Hello,

My name is Bianca. I am a Butterfly. Sue has asked me to type this post for her as she is quite busy cleaning and unpacking from her show in Almonte, Ontario yesterday. (Originally Posted August 25, 2019) I wasn’t able to go but she promised me that I’d be able to join them soon.

 I wonder what ‘soon’ means. Does it mean tomorrow? Next week? Next month? I will be patient. I know that I will be in on all the fun when it’s my turn. (Sue mumbled something about Christmas… but I don’t think I was supposed to hear that… or type it. Shhh.)

Until ‘soon,’ I flutter around Oh Valley with all my friends, The Fancifulls. We have a wonderful time. We play Rain Ball on rainy days and Wing Tag when the sun shines.

What? You don’t know how play Rain Ball? You simply must go back and read Sue’s Post about Dinah arriving and learning how good she was at playing Rain Ball. Sue say’s she’d show me how to link Dinah’s story to this one if she knew how. Unfortunately, she’s still on that learning curve she’s always going on about. Is that like a curve in the road, or the curve that makes a basketball round?  Update June 20, 2020 – Here is your link back if you missed it.

Wing Tag is so much fun. To tag someone as ‘it’, you must touch one of your wingtips to one of theirs. The rules are as simple as that.

 It is much harder than it sounds. Dragonflies and Bumble bees can fly so much faster than Butterflies or Moths.

It is nearly impossible to tag a Grasshopper! They can leap out of the way just before you tag them and you never know where they’ll land. They get their large wings flapping and they can end up practically anywhere! Besides that, when they land, they tuck their wings up to their sides and don’t look like they’ve gone anywhere at all. Wow!

Did you know that when Grasshoppers are young, they don’t know where they’ll land either. That’s why they have C.H.A.S.E. to develop their skills. You can learn more about C.H.A.S.E. – Catapulting for High Adventure and Sighting Exercises in a future story. 

Ladybugs don’t fly much faster than I do but they’re so small, with suitably small wings, they are hard to tag. My best friend is Lily. She is a Ladybug. She told me that in some places of the world, Ladybugs are actually referred to as Ladybirds (United Kingdom). I like that, though I’m not sure why they’re named, Ladybirds. Lily looks NOTHING like a bird. (Sue’s back… an says that technically, Lily isn’t a bug either. Lily is a beetle.)

I long to be a Ladybug. I want to be able to zip around like Lily can. My Butterfly friends, Buttercup, Flutter, Fanny, Bradley. Bella, Brianna, and Bonnie, are supportive but don’t really understand. They enjoy their beautiful wings and are proud to display them. I think that my wings are beautiful but they are so darn cumbersome. They get in the way so often and stop me from doing what I want to do. I like compact wings that tuck away when I’m not using them. My Grasshopper friends, Grommet and Gryffin’s wings do that. Lily’s wings do that too. Way cool! 

I may not be very good at Wing Tag but I am good at Rain Ball. Butterflies make the best ‘Shelley’s.’ The more butterflies you have on your team, the more likely you are to win the game. I will remember how much fun I have at Rain Ball and stop feeling sorry that I don’t play Wing Tag as well. I have decided to keep finding what I’m good at and fly with it!  We can’t be good at everything. That’s impossible!

Sue doesn’t think I’m old enough to have my picture posted on the internet yet so I can’t show you how big my wings are. She said something about Christmas then too. She says I have to post pictures she took at North Lanark Highland Games yesterday. (Update December 5th 2019, Butterfly Collection has finally made it from prototype to production to purchasing – the real reason there were no pictures of poor Bianca – I hadn’t designed her yet.)

Bianca hanging out at home in the Ivy Arbour.

Oh My Gosh… I almost forgot…Bradley (Butterfly) visited our Insect Inn the other day. He stopped over due to bad flying conditions (super high humidity) on his way to Berrytown. He had a very long conversation with Baxter about something called a Pollen Extractor. Bradley is a travelling sales-fly and he sells these.

Bradley arrived to find that all the Fancifulls were staying out of the humidity too. We were inside spending the afternoon playing board games like Clue, Snakes and Ladders, and Crokinole. Bradley is a whiz at Crokinole. He grew up in Sebastopol, Ontario, Canada, where the game originated in 1860 or so. His town holds biannual tournaments and he’s played against the best players from many countries. At the inn, He won every game of Crokinole he played.

When the weather had cleared everyone went out for some fresh air. I waited for Bradley while the others flew on ahead. He’s kind of cute. Although he’s a butterfly like me, his wings are very small, sort of mini. They don’t seem cumbersome like mine do. Not at all! While catching up to the others, he mentioned Baxter was interested in purchasing a pollen extractor and Bradley was glad he chose to stop in Oh Valley on his journey from Waterville.  He would have missed an opportunity to meet and help Baxter otherwise. I wonder what Baxter wants with a Pollen Extractor? Sue’s later addition – Baxter has become allergic to pollen and is quietly looking for a way to do his work collecting it without getting stuffed up. Baxter is a bee and as a worker bee, his primary job is to collect pollen. An allergy to pollen is a big problem!

Hey! Who’s this? It was at the Games yesterday too. I believe there is an impostor out there trying to pass itself off as a Fancifull. Don’t you agree? Update – This is a Halloween pennant that liked my display. I think he actually had a thing for the bronze clothespin used to ensure my stock doesn’t fly off the hooks with the strong breezes at the outdoor show.

If you like the post I helped Sue make, please comment and she may ask me to help again. I enjoyed helping her with it – especially the parts I added that she doesn’t know about. 🙂

I must click “publish” before she gets back from the laundry room so you can see the those parts… teehee.

Bianca, Sue, Axie, and all our Fancifull Friends in Oh Valley

PS… Sue is calling out, as she scrubs the toilet, to remind me to say she will post in her blog, later in the week about her encounter at the games with a real dragonfly.

Whatever… 🙂

Update – July 26, 2020 – Posting to Instagram Feed – If you know more about bees than I did last year, you’ll realize that Baxter could not be a pollen collecting bee as he is a boy bee. Only girl bees collect pollen. I will try to correct future stories but have left this one intact.