The Old Ballgame

BACK TO BASEBALL: Thursday afternoon we made our pilgrimage to the Sodo (south of downtown) district of Seattle to the Mariners' ballpark. Finally, the long winter was over and baseball was back!

In the off-season, the park was renamed. Safeco Field is no more. Now, it's T-Mobile Park.

It's worth noting that T-Mobile's corporate color is magenta. And from first-day impressions, it wasn't just a matter of renaming the stadium. It's a whole corporate make over, in magenda in this case. ...

We bought the cheapest seats possible for opening day. That put us under the Blue Jays' flag in left field. We quickly abandoned that spot, as we were penned into the end of a 20-seat long row.

 Before we got too crowded and abandoned that place, we watched the field crew get their acts together. 

Earlier, when we were standing in the bullpen area, we checked out the turf farm and the future garden.

Pre-game festivities included Seattle's own Macklemore performing. 

He performed two songs. Up first was "My Oh My," his tribute to Mariners' broadcaster Dave Niehaus.  

It was nice to see Dave's widow Marilyn on hand for the ceremony. 

We watched the Mariners' team introduced. They ran out on the 'red' carpet. When they rolled it out, I thought, "Geez, the Mariners' need to spring for a new carpet. That one is faded." 

Turned out the new carpet is T-Mobile magenta. Ugh. 

After the intros, it was time for the national anthem. It was performed on guitar by Mike McCready, of Seattle and of Pearl Jam. 

 He shredded it, as always. 

Right after the anthem was a fly over. 

A pair of EA-18G Growler from Naval Air Station Whidbey Island buzzed the stadium.

There was a ceremonial first pitch, of course. This one was super special. My photo is awful because of the smoke from the fireworks that proceeded it, but it was Hall of Fame inductee Edgar Martinez.

 You know, the Mariners' hero, the guy the American League batting championship is named after. That guy.:)

The Mariners unveiled a Countdown to Cooperstown banner. 

We're looking forward to late July when Edgar is inducted!

As day edged toward night, the stadium edged even more toward magenta. I'm not down with that so much, but we do love the fact that the Mariners are 3-0 and in first place. 

And that makes us tickled pink. :)

ROCKET MAN: Part of CJ's homework for his Washington Aerospace Scholars program involved watching an hour-long documentary about Wernher von Braun. Naturally, Annabelle and I watched as well, because who doesn't want to know more about the Rocket Father?

The program we watched was called "Missile to Moon," made by Alabama Public Television. It covered more than the Rocket Man, though. The program also showed how Huntsville, Alabama evolved from the "Watercress Capital of the World" to "Rocket City, USA."

Annabelle can tell you a bit more about it.

"Missile to Moon" is a documentary about Wernher von Braun and his part in the Apollo missions that helped the United States begin the space race. Though it shares its name with a 50's Science Fiction film, it's much more grounded in the fabric of reality. The documentary goes as far as to show film feeds from the launches without narration, really bringing the viewer in and making them feel as though they're watching live coverage of something that happened years ago. It also does a great job of informing the viewer on exactly how von Braun was instrumental to the programs and his journey to joining NASA. It's definitely worth a watch even for those who already know the story, as it may be able to provide a fresh take.

You can watch the documentary for yourself on YouTube:

Cake Wars

SUGAR STRUGGLES: So, we had a cake due today for Birthday Dreams, a great nonprofit that provides birthday parties for kids in homeless shelters.

Our birthday girl wanted a galaxy cake. We had watched a number of videos on YouTube and felt confident we could decorate a cake accordingly with the nifty airbrush food coloring sprayer tool we have.

Until ... we fired it up today (for like the second time ever), and it didn't work. There was no control with the on/off trigger, it was just on On ON. Spraying everything, everywhere.

We really didn't have a Plan B. This had to work. So Annabelle and I devised a work around where I would control the 'trigger' by turning the whole unit on or off while she sprayed. Not ideal by any means, but we had no choice. 

We started with a plain ol' white covered cake. (The cake underneath is chocolate brownie with whipped chocolate filling and some mini chocolate chips in the mix for fun and texture.)

The rule for air brushing a galaxy cake is layering colors and starting with your lightest color first. We went pink then blue then purple then black.

 How do you like our super low-rent paint booth? It's two paper grocery sacks on the sides and the bottom of a case of  Top Ramen on the back. Very professional! ;)

From the air brushing to the 'stars' Annabelle did all of the decorating. 

The cake in and of itself was super pretty, but we wanted to make a cake topper for the birthday girl. So, yesterday, we made a shooting star out of gum paste.  This morning, we got up and found it had dried with numerous cracks. TOTALLY not acceptable. Time to reboot.

And so, that's how I found myself suddenly making a batch of cookies and fondant. 

So cake topper 2.0 was a whole lot bigger and more delicious than the first version, so I guess it's OK. Tragedy averted. (Oh, and, yes, the name is blurred.)

Mixed Bag

DAFFY-DILS: We went and visited Kennedy at his new classroom space today. He teaches fourth grade at a school in Seattle's Fremont/Greenwood area. 

It was great to see his classroom was big and bright and organized and inspiring. He had some neat-o math graphics up on the white board that I should have taken a photo of. Instead, I took a(n out of focus) photo of these crazy flowers on the way into the building. They most certainly have to be a daffodil varietal. Pretty cool! They look like yellow fireworks!

Speaking of out-of-focus plant photos, we have lift off! I mean life! Here's the first greenery from the seeds we planted a few days back. Can you picture the future tomato plant?

DESIGNER BAG: Last week we stopped at a thrift store to drop off a bag of clothing. Naturally, we also left with a (smaller, at least) bag. One of our scores was a silver vinyl bag I snatched for $3. "You can do something with this," I told Annabelle.

The something she did was (at my exhortation) convert it into a custom Queen (the band) bag.

One side now sports a silhouette of Freddie Mercury. ... 

 The other has silhouettes of the band members' faces from the cover of their album "Hot Space."

Annabelle used her Cricut (a cool, programmable design cutting machine), and some heavy duty 'outdoor' vinyl to create the images. 

They look so great!

SENSORY: We continue to learn about bees before we take possession of thousands of them in our hive in the not-too-distant future. 

Using the PerfectBee curriculum, we learned that bees possess a delicate sense of touch throughout their body, and that their antennae are especially receptive. This is important, because in the darkness of the inside of their hives, senses other than sight are important, and touch is essential.

This cool video below shows how bees keep their sensory antennae clean, so that they're ready to be receptors. 


We also learned about the bees' waggle 'dance.' By their movement, they communicate important information quickly and efficiently, be it about their next meal or next home. Amazing.