Once upon a time this nook in our kitchen contained an ironing board. It stood empty the first few years we lived in the house, and then when we redid the kitchen, our contractor installed the glass shelves. We could never figure out what to put on the shelves--wine and liquor would have been the obvious choice, but those were all too tall. At some point, it accidentally became a nature-study display area, and finally this space has a purpose. Jackson demands that we pull down various objects and he gets to handle them and we talk about the various items.
This is getting featured today because the baby-food jar on the bottom shelf is a new addition: We found an owl pellet on our sidewalk, and nothing makes mama excited like digested and regurgitated fur and bones! Hee. Anyway, here's a quick walkthrough of what's what, with my personal favorites bolded:
Top shelf: Geode collected from a streambed on one of our last family trips to Indiana, pine cone, rock labelled ROCK.
Second shelf: Sea snail shell from a tide pool, various other shells from grandma's trip to Florida, multicolored macaw feathers collected at the bird sanctuary at the Veterans' Garden
Third shelf: Another pine cone, European paper wasp's nest, bunya bunya tree seed (falling apart), lizard skin (falling apart)
Fourth shelf: Various dead insect stuff (fig beetle, honey bee, some spider egg sacs), magnolia tree seed, mussel shell (falling part), maple tree seed, owl pellet in baby food jar.
