We are reaching the time of the year that our female spiders are as big and as fat as they are going to get. Many of them are beginning to look for good places to lay their eggs. The golden web weaver spider (Nephilia pilipes) is one of my favorites because of its brilliant colors and the big size of the mature females. This digital water color painting is something I created using one of my photos as a reference. This particular lady has lived on my back porch most of the summer, and I’ve watched her grow from about a quarter of an inch to about two inches long. I took the photo approximately 6 weeks ago before she started laying eggs, but now she has two egg sacks under the eaves of the house near one of the attachments of her web. Once she is completely done she will die, so I decided to memorialize her with this painting.