Summer Tree Study

While we've been keeping an eye on it regularly since January, we finally took some time on our last 'project day' to update our nature journals with our summer tree observations.  (You can see our winter/spring observations here.)  Back in April, Michelle predicted that "our tree would still get more leaves."  She was right!

Here it is in its summer glory:

A few of her other observations: The leaves were bigger...very big! (Not quite 6 inches.)  They were light green before, but now they are dark green.  I was right that the tree would get more leaves.  The summer leaf is not fuzzy, it is smooth.

Back in the spring, we had hypothesized that our tree was a sycamore maple.  But after carefully observing the shape of the mature leaf, we decided that it is more likely a silver maple.  You can check out some pictures of sycamore maples here and silver maples here if you want to check it out and see what you think for yourself. =)

Busily making journal entries

Michelle also wrote another stanza for her poem, "My Tree in All the Seasons" to describe her summer tree:

Darker, Darker, Bigger Leaves

Lots more of them, too

Hot sun keeps the tree warm and nice.

Donc, voila!  We'll check back in with our tree in the fall.  In the meantime, we've been working through Barb's summer photo challenge and growing sunflowers in pots on our [extremely narrow] balcony, and hope to be able to share those with you soon!