Seconds

TESTING, TOO:  Today marked CJ's second day of mandatory annual state standardized testing. He had a science test to take. We met in the library again, where Annabelle enjoyed a book, and a 'float' in a boat.

While CJ was in testing, Bee and I took the pups for an hour long walk. 

We returned to the wooded area behind the school. There, we made notes about the ecosystem and subsystems, and hoped CJ remembered those terms while testing. We found a fallen tree that is acting as a subsystem in the stand of trees' ecosystem, hosting fungi and countless insects.

While walking, we skirted a Shoreline School District rule at times.

CJ was done about 11:30, ending the annual tests until next year.

TIME OUT: This afternoon, the kids read the May 2 edition of Time for Kids. It included topics such as kids using crowdsourcing to fund projects, an update about the World Cup coming up, news of Kepler-186f, a 'cousin' planet to Earth, a graphic about popular youth sports, an article about Little League's 75th anniversary, and a feature story about an organization creating jobs and other opportunities for women in Afghanistan. After they read the articles, the kids completed some comprehension and opinion questions, and we watched a video about crowdfunding (www.timeforkids.com/crowdfunding) and about the non-profit working to help Afghani women, Arzu, which means 'hope' in Dari, a language spoken in the country (www.timeforkids.com/arzu). 

TALE OF THE TAPE: I'm in the process of migrating decades-old home movies from VHS to DVD. This process includes lots of me cursing my 1991-era self for not taking those 12 seconds to label the tapes' contents right before or after I recorded them.

Today's mix tape was a Halloween party Rick and Ken went to in 1991, followed by "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" (which CJ and Annabelle didn't mind watching in May), followed by a kindergarten classroom Halloween party for Rick (with him dressed as Spider-Man and Kennedy was The Hulk, seems like I made this costumes just yesterday). Next up was the Disney's animated version of Robin Hood from 1973. We didn't watch but 5 minutes total of that. However, that was followed by a classic Disney cartoon where Mickey Mouse kills seven flies with one blow. When "The Brave Little Tailor" trumpets his 'seven-with-one-blow' feat to some guys standing nearby, they misinterpret him, thinking he killed seven giants with one blow. Mickey goes along for the ride, embellishing his story with every retelling. CJ, of course, wanted to know what year the cartoon is from. We found out the answer is 1938. 

Someone (other than the Disney Co.) has uploaded the nine-minute cartoon to YouTube, in case you're interested. (In fact, there are multiple uploads, one being here: http://youtu.be/GT5ucWolPhw)

WORLDWIDE: A couple weeks ago, we participated in NASA's #GlobalSelfie social media campaign, submitting a photo of the kids in front of the Fremont Troll on Earth Day. It was cool, people from all over the world 'liked' their photo on Facebook, and we enjoyed looking at others' photos. Today, NASA released a neat-o video showing just how far and wide the #GlobalSelfie day spread!
http://youtu.be/lbtjx8XgDvs

In all, they received around 50,000 photos, which are being assembled into a mosaic image of Earth to be released later in May. The Global Selfie event was designed to encourage environmental awareness and recognize NASA's ongoing work to protect our home planet.

CALLED TO DUTY: Christian spent all day yesterday in a holding pen, waiting to be called (or not) for jury duty. This morning, he sat there again. At least his view was phenomenal!

Finally, just before noon, he was called into service and he is now Juror #5 on a Seattle municipal court trial.