Is it Groundhog Day?

Last time I checked, Groundhog day was in February, but we had ourselves a personal groundhog day yesterday. I was sitting out in the front yard enjoying a few moments of peace, quiet and the beautiful Virginia Fall weather. Snickers was curled up on my lap snoozing the afternoon away as I read. Suddenly she popped up and leaped out of my lap bolted across the yard toward the driveway barking her little head off. I could see that she was after something furry and had managed to trap it underneath Lee's car. She kept circling around keeping the creature hemmed in. As I approached I could hear its little teeth chattering! I bent down to look and the above pictured groundhog is what I saw. He was NOT happy at being cornered by a wiener dog. I yelled for the girls to come look and of course bring the all important camera. I let Snickers feel important for a few more minutes while we ALL laid down on our bellies in the driveway to get a good look and take a few pictures. I can just hear the neighbors now... "I knew that home school family was a bit odd!" Our encounter with this little guy led to a bit of study about groundhogs. See, we take every chance to learn something new, it's what every self respecting home school mom would insist on doing. Can you hear my children groaning?
Anyway two very important things we learned about groundhogs are as follows:
1. Groundhogs and also called Woodchucks.
2. Groundhogs hibernate ALL winter....which means that every year they have to wake poor Punxsutawney Phil from his peaceful slumber just so that we can see if Spring will be early.
If I were him I'd tell em to go turn on the weather channel!