In taking down this year's Halloween decorations, we found a few real spider webs underneath the pretend ones. Their sticky homes could give spiders a bad rap, unless you're familiar with Charlotte's Web, a story that gives arachnids a whole new spin. Based on E.B. White's classic book, the new live-action adaptation stars Dakota Fanning as Fern and Julia Roberts lending her voice to literature's most literate pig. Charlotte, the webby wordsmith, saves her friend Wilbur the pig from becoming dinner by weaving words like "Some Pig" into her web and creating a publicity stir. Like Wilbur, and our kids were enamored with Charlotte, so we checked out the a Spider Exhibit at our local natural history museum o see if Charlotte's movie star good looks were as mesmerizing off the screen. The Pavilion is an enclosed space on the Museum lawn that houses spiders cage free in a natural habitat. Kids can wander about looking for cool webs and five varieties of spiders. Arachnaphobes have nothing to fear: spiders are shy and stay put in their webs amongst the garden bushes. If you look close, you may just run into an Agiope -- Charlotte's cousin who weaves her silken threads into geometric patterns! (Click here for a video of naturalists handling a tarantula and for more books and films about spiders.)
1 comment:
I must get that book out of our library for my little one. Our blog on this subject is found here. http://www.familynavigation.com/spider-in-the-car/
Annika really loves spiders. So this experience was a bit of an anomaly.
And yes the spiders this time of year are huge here, and very plentiful.
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