our little visitor

today was so terribly hot. the two oldest kids are away this week at camp and aunt & uncles house. the last three and I were simply melting away here. we are being very stubborn and NOT putting air conditioning in the windows. it wasn't all that long ago that people lived without that blessed piece of technologyone of the ways we used to beat the heat when I was a kid -oh so many years ago- was run through the garden sprinkler. ahhhh.

so we turned on the sprinkler and the kids ran around through it and cooled off and had a good fun time.

I decided that it was just as good a time as any to give the boys a hair cut and got started with that. and then Emma felt like she'd had enough of the sprinkler and went to get her towel.
I heard a shriek. not of fear but of a bit of a shock and fun surprise.

"Mom, I just saw a squirrel! how small can squirrels be?"
I asked if it was a regular squirrel or a chipmunk and they all went to go check.
it was hiding under the van and it would brave out and then seek shelter under the van again. it did this for a couple of minutes and then it must have realized that we weren't going to hurt it and it came out further. I think the poor thing was just getting a cold drink of water from the drips from the sprinkler. he ran around us for almost a half hour, many times getting only a few inches away from the kids or myself.

it's hard to tell size from the pictures, but he must have only been about 6 or 7 inches long nose to tip of his tail.
awwww