DIY light pens

Kaila drawing with "finger lights" (on July 31st).

Drawing with light! Neat tools - gotta try it!

LED Light Drawing Pens: Tools for drawing light doodles - More DIY How To Projects

Let's Draw

Kaila has been having fun with her Nintendo DS "Let's Draw". She decided that she wanted to keep some of her drawings and used the DS as a guide, but made her drawings on paper rather than on the screen. And, of course, she always draws herself as the spunky "teenager"...

Visiting the capital

We had a fun-packed weekend in Austin. Ate brunch at a great new restaurant La Condesa, went for a swim at Barton Springs Pool, took a "choo-choo" train ride around Zilker Park, visited the Texas State Capitol, took a day trip to Fredericksburg, bought a Tickle Monster book with mitts, had the most delicious peaches on a stand by the side of the road, tasted some good Texas wine at Becker Vineyards.

Half way home, we drove through a very severe front - a pretty loud thunderstorm and lots, lots of water coming down from the sky!

At the beach

Hurricane Alex managed to agitate the Gulf of Mexico waters pretty well in early July. The beaches in Padre Island were covered in sargassum, an earth-brown seaweed. It was interesting to observe a whole micro-environment and habitat it creates. The sargassum provides a protective living space for shrimps, crabs and fish. All these small animals are camouflaged to blend in with the seaweed and they do it indeed.

The kids had a blast collecting some of these tiny animals. Their beach buckets became mini-aquariums. Kaila and I found a palm-size sargassumfish and as soon as we placed it in the bucket the shrimp went crazy. They all literally jumped out of the water, running for dear life, back to the beach, away from the fish. I guess sargassumfish think of shrimp as a delicious meal...and the shrimp know it.

We were happy to release the fish back in the ocean after identifying it (with the help of a Padre Island National Seashore park ranger). The shrimp took care of themselves.

Dear Diary

And here's a glimpse into Kaila's world through her Kindergarten free-writing journal. It was nice to learn that it provided her a stress-free outlet to express her ideas.

"Writing book. I like my writing book because I am by myself and nobody is saying, 'No, that is not how you write that.'"

"Planting. You need to give them water, sunshine and love."

Sweet Pears

Took some time away from the kids tonight to go to a painting class/BYO Wine party. Amazing how well most projects came out with only basic instructions.

We painted on canvas two "Sweet Pears" on a table top. I documented the 'evolution' of my painting, just for fun. The background for me was the most difficult, as you can see in the finished product... anyway, it was a fun Monday evening.

The Blues...

Blueberries any one? We picked close to 20lbs of blueberries this morning! The kids had a blast - and my bucket was always the least full. Kaila and Daniel picked berries from the bushes and from my bucket... They had a big laugh seeing Daddy eat straight off the high branches like a giraffe.

It reminded us of our trip to Alaska a couple of years ago. The best part of our hikes, scenery aside, was picking wild blueberries and salmonberries along the way. One big difference, 60's and 70's F in the AK summer versus 80's and 90's F here in TX.

Oh, and Kaila did not "allow" me to take too many pictures. It degraded productivity. "Mommy, you're not picking your blueberries! You're just taking pictures!!!"

I'll have to try making some blueberry jam, blueberry cobbler, blueberry pancake...courtesy of http://www.moorheadsblueberryfarm.com/. I'm glad they supplied us with some yummy sounding recipes.

Giggles

Just as Kaila was going to bed on Sunday she told me:
"Mommy, my favorite part of the day today was spending time with Eden. I like her and she likes me, too. I made her laugh :))
Just like Connor. He likes me a lot and I like him, too."

Both Eden and Connor are 1-year olds. Kaila just loves playing and spending time with the little ones. She loves to make them giggle!

NYC Public Library

Reading room and NYC & Hudson river valley map exhibit.

Desigual

I discovered Desigual this week in NYC. They had the most fun, colorful pieces. It was a treat to browse around a new clothing store.

Nigardsbreen

Norway is such a beautiful place. Arthur and Elizabeth from Poland just sent us their video from a walk in Nigardsbreen glacier in 2004! What a happy surprise. Thanks, guys!



Where the sun never sets...reindeer everywhere. Pretty neat!

Oil spill, still going...

For how much longer...

video of the spill by BP/AP

Tiger Swallowtail

A beautiful yellow tiger swallowtail greeted me this morning as I did a short warm up run before a yoga class today. This is only the second time I see one of these butterflies in my runs. I spotted on for the first time about 2 weeks ago - I was delighted to see the large yellow and black butterfly fluttering around. It was definitely a male since it did not have the blue on top of the wings, just a small patch on the underside.

The black swallowtails are quite common by the reservoir and sometimes I'll run by one that will follow along with me for a while. It always makes my day a bit brighter!

The black swallowtails are apparently very common in Ohio also.

Spill

Approximate oil locations from May 1, 2010 to May 5, 2010 including forecast for May 6 based on trajectories and overflight information. Produced May 5, 2010.

From NOAA's website - daily updates and forecast of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill:
http://deepwaterhorizon.noaa.gov

Hopefully the weather will hold steady and not hinder on-going cleanup efforts and efforts towards stopping the leak.

Great Egret

We were back at High Island this past weekend. We saw many nests still with beautiful blue-green eggs. Parents were busy preparing for the arrival of their little ones. A couple of nests had chicks and the egrets were carefully feeding their chicks. Last year by this time most nests had chicks already and the egrets were busy feeding their young.

The roseate spoonbills seemed either to be a bit behind in breeding or they took great care in hiding their eggs in the nests. It looked like they were just hanging around with some happily playing courting games.

A great number of warblers were reported in the woods. Sam Wood's blog has great pictures of the birds migrating through the High Island Sanctuaries. Yesterday he posted gorgeous pictures of a Kentucky Warbler and an Indigo Bunting.

I'm yet to see an indigo bunting or a painted bunting that migrate through. The kids will need to be a bit older for that kind of birding. Daniel is good at spotting alligators, frogs and the big birds. As expected, not very patient or quiet to wait for the smaller birds. He hears them though and is quite excited about it. A couple of more years...

All Pink

I took this photo of my glamourous princess on the left a couple of days before receiving the postcard on the right from Melissa in Ottawa.

Too funny...

This is a really neat calendar by Nils Kjeldsen.

New camera anyone? New bag?

There is no such a thing as too many bags or too many shoes, right? Or too many cameras, by that matter.

Epiphanie is has a great giveaway of a Canon 5D Mark... check it out.

www.haveanepiphanie.com

Spelling?

“ I DN'OT GVIE
A DMAN FOR
A MAN WHO
CAN OLNY
SELPL A WROD
ONE WAY.”
- MRAK TIWAN

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid. Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer inwaht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas thought slpeling was ipmorantt.

I read this text at the San Francisco Exploratorium a few years ago. I was quite surprised and amazed that, yes, I could actually read it!

Spelling

Kaila is quite fluent in reading. Now she is working on her writing. It's fascinating to have a glimpse into how her mind works throught the learning process.

We played instant messaging this weekend. Here are some very nice messages I received from Kaila with interesting phonetic spelling.

flayurs aer byotufol.
you are byotyfol too.
theyc you mommy.
sh sh shark.
f f fesh.
w w wayel.
I now wat you are goweg too say.

Flowers are beautiful.
You are beautiful too.
Thank you, Mommy.
Shark.
Fish.
Whale.
I know what you are going to say.