoy our nature journaling more than the kids do, but they are having a great time, too.  Today the whole family took a brief hike up into our woods shortly before the sun went down, searching for lichen, fungus, and mushrooms.  My son has a very keen eye and can see things that none of the rest of us ever will, and he had so much fun scouting out all the "finds".   We examined the insides of fallen trees, squinted our eyes to more closely observe the patterns of tiny lichen clinging to the tree trunks, pointed out ferns and rubbed our fingers over moss, noticed the bugs crawling around under the mushrooms' gills.  It is always a game of discovery, this nature journaling.  I'm so glad we're doing it!

Oak

Magnolia Seed Pod

Insects

For today's assignment, we went outside and found three different insects to draw, and hopefully identify.  Initially, I just wasn't seeing much, except for ones that moved so fast I only saw a flash of "something" before they were gone.  And then I saw a tiny blue-ish-grey butterfly.  It danced in circles on a bit of grass before flitting off to find another piece.  When it opened its wings, I could see some light brown color.  As best as I could tell, it was a Hairstreak of some sort.  Later, though, I've wondered if it was a "Common Blue".  Any thoughts?

Next I saw a decent-sized "butterfly" on my black butterfly bush.  It had such long "tails" that at first I thought it was a black swallowtail.  But upon looking up "butterfly with long tail" on Google, I instantly realized it was the Long-Tailed Skipper.  It's body was quite velvety-looking, and sort of iridescent blue.  Quite pretty.

We have a plethora of wasps around our house.  Dear Husband is continually trying to combat them, but they always seem to make a come-back.  This one was happily drinking from the bird bath on the back porch.  He is quite pretty, but I certainly don't care to receive his sting!

Anna's Hummingbird

Daughter chose to document this little bird, which we had the privilege of watching for quite some time.  He was flitting all over the place, and just chattering up a storm with several females.  When he turned just right in the sunlight, we were able to see a flash of his irridescent colors.  He was beautiful!

Great Blue Heron

While at MacKerricher State Park in California, we saw a massive number of birds!  (See growing Life List of birds in the column on the right.)  One bird that my son enjoyed watching was the Great Blue Heron.  I think he was jealous of all the frogs that the bird was wading through at marsh's edge.  Son wanted SO BADLY to catch one of those big, bad boys!

Persimmon

Mt. Shasta and Lake Siskyou

Olive Branch

Journaling and Reluctant Artists

Here's a question from a friend:

Q:  How on earth do you deal with a child who is afraid to try drawing a picture of something?  Consistently he balks at even making an attempt, because "I can't do it right."  This is just the kind of thing I think he needs, but we end up with tears (either his, mine, or both) when I ask him to either write it down, or draw it.  Do either of yours react that way ever?  How do you handle it?  

* * *

A:  First, a little bit about my kids and where they’re coming from in this whole process:

My son is 6.  We started loosely journaling when he was probably five.  He is a very melancholy perfectionist.  He sketches (with shading, even) amazing pictures!  And his writing is incredibly legible for his age.  This is truly his area of giftedness.  For the most part, this is serving him well when it comes to journaling.  But when he messes up a drawing, he wants to throw away his whole book.  Tears, tears, tears!  (I insist on keeping the books intact so we can later see the growth and development.  It bothered him for awhile, but he’s okay with this now.  --  Most of the time.)  His concentration is incredible, as is his attention to details.  But he has his limits at times as well.  Once he half-heartedly and hastily scratched a minnow on his page when we were watching a beautiful bird, and then ran off to play.  Sometimes it’s more interesting to wade into that pond and catch stuff than it is to sit at pond’s edge and be reflective.  I’m learning to go with the flow, knowing that learning is still taking place.

My daughter is 9.  She started journaling at age 7.  She is totally sanguine-phlegmatic, and you can transparently see it in her book.  Her handwriting is, ahem, “creative”.  Her drawings are also reflective of her personality, and are few and far between.  They have forced out a lot of tears.  I accidentally discovered that she does much better if she has a picture to look at while drawing, so when possible, I just hand over the field guide that she uses as reference. She likes to copy my drawings as well, and that’s okay with me.  She prefers writing, so we go more with that, for her.  We started out with a lot of dictation.  Writing is not as laborious as it used to be, though, so I expect to see more interesting entries from her as time progresses.

For me, the idea behind nature journaling is not so much about getting that cool keepsake of drawings (although I confess I do like that), but about getting outside and enjoying and learning about God’s creation.  With that premise, is there any way besides drawing and writing that could get the excitement going?  Or ways to ease into the drawing and writing?  I think so.  Here are some things we’ve tried:

1. When the kids were smaller and not writing, they scribbled a picture on a piece of paper, and I wrote in the date and weather for them, and added a short description (following their dictation) about the picture.  As my son has gotten older, he has taken over the date and labeling, with me dictating the spelling, per his request.  I have written whole pages of stories for my kids as they have dictated them to me.  They love to go over them later and see their own thoughts written legibly in their book.
2. Instead of drawing, sometimes I take pictures of what we see.  I never get around to printing them, but if I did, these could also go in our journals.
3. As mentioned above, I let my son draw a quick minnow instead of that cool bird I really wanted him to draw.   He was more interested in catching critters, and the time to take in drawing a detailed bird just was NOT what he wanted to do.
4. I draw along side my kids, and let them copy my pictures if they want to.  (You could even let your kid trace over yours until they feel more comfortable drawing on their own.)  I think this is key.  I cannot expect them to go out and draw something without my participation as well.  Sometimes I want to cry at my own drawing.  (I even tore one out of my journal once, and my son is always throwing that back in my face.  I promise I won't do that again!)  Letting them see me work hard and not come up with perfection is very good in helping them learn that this is a struggle for most people.  But they also see my determination and my growth.  This is very motivating for them!
5. I try to do a lot of learning or just “fun” activities outdoors that don’t involve the writing or drawing.   Sometimes I ask them to tell me about what they saw or did or learned about.  Oral reports are good, even though they might not end up in the journal.
6. I take my journal with me many places.  I don't always have my kids take their's.  I think letting them see me doing this for enjoyment and as a normal part of life could only positively motivate them.  At first it was really hard for me to just get pencil to paper because I was afraid of making a big mess, and I didn't know where to begin.  My journal has been many places without proof of such due to intimidation factor.  But it is getting easier.  Sometimes when the kids have their's, I'll give them specifics; other times I let them choose what they want to do.  Feedback helps, when asked for, but otherwise I just let their work be their's.

I'm learning.  They're learning.  

My Sample Curriculum (September)

Here is a one-month sample of what we're doing.  Unless you have the book, you may not understand all I'm talking about.  Maybe this will entice you to get the book.  :)  And no, Clare has no idea that I'm blogging about this, as in, she didn't pay me to write this.  Ha!  

September

Monthly Projects:

Whooping Cranes (Journey North)

Symbolic Migration (Journey North)

Nature Notes

Path of Sun, p. 236-237
nwf.org (Wildlife Watch)

Day		Charts/Papers	Extra Reading	Activity
1	Journey North projects; Nature Notes; Path of Sun.			Set up monthly projects.
2	p. 220-221 Change	p. 221		Go outside; observe; journal
3	p. 222 Nature Quest	p. 222 p. 223		Take a walk.
4	p. 224-225 Grass			Identify and journal grass
5	p. 226 Choose 1 Bird			Journal about a bird
6	p. 226 Go Outside			Play outside!
7	p. 226 Collect Rocks			Collect rocks and learn about geology
8	p. 227 Visit observatory			Field trip to observatory
9	p. 227 Insects			Journal about insects.
10	p. 227 Curl Up with a Book		Ring of Bright Water by Gavin Maxwell; or Never Cry Wolf by Farley Mowat
11	p. 228 Going to Seed	p. 229		Journal about seeds
12	p. 230-231 Getting Ready for Winter			Journal about winter preparation
13	p. 232 Animal Activity	p. 233		Journal about one animal
14	p. 234-235 Take a Night Walk	p. 234-235		Journal about night walk
15	p. 236-237			Complete journal about path of sun

Our Nature Journaling Supply List

I've had several people asking me what I'm using for "curriculum" for nature journaling, and just wanting to know more specifics of what I'm doing.  So, here's the scoop:

This book is my "spine" for our nature journaling curriculum.  I LOVE Clare Walker Leslie's books and teaching style!  In fact, this is not the only book of her's that I have, but this one is written with children in mind, but I find it is just as useful for adults.  It is laid out seasonally as well as month-by-month with specific activities outlined and demonstrated, as well as general suggestions for nature observation for every month of the year.  The appendix lists multiple resources for furthering your study, and I am pulling from a number of these to further beef up our study, if that was even necessary!  But I'll get to those later.  This book, though, is fabulous!

This is March's excerpt for "extras".  While some of these ideas are for serious study, others are just plain fun activities inviting kids to just enjoy being outside and enjoying nature.

I'm still learning to use the binoculars.  I prefer the naked eye for siting birds, but I think the eyes ain't what they used to be, and definitely not as good as God initially designed them to be!  So, we're working on that with aid of the binoculars.  The magnifying glass comes in handy when inspecting a bug or feather for details. Also, I should tell you that we always have a jar or container of some sort right by our porch containing some kind of critter.  Containers usually go along with us whenever we're doing some exploring.

My nature journal is a 7x7 bound, unlined paper book.  Next one will be bigger, but this is great for small illustrations for the purpose of learning.  The smaller journal is my bird life list book.

My son's journal and bird life list book.  While the journal is smaller than I like, it is also serving well as a first journal.  (It is the green book, 4x6, unlined.)

And my daughter's books.

More of Clare Walker Leslie's books that I refer to:

The "Old Farmer's Almanac" is a great yearly resource with all KINDS of nature-related tables and information.  It is recommended in Clare's book, and is helpful when trying to schedule specific things (field trips).  I found mine at my grocery store in the magazine section.

 Below are some of the best birding books out there, in my opinion.  The book on the right is helpful in bird identification, and the one on the left is chock-full of amazing details about birds in general and specific.  It is fascinating to read!

That being said, we will be heavily using Field Guides with our science.  In my opinion, it is one thing to have art class and draw something that you see, but if you have no idea what you're looking at, what good will it do you tomorrow, next year?  My reason for doing nature journaling in the first place was to help my kids and myself learn about what is around us and why it's there and why it's changing.  Thus, the field guides are utterly important in this nature journaling quest!

I started out collecting the little field guides with the basic, most common specimens.  I found this frustrating, as much of what we were seeing was not in the books.  I then went to the internet and searched for information and identification this way.  While this method works, I do like having actual books for when we're out in the field.  So my collection of full-volume books is slowly growing:

Here are the "kiddy" ones:

For our journaling, I've gotten "mine" and "their's" supplies.  These water colors are inexpensive, and perfect for learning how to control the amount of water, mixing, etc.  They're cheap enough that if the kids waste half the tube, I won't have a coronary.  The brushes are really nifty, in that they hold the water, and you just squeeze the brush to get the water to come out to the brush.  Pretty cool!

Nicer colored pencils, not too expensive when bought with your 40% off coupon at Michael's or Hobby Lobby.

These are the kids' watercolor pencils.  I didn't understand what these were at first, but basically, you color your picture with the pencils, and then use a water brush and blend it all together, making it look really like a painted watercolor.  Makes it easy for the kids.

 My watercolor pencils, also not too terribly priced when you use your 40% coupon:

I'll not lie.  These were expensive.  Even with the coupon.  But they are SO, SO nice!  And they are all mine.  I WOULD have a coronary if the kids took over them.  ;)  That tiny brush is all I need most of the time in my journaling, too.  And the whole thing folds up to 2 1/2"X5", so is super portable for field work.  (It's Windsor and Newton, if you were trying to read the blurry fine print.)

Drawing pencils and pens of varying size and hardness, as well as an eraser and pencil sharpener fit neatly into a little pouch where they don't get lost.

I recently got a place fixed up in the hall for all our "finds".  I am not able to take a picture of it as the space is tight where it is, but basically I've hung two 4-foot shelves up, giving us plenty of space to display some of our "treasures".  I got the kids each a 12"x12" shadow box for them to display their favorites in.  A jar for each of them also sits on the shelves, where they put collections for future displays.  When they want to change it out, we'll get a piece of scrapbook paper for the back, and glue or pin on their arrangement.  They are so proud of their collections!  I'm anxious to see how they change over the year.  Also on this wall is space to hang favorite drawings or show off other creations and nature finds.  It's truly a happy place for all of us!

This is my daughter's shadow box:

And my son's (And yes, that is snake skin from probably 5 different snakes, pinned together to look like one, with all the little bits pinned down as well.  He has plans to keep it after he takes this display apart, thus I was not allowed to help him glue it down.):

Specific questions I've been asked:

1. Q:  Do I have {lesson} plans or am I just scheduling time for it and drawing what I happen to see?

    A:  I have made up my own lesson plans based on "The Nature Connection" guidelines.  I have worked           specific things into our weekly schedule, planning for 30 minutes 3-4 times/week. 

2.  Q:  Are you working specifically within one area (i.e. animals, plants) or all at once or seasonally?

     A:  Clare's book is divided up mostly seasonally or monthly.  She encourages observation of, say, animals                at different times of the year (hibernation/migration/nesting).  One month will look at stars/constellations, while another month she puts emphasis on the various kinds of grasses.  She also uses charts and graphs to track weather-related issues, like how much rain in a specific month; temperature; tracking the sun's path during seasonal changes, etc.  

3.  Q:  Are you using any curriculum supplements?

     A:  Aside from the field guides and other things mentioned above, yes, we are doing a few other things.  Under "Inspiration" on the bar on the right, we are regularly keeping up with other nature journaling artists, and I would love to take the kids to a workshop sometime if we are fortunate to find one close to us.  Also in the bar on the right under "Nature Websites", we will be participating in "Project Feeder Watch", pick a few projects through "Journey North", and set up our own "Wildlife Watch" list.   Each of these things has an extensive plan for learning and observing the nature around you, as well as suggested activities and specific information.  We will set up each of these (that we're using) at the beginning of the month, and track changes/progress throughout the extent of the project.

If you have further questions, please feel free to leave a comment, and I will add to this post as I can.  We appreciate your interest in our project so much!  If you start your own nature journaling project and are able to share by blog, let us know where you're at and we will happily follow you and add you to our list of "inspiration"!

Color Wheel of the Seasons

A recent assignment was to make a color wheel of the seasons.  This is my daughter's color wheel.  She is learning how to use water colors, as am I.  While we love water color paints, they can be tricky, and make you feel like you are hardly in control of what happens in your paper.  The bleeding of one color into another, the puddling of too much water in one spot, the wrinkling of the paper  --  it all can cause frustration, or it can help you become accepting of this "out-of-control-ness", and help you learn to work with whatever happens.  While my daughter isn't crazy about this, I do like the way it turned out, because it expresses her.  She is not melancholy or a perfectionist.  She is a "fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants" kind of girl, and I think this depicts her very well.  I actually love this, in her and in her art.  

Chestnut

Drawing 3-D is proving to be quite the challenge to me!  That nut casing doesn't look quite right.  But this is all about learning, and not perfection, so I guess I'm okay with it.  ;)  

On another note, I am really enjoying looking through my growing nature journal:  reading the entries and looking at the art.  It's a piece of me, and will definitely be a keepsake that I will treasure.  Someday I hope my kids and grandkids will want to keep it on their bookshelf and study through it occasionally.  The things I'm learning because of researching has also brought a lot of fulfillment to me.  Overall, this is just such a rewarding project.  I'm so glad I'm doing this!

Hibiscus

Not at all thrilled with my scanner's choice to wash out the colors, but what to do?  It was a very pretty flower.

Florida Birds

Having lived in Florida for four years, and having hooked my husband on birding, I was sorry to have visited recently and walked away with so few birds identified.  The ones I did see were so classic "Florida", in my opinion.  I know there were more, but these were the ones I remembered.  And no shore birds!  I thought I'd have a million.  But we were on rough seas most of the time we were there, and I'm sure the smart birds were on the other side of the state, enjoying the Gulf sands.

Sea Shells

Recently while on vacation, I picked up these bits of shells from the beach.  Here they are, identified as best as I can.

Birding by Call

I come from a family of what I consider to be fairly hard-core birders.  Not "Big Year" types, but still pretty intense.  Due to family circumstances, the younger crowd has sort of dropped off the "intensity" level, but once a birder, always a birder.

A week and a half ago my cousins were here to visit, and we took a hike together.  This was a family hike, where the kids were loud and rowdy.  We were not going with the intent to bird.  But I grabbed my cousin, Tom, and told him, "Tell me the name of every bird you hear."  And so I started my list.

Prairie warbler (saw)
Eastern towhee
Blue-grey gnat catcher
Hooded warbler
Northern perula warbler
Yellow-billed cuckoo
Chimney swift (saw)
Cardinal (Tom didn't bother to name this one, as it was a "common" bird)
Kentucky warbler
Indigo bunting (saw)
Barred owl
Red-eyed vireo
Scarlet tanager
Eastern phoebe

Yes, all these were "found" based on their call.  I could actually still tell you what half of these sounded like.  It was a neat experience.  Thanks, Tom!

Eastern Box Turtle

This morning as Husband was driving off to work, he spotted a turtle in the driveway.  Dodging the downpour, he ran back to the house to share "the find" with Dear Son.  As nearly everything dies that makes it into his hands, I was not excited to see the demise of such a sweet creature, so told Dear Son to let it go.  Suffice it to say that the downpour doubled in intensity.  I caved, for the morning only, and turned it into a nature journaling experience.  This is the result, by Dear Son, aged 6.

Not to worry, he will go crawling off into the rainy yard this afternoon.

Great Blue Heron

Pink Lady's Slipper

Finds

Today we sited a lot of new "stuff" since starting our journaling.  Some I wasn't so excited to see, some I definitely WAS excited to see.  Here's the list:

bluebird

ginger 

scorpion

black king snake

black widow spider 

pink lady's slippers

And from yesterday:

eastern turkey

Purple Finch

The 6-year-old son drew this.  The Mommy is sorta, kinda proud. 

We have a pair of nesting purple finches in a jasmine vine in the flower bed.  Every year they try to build a nest as close to our front porch as possible.  They usually try building on the top of the columns under our porch, and that never goes well, as we are in and out the door constantly which makes the birds really nervous.  This year they moved a little ways away from the front door, which suits all of us much better.

Intro To Nature Journaling

Today (April 19) was our first "official" day of nature journaling.  Prior to today, I feel like we've been dabbling in it, with aimless stabbing taking place.  But today, we jumped in, with a much more pointed direction and plan for consistency in what we'll be doing.  I'm pretty excited about this adventure.

Following Clare Walker Leslie's suggestion in her book, Nature Connection, we went outside for about 25 minutes this morning, simply listing the nature that we saw.  We will be doing this daily for one week.

Here's what we came up with:

Birds
Cardinal (male)
Crow
Blue Jay
Mourning Dove
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Purple Finch
Phoebe or Flycatcher (not sure, although leaning towards phoebe due to tail movement)
(4/20) Determined that it was indeed an Eastern Phoebe!
           Mockingbird
(4/21) Canada Goose
           Pileated Woodpecker (heard it only)
(4/23) Scarlet Tanager!  (Dear Son spotted it high up in the thickly-leafed trees, and yelled, "Cardinal!"  I               was about to congratulate him on the good find and identification when I realized it did not have the crest on its head, and it was even more vivid red than the cardinal, if that is even possible.  Then I saw his dark red-black wings and said, "We've got a good find."  :)

Insects
Crane Fly
Leaches Millipede  (I do not like these!)
Orchard Orbweaver (a beautiful green spider with a red-spotted belly, guarding a perfect web)
Six-Spotted Green Tiger (fluorescent green beetle)
Earthworm
Carpenter Bee
(4/20) Red-Spotted Purple Butterfly?
           Ladybug
(4/25) Aphids
          Ants
          Assassin Bug

Trees
Peach
Dogwood
Redbud
Ornamental Cherry
Tuliptree
Shagbark Hickory
(4/20) White Oak
           Long Leaf Pine?

Wildflowers
May Apple
Trillium
(4/20) Trillium
           Larger Blue Flag Iris
           Wisteria
           Forsythia
           Common Buttercup
(4/23)  Lyre-Leaf Sage

Reptiles/Amphibians
Rough Green Snake
Worm Snake (Both of these are currently captured and in containers on our front porch, thanks to Dear Son.)
(4/21) Ring Snake
           Brown Water Snake

Weeds/Grasses/Other Plants
Clover
Violet
Honeysuckle
Poison Ivy
Common Fleabane
"Lemon Leaf" according to kids, but don't know it's real name yet
Various Mosses
Wild Grape Vine
(4/20) Virginia Creeper

Cultivated Plants
Rosemary
Weigela (ending blooming season)
Clematis (deep purple, currently blooming)
Lilac (starting to bloom)
Star Jasmine
Pink Knockout Rose (blooming)
Snowball Bush (ending blooming)
Lavender

Fungus/Lichen
"mushrooms" on a dead, downed tree

Animals
Groundhog
Squirrel

As the week progresses, I will add to this list.  I'm thinking the following days will be more difficult, as we're quickly knocking out things that we know, and will now be identifying everything from our Field Guides or pictures on the web.    I cannot help but think about how our knowledge is about to greatly expand here very quickly!

(4/20 update) Today was a lot harder!  Yesterday we knocked out a lot of things that we knew without having to look them up.  Today we had to use the field guides for nearly everything, and even then were unable to identify probably half of what we saw.  Dear Daughter has no sense whatsoever about how to use a field guide, and I'm not much better off.  She did at least try, and when I opened the page to where the oaks were, she was able to figure out which one it was.  Dear Son likes to look at the pictures and learn all the details before he ever finds the actual live specimen.  When he finds a specimen, he can go straight to it in the book and then asks me to read what it says.  We will all learn a lot doing this!

(4/21 update) We spent the day at our "second home", which is a retreat center about 45 minutes from our house.  We were there with a large group, so didn't really go hunting anything down.  I sat on a large rock at the edge of the creek and watched the kids play in the water for awhile.  My son came up to me, and suddenly exclaimed "SNAKE!"  I jumped up, saw the snake curled up two feet from where I had been, and went and got my husband and the field guide.  Another man came along and caught the snake by the tail, got bit, and hoped it wasn't poisonous.  Ahhh!!!  That was the second snake.  As the day progressed, Dear Son found at least four other snakes, was given a salamander of some sort, and went on several other great hunts that turned up various other critters.  It was a good day.

(4/23 update)  What a chilly, windy day!  At only in the 50's, after having spring days already that felt more like summer, we bundled up in our winter jackets.  The unusual winds had the trees in our thick woods bending and swaying.  The leaves fluttered their silver underneaths into the bright sunshine.  It really was a beautiful day to wade into the woods!  We always wear our tall garden boots, as poison ivy is thick already.  Dear Son had his flashlight, looking into the rocky crevasses for snakes (none found, for once!), and I sported binoculars, the likes of which I have to really get any good at using.  My naked eye seems to prove more accurate at this point, but I do like to try out the "spectacles".  . . .  This wandering in the woods is so good for my soul.  I'm SO glad we're doing this!  I picked several different maple leaves that maybe one day I'll be able to identify.  For now, I did a rubber stamping of them in my nature journal, to refer back to later. I also picked one flower that I didn't know, brought it inside, and painted it.  (You can see that in the above post.)  It was an enjoyable time.

(4/25)  Yesterday was too cold for me.  ;)  (It was actually beautiful, but cool in the morning when we would have been outside.  So I copped out, and instead of nature journaling, we watched the live webcam from Cornell University's site of the red-tailed hawk.  Today was gorgeous, and found us back outside.  I've decided I need to invest in more than just children's field guides, as more than half of what we have around here is not in our books.  I can't identify much anymore.  So it will be leaf prints in our journal, waiting for later I.D.  

Lyre-Leaf Sage

I didn't know what this was when I picked it.  I brought it inside because it is surprisingly chilly and windy outside, and I drew it with pen then painted quickly with water color.  And then I figured out what it was.  :)

Scroll down to the next post to see what our finds for today were in the week-long journaling hunt we're doing in our woods.  Great find!

Identification

As you can see, the identification process is . . . stumping me.  If you know what any of the following are, I'd love to hear the answer!

#1.  This looks like some parasitic something, growing on the leaves of a tree in the woods. 

#2.  This one just makes me itch.  What's the caterpillar??? 

#3.  I think this is some kind of maple.  It is a sapling, so the bark isn't very helpful at this point. 

#4.  What kind of bee is on this common buttercup flower?

#5.  This pinecone was at the base of the tree you can see in the background.  I think it's a long leaf pine, but not sure.  The needles are probably 8 inches long, clustered at the end of the branch.

#6.  I think this is some kind of pea, but not sure.  

#7.  Boxelder beetle???  Otherwise, no idea.

Thanks for any expertise in identifying our finds for today!