We made butter! From scratch! To eat on our fresh-made bread! And because this wasn’t enough science for one day, we whipped out a microscope to get an up-close view of our world, and then we buried some dead snakes.  January 6, 2018 was a busy day.

First, butter.

Not pictured: The act of turning heavy cream into butter. The Spring Lake Adventure Club photographer sometimes gets so wrapped up in what’s happening she forgets to document what’s happening.  That’s okay, though—sometimes it’s more important to be fully in the moment.

Here, we’re using cheesecloth to squeeze all the excess milk out of the butter.

Adding a little salt.

Then bread.

Resting our bread, but not resting our faces.

Making bread and playing with a turtle, of course.

The girls were surprised by a gift from Amy Jones, a friend of SLAC. Amy hand-made a crocheted Craker for us and it literally bowled the girls over. They love this stuffed animal so much.

Science.

We got an up-close look at flowers, insects, and water from the lake.

Snakes.

A SLAC-ker demonstrates how to tell a venomous vs. non-venomous snake based on its belly scales. (side note: SLAC-kers know not to do this move with a live snake.)

These snakes were previously buried in our original science graveyard, but then the cable company came through and unceremoniously dug ’em up. The cable company received some harsh words and manic behavior from one very upset SLAC mentor (who readily admits she’s probably on some list for crazy behavior now…).

The girls were unfazed—they just reburied their science experiments in a new and safer location far from any buried cables.

Not pictured: Washing our hands and eating our bread and butter. The Spring Lake Adventure Club photographer was entirely in that moment and had no time for a camera.