Puffballs Are Not Dandelions - Important Public Notice

I cannot believe puffballs are not common knowledge. They are a type of fungus that grows up into a large ball which can be HUGE! GIGANTIC! And their most important feature - should you be either a child or really immature - is that when you step on them, they make a very dramatic cloud of spores over and over again.

Also, they're edible and quite tasty.

Dandelions are pretty awesome, too. They're cheerful and hardy and early and edible (The Girl insisted right at the start of spring that we eat a dandelion leaf salad for supper one night.) and when they go to seed, you can make wishes. What more do you want? One of these days, all of my dandelion wishes will come true and I'll wake up to a pony in my yard and the guy I had a crush on in grade seven calling me for a date. AWKWARD!

Puffballs seemed to be more common when I was a kid, although this might have been because I spent more time running around damp fields than I do now. My husband and I exchanged stories of magical school days in the rainy spring when you'd go outside at recess and the whole YARD was covered in puffballs and little kids in rainboots stomping on them, surrounded by this enormous dusty cloud.

Here's my three kite-flying last night. The giant mob of seagulls hadn't quite got there yet. Isn't that sky something?

You can see the gulls in this picture - look for all of the white flecks at the top of the hill.

Hundreds of gulls, each avidly watching the kite flying through the air. One swallow bravely flew around the kite several times and then soared away, a courageous brown-winged bird disappearing into the trees.

Life is full of beautiful things - the silvery wings of the gulls, the circling arch of the sparrow, my laughing children running through the damp fields, the red kite craning into the sky, straining against the string. The end.