Invasion of the Frosted Flakes

MYSTERY BOX: A few days ago while shopping at my favorite grocery store - Grocery Outlet - I spied this box. How could I NOT buy it? A rocket, an astronaut and alien looking writing?Yes, please!

The kids were enthralled by the box. I decided to turn that into a writing exercise for them. I asked them to write about how the box came to be on the shelf at Grocery Outlet in Ballard.

Annabelle kept trying to turn it into an art assignment, drawing her story, as you can see here.
And in case you can't read it, hers says, "One day, CJ and mom went shopping at Grocery Outlet, and found this (arrow). Here's a close-up (another arrow). I think an alien snuck in and put the cereal there. And that's my theory. The end!" (In case you're wondering her last picture shows the night watchman sleeping on the job, hence the alien being able to do its deed.)

CJ's story was very nicely written. Check out this penmanship!
It reads, "The mystery of the alien cereal" By CJ Kisky

There were some delivery aliens. A box of cereal fell out of the delivery ship. But the delivery aliens didn't notice it. The cereal fell into Grocery Outlet. The cereal landed on a random shelf. The end

Oh, in case you were wondering, this is the backside of the box. And the fine print says it's made in the USA but it's made for Dubai, which would explain the foreign-to-us writing, eh?'SHOPPING: Annabelle enjoys Pokemon and she struck upon the idea of making a hybrid of two characters, Pikachu and Eevee. To do so, she first had to find a suitable image of each of the characters. Here's the Pikachu she found on the 'net:
And here's Eevee, another Pokemon character:

And here is the hybrid she created: It took her about four hours. She worked really hard and was very proud of the outcome.

GOOD QUESTION: Today CJ asked me, "Is Barney a friendly dinosaur or the embodiment of evil?" Y'all know how I answered THAT one.

PLAY LIST: We've been on a steady diet of Hall & Oates here 'round MPA for the last few days. I'm trying to give the kids a crash course in the duo's music since on Monday we'll be attending Bumbershoot, and H&O are the headliners.

I think they've pretty much got the duo's greatest hits committed to memory at this point. I think without a doubt, "You Make My Dreams Come True" is their favorite. This morning they felt compelled to shake their groove things to the tune.


THESE WALLS HAVE EYES: We have a mystery shop assignment tonight, which means we get to have dinner for free. Whoopee!

Red

BEE A CLOWN: We rediscovered this circus leftover a couple of days ago. Annabelle has taken to wearing it for a portion of the day. Maybe she's trying to desensitize me to my clown phobia.

HARVEST TIME: It's September 1 and I am happy to report we finally had another RED tomato to harvest. In fact, we had TWO tomatoes to harvest. That would make THREE this year. How freaking pathetic is THAT?The kids were excited about the red tomatoes, but Annabelle was nonplussed regarding their size. "Tomatoes are supposed to be size of your fist, not the size of a pebble!" she protested. I explained to her that we were picking cherry tomatoes which are supposed to be the size of a cherry. She felt better about it after that.

Try as I might (reminding them they eat tons of tomatoes in the form of ketchup, pizza sauce, spaghetti sauce and such), neither one would eat their whole cherry tomato. Here's CJ coming close to taking the plunge, but ultimately he put the brakes on.
Oh well, more for me. ;)

SECOND SEASON: Ever since we harvested all of our lettuce (and we got lots!), our raised planter boxes have looked so naked. So when I saw fall vegetable starts on sale at Fred Meyer today, I was all over that.

We bought three kinds of lettuce, some cauliflower and some onions. The kids helped till the soil, plant and water our new veggies. It looked ever so much better when we were done!
A CONFESSION: This morning in bed, about 6:08 Annabelle came clean. "There's something I can't do," she said, solemnly.

"What's that?" CJ asked, clearly intrigued.

"The classic armpit fart," she confessed, with a sigh.

At that, she and CJ both tried to do it (cupped hand in armpit, with that arm then flapping, trying to create some kind of suction and silly sound). No luck. I told them I couldn't do it either, but that I bet their daddy could. Annabelle and CJ both confirmed that they'd seen/heard him do it before. Guess we can't all be blessed with that talent. :)

SPACE STATION BLUES: As you may have heard, the U.S. is out of the manned spaceflight business now, and we are relying on Russian rockets to transport NASA astronauts to and from the ISS.

Well, our Russian friends have had a little trouble with their rocket launches recently (crashes/explosions), and until they get they get the kinks worked out, our astronauts are, for all intents and purposes, stranded on the ISS. (Insert "Space Oddity" music here.)

At least the astronauts are able to keep a sense of humor about it based on a video we watched today. In addition to poking fun at the situation, the video offers a cool tour of the ISS along the way.

Movies and More

JIFFY POOP: Out of nowhere this morning, CJ said he wanted popcorn. An odd request for 9:30 a.m., but oh well, why not. So I made a bag of microwave popcorn. And kinda sorta burned it. :/

So I went down to the basement to fetch another package of it for do-overs. While down there, I found an old Jiffy Pop container I'd bought for the kids for a camping trip a year (or two?) ago. "Oooh, wouldn't this be more fun than microwave popcorn?!" I thought. And so, with great fanfare, I presented it to the kids and told them how cool it is and how their Aunt Renee and I used to have it when we were kids and how much fun it would be popping it.

We read and followed the directions and ... what we wound up with was a stinking, smoldering plasticy pan full of nasty. It wasn't jiffy and it barely poppped. Major Bummer. So back to the basement I went for another bag of microwave popcorn. At least I didn't burn it this time.

BREAKING NEWS FROM SAFECO FIELD: I forgot to post this tidbit from the other night. While we were wandering the concourse (practically by ourselves attendance was so sparse), we noticed a photo-booth looking thingee out in center field. It had something about ROOT SPORTS on it (the network which broadcasts the games) and something about being a broadcaster.

Turns out it had software and hardware that would allow you to record a message as if you were holding a press conference. To see what CJ and Annabelle came up with, check out this link: http://www.mlb.com/sea/fan_forum/video_interview.jsp?view_key=93814578249(When you watch it, you'll see that the booth was designed for significantly taller people.)

PAPERWORK: This afternoon we had to head north to Shoreline to check in at the school whee the kids will be taking three classes a week come mid-September. We went early so they could play on the playground while we were there.
Once it was time for our meeting, there was lots of paperwork to do and I had to meet with a coordinator. That took about a half hour. While I was in the meeting, the kids sat in an adjacent room for 35 minutes and read silently, which I really appreciated. I told them I was very proud of them for behaving so well. :)

LAST DANCE: Annabelle had her very last (sniffle, sniffle) afternoon with her first and only ballet teacher today. It was a 90-minute dance camp, with an "Under the Sea" theme.

So for the first time in 3 years, I think, Annabelle is a ballerina without a place to dance. We're going to have to do something about that.

READY FOR HER CLOSEUP: Last night after the kids were in bed, Christian and I were watching "Flipping Out" on the Bravo channel and were floored by a commercial for "Dolphin Tale" - a full length feature movie about Winter the tail-less dolphin! Winter is one of the reasons we went to Florida last year (along with that little Space Shuttle launch deal).

Winter is going BIG TIME! The movie stars Morgan Freeman, Ashley Judd, Harry Conick Jr., and Kris Kristofferson, among others. It's coming soon to a theater near you in 3D. Here's a link to the trailer: http://www.movies.com/movie-trailers/dolphintale/2019268495
MOVIE MAKERS: Today the kids got some exposure to and experience with Windows Movie Maker. They're both interested in posting videos to YouTube, and while it's certainly not Ken Burns worthy, WMM is pretty user friendly and good for a beginner.

I wanted to put together a video for a Facebook group of space program/shuttle enthusiasts we belong to using photos members of the group have taken, along with some NASA photos to help capture the end of the space shuttle program. For a soundtrack, I chose a great song by a Seattle band, The Heart and The Hand.
I'm not putting the video link on the blog because it uses photos from other people whose permissions I don't have to post their photos publicly, but I can easily and guilt free share the song with you. Called "Lost in my Mind," to me it's all about losing something and feeling lost but knowing you have to rebuild and go on because there are stars in the sky propelling you onward. It seemed like the perfect soundtrack for our project. :) Here's the band peforming it live, in studio @ Seattle's KEXP.

Mariners and More

MARINERS AND MORE: Monday we had the pleasure of attending the Seattle Mariners game on a sunny summer evening. We had great seats (just 13 rows from the field) for a great price (thanks to a season ticketholder trying to unload them as he was unexpectedly stuck back East due to Irene).

One of the reasons I wanted to go to last night's game is because the festivities included a tribute to Japanese culture. As part of the program, before the game a large Japanese drumming group took the field and performed. I like the photo below. It looks like Joel Piñero is challenging the dragon to come fight him!
Out on the center field concourse, there were a couple of tables - one was a display about Japanese baseball. The other was hosted by some local Japanese library. There were women helping people fold origami hats out of Japanese newspapers, which thrilled Annabelle.Here she is modeling it today.

Meanwhile, CJ chatted up a Japanese woman who had some old VHS tapes the library was giving away for a donation. CJ was enthralled by them - they were Japanese versions of cartoons he's familiar with. He finally selected a Pokemon video, but was very concerned that it might not work in his VHS. He started quizzing the woman about the potential differences between the circuitry of the US and Japanese VHS players. You should have seen the look on her face. Priceless.
At one point late in the game, the Angels pitcher gave an intentional walk to a Mariners batter. Annabelle drew this - a chicken pitching! Too funny! Here are a couple of action shots from the game ... AND ANOTHER: I found another big ugly scary spider in our sink today. Where the hell are these things coming from and why won't they leave me alone?

I captured it in a glass and Christian led the research team trying to figure out what kind of spider it is. Naturally, a fear is it might be a hobo spider, and while it certainly has some of the hobo characteristics, we can't say definitively that it is or isn't one. It seems more likely to be a giant house spider.LAST CLASS: Today marked a sad milestone - it was Annabelle's last ballet class with her beloved instructor, who is retiring. Bee made the teacher a card today. And she thoroughly enjoyed the class, of course.
Tomorrow Annabelle has a 90 minute dance camp with the teacher and then it's over. We're very happy for the woman who is retiring, but we're very sad to lose her. She is a fantastic teacher.

Ups and Downs

GOING UP: This weekend we had an opportunity to learn even more about space elevators. This time, our continuing education took place under the arches of the Pacific Science Center and our teacher was Michael Laine, founder of LiftPort, a Washington-state based company working on creating cheap, reliable, and safe access to space, with their focus being on the construction of a space elevator that rides up and down a ribbon made of super-strong carbon nanotubes.

We got to see a demonstration of an elevator model climb a strap tethered to the arches of Pacific Science Center. The Space Needle and its golden elevator were the perfect backdrop for the demonstration! I was getting ready to take a photo of the kids and our fellow space enthusiasts' signature poster. When Laine saw the poster and I explained its genesis and travels, he wanted in on the shot, which made it even more special! :)

FIGHT CRIME! PLAY MORE VIDEO GAMES!: I spied a story on Yahoo! this weekend that reported research from the Centre for European Economic Research, Baylor University and the University of Texas at Arlington shows video games reduce the number of criminal incidents by keeping potential assailants, thieves and other potential bad guys and girls occupied. Interesting.ALL FALL DOWN: While at the Science Center for the space elevator demo, the kids asked if we could pop into the "Goosebumps" exhibit. There was an attraction there - a booth simulating a free fall - that we didn't visit last time because the line was so darn long. I figured on a Sunday just before noon, the place might not be as busy, and boy was I right. No waiting whatsoever!

Without hesitation, CJ stepped up to be strapped on a padded board and then with the flip of a switch, he went from vertical to horizontal quite quickly. He let out a little peep, which you can hear here ...
Christian gave it a go, too, but Bee and I both took a pass.

TAKING FLIGHT: I also came across a story this weekend about paper airplane designs. I like doing planes with the kids because it means that a) they have to listen and follow directions carefully and b) we get to talk about principles of flight/physics.

Today we tackled a design that Floridian Ken Blackburn supposedly used to set the world record for paper-airplane flight time (27.6 seconds in the air) back in 1998.

Though the three of us all followed the same directions, our planes turned out pretty differently. We took them out to the alley to do some test flights.

First, we made some throws to see whose plane could travel the farthest distance. Then we did some flights to see whose plane had the longest duration/hang time. We talked about why CJ's stubbly plane wasn't flying as far or long as the others.And we also did an experiment where each pilot flew each plane, so we could take into account each person's different throwing styles and how that impacted each planes' flight.
image credit: NASA
SWEET SIXTEEN: Astronaut Ron Garan, on board the International Space Station took this photo on Saturday. It was just one of sixteen sunrises the ISS astronauts see each day. This one was spotted while they were on a path between Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Buenos Aires, Argentina.

TO THE SAFE: This morning I got a wild hair and typed the words "Mariners tonight" into Craigslist to see what kind of tickets popped up. One of the hits was for four $50 apiece seats just 13 rows off the field - for only $15 each. Yes, please. We bought them from a season ticket holding U of W astronomy professor who is stuck on the East Coast due to Irene.