Monday, March 2, 2009

Who knew?

(Note: I confess that I wrote this blog post back in November when I was doing school visits in Iowa City. I never got around to posting it....so since I have nothing else to report...here it is. That's what we call "a slow news day." Ha!)

Until my trip to Iowa, I had never been to the Midwest at all.

It was interesting to see things I'd never seen before.

Like hedge apples!

These were all over the ground in the yard of the B&B I stayed at.


They are big - about the size of a grapefruit.



They come from a big beautful tree called a sage orange.
They supposedly keep spiders away.
Who knew?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I LOVE the smell of these things. These and walnuts husks I could smell all day.

I bring in the hedge apples (my kids call them monkey brains) for a while just because I love their texture and color, too!

Glad you finally visited us here in the mid-section!!

Janet, said...

I have never heard of or seen hedge apples before. Hope you enjoyed your school visit in the Midwest. I have no stories published yet, but I've been invited to 2 sixth grade classes on Friday to talk about my MG historical fiction book I've just finished writing. She's going to read it to the class this week. I'm excited and nervous, never did anything like this before, but I figure it will be good experience for when I become published.(That's positive thinking, isn't it) Any suggestions?

Barbara O'Connor said...

Janet: That's wonderful! You'll have fun. I would suggest relating any details from the writing process - things discovered during research; copies of revisions; any major changes you made. If you have visuals, that's always a bonus. (Powerpoint?) Maybe read a short excerpt. Good luck! (And I LOVED my visit to Iowa City - it was fantastic)

Janet, said...

I had my visit Friday and it was great. You can read about it at my sight:
http://creativewritingintheblackberrypatch.blogspot.com