Delicate Alien

I arrived home from work a few days ago to unfettered glee over a surprise my children had for me.  During the course of the day they had come across a baby praying mantis and had captured it in a toy parmesan shaker.  Hey don’t knock it–it was perfect–it had holes and everything.  Once they had calmed themselves enough to coherently ask me to get my camera we set about trying to get some pictures.

I was amazed by the tiny creature. As it emerged from its home of imaginary aged Italian cheese it stopped to swivel its head from one side to the other as if to look both ways before crossing.  Slowly it gained confidence and eventually even made it into my daughter’s gentle hand.  She and my son took turns holding it and were both largely fearless…until he got a little too far up their arms.

I love this shot because of how delicate the insect is but also I love that my daughter’s hands are dirty from exploring the big amazing world that is our back yard.