I got up this morning to do a little downward dog in the family room, only to discover a little outward skunk wandering around on the deck.

Take note that this picture was taken BEHIND the safety of a glass door.

I flew up the stairs to snag Ava out of bed. Wake my sleeping 5 year old on purpose? Am I insane? I knew she’d love it though and I didn’t want her to miss it. She’d have been up shortly anyway. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

We got back downstairs to see there wasn’t just one skunk but TWO!

And one very cautious cat.

It’s almost as if you can read her mind, no?

Oh good they left the lid off the sandbox again!

So I’ve recently been keeping a large compost bucket on the deck to help keep the fruit flies population to ZERO in the kitchen, but apparently this bright idea attracted a different sort of critter.

On to Plan B with the fruit fly issue.

We got to watch our little skunk friends wander around, and got an up close and personal account of one skunk stand on his hind legs to try his hand at getting the lid off the compost bucket – but he couldn’t do it.

Mom: 1, Skunk: 0

Skunks are generally nocturnal, as we’ve come to learn. Zak has spotted skunks in the compost pile in the back, but sometimes at dusk or in most cases, under the cover of complete darkness. They’re good for the compost and generally don’t come very near the house so we don’t mind them. It’s been a great opportunity for learning about skunks and the role they play in the food chain too.

Moving the compost bucket off the deck has just been added to my to do list this morning. Even mama got a little lesson today.

Once our morning excitement quieted down and the skunks moved on, I wrapped up my 40 total minutes of yoga and got to work on some green juice – and making more compost too.

Enjoyed on the deck, without skunks. Or cats.

The other new critter in our life was pretty busy this morning too. I put the leaf in there last night just before bed!

Yowza. Eric Carle isn’t joking around with The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

We’ve been learning about monarch butterflies here, among other sites. While of course we don’t know exactly how old our little buddy was when we found him, we now know that Monarch caterpillars take about two weeks to be considered full grown. Now you know.

Thus concludes our homeschooling lessons this morning! There’s the bell, class dismissed.