Big mother.

Circus of the Spineless has got me going through the old slide boxes in search of pictures taken in the days of Kodachrome, and these are three of a female wolf spider. These very mobile hunting spiders are common on our piece of land in the warmer months, I generally see them lurking at the mouths of their vertical burrows, and as soon as they spot me they disappear downwards in an instant. This big female had her burrow at the edge of a garden bed, and got quite used to me looking at her, and taking her portrait. I never saw her male friend, but you can see the result of their friendship in the third picture, her back is covered with tiny spiderlings which she protected until they were big enough to leave home.