tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75965413687396285862024-03-05T06:37:02.134-08:00Bee Bop Parade"The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn." - John LubbockYelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.comBlogger281125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-7247233803493201842014-09-14T19:00:00.002-07:002014-09-14T19:29:50.728-07:00Homeschooling or Unschooling<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Lately I've been coming across lots of mentions of unschooling. I've known about this idea for some time now, since my very good friend, mentor and co-author unschooled her child all the way to graduation. It it always sounded so radical and enticing and scary. I tried it a few times in the last couple of years and it always went something like this:<br />
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<b>Day 1:</b> Yeah, freedom! Asking M what he wants to do. Helping him do it. Totally enjoying the way it feels to unschool, the way M feels when he's not made to do things he doesn't want to do.<br />
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<b>Day 2:</b> Still going strong...<br />
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<b>Day 3:</b> Talk to a friend (or see a Facebook post) about that friend's child and how he reads this and does this in math. Freak out over my child (same age) not doing these things yet. Make a secret promise to myself to trick my child into wanting to do these things the next day.<br />
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<b>Day 4:</b> M sees right through my attempts at tricking him into doing "regular school". He resists. I get scared and angry. We fight (sometimes both end up in tears). We stop unschooling. The end.<br />
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So here's where seeing so many examples of successful unschooling, from the ones in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Free-Learn-Unleashing-Instinct-Self-Reliant/dp/0465025994" target="_blank">Peter Gray's book</a> to the various articles, including the latest one in, of all places, the <a href="http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/nature/Unschooling-The-Case-for-Setting-Your-Kids-Into-the-Wild.html" target="_blank">Outside magazine</a>, to blog posts like <a href="http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2014/09/how-do-unschoolers-turn-out/" target="_blank">this one</a>, to just seeing kids who unschool, all this helps. It leaves very little time to "compare and contrast" my child and my friends' children. And it makes not freaking out a bit easier.<br />
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Now that M is technically in the second grade, we are once again trying unschooling. Which doesn't mean we do no learning. Instead, it means M's learning is driven by his interests (instead of by someone's curriculum or my own anxiety). His current interests are chess, LEGO robotics, programming, and fencing. And, as usual, he just loves listening to the stories we read to him.<br />
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For now his English reading consists of exercises in his chess book. And his writing is, for now, very minimal, and again tied to chess (learning to record games). But I also ask him to read book titles and chapter names in the English and Russian books he wants me to read to him. There are some other times when he reads, like when he wanted to get hummus at a grocery story and had to make sure it had no jalapenos, olives, red peppers, garlic or horseradish. But again, this is a very purposeful reading that he's been doing and it's driven by what he wants to learn and do. Maybe because he is more focused, more in control of what he reads, or doesn't feel stressed out, his reading actually got more fluent, especially in Russian.<br />
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Math is a lot easier for us. We play lots of card games and board games. And he plays some apps on iPad. We read living math books. I play-test all the books that come my way for editing and feedback (and there've been some really exciting ones lately). And, of course, we play Moebius Noodles games.<br />
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Programming - we talked a bit about flow charts and M created some funny ones based on our joint "how to grow a beard" flow chart. We also play Silly Robot (another of Moebius Noodles games), paper programming, and a bit of Code.org. I found some good programming lessons on Khan Academy, but not sure if M will like the format.<br />
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LEGO robotics - that's our Jr First Lego League team (I'm coaching it this year) plus whatever he builds at home using WeDo and EV3 kits. He also loves spending time with other Wake Robotics kids, playing with MaKeyMaKey, littleBits, and 3D printers (ok, these he just observes and asks questions for now).<br />
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We also try to get outside whenever possible. We have some really great parks nearby where M explores little streams, looks for interesting rocks and plants, digs, builds and gets to have "wild and crazy time".<br />
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I'm not saying this is how it's going to stay. But I'll try to be patient, believe in my child a bit more, and KEEP CALM and UNSCHOOL for a bit longer.<br />
<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-88563475329211387422014-08-16T18:28:00.002-07:002014-08-16T18:28:23.629-07:00Infinite Zero<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I am trying to clean up my Inbox (you know, the whole "zero emails" goal). As I'm working on it, I've come across an old e-mail where I recorded my conversation with M. This took place a few days before his 7th birthday (hence the wintry picture up top). So I'm transferring it here for record-keeping.<br />
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He said: "I'm drawing an infinite zero". I asked him to explain. </div>
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Him: See, this is a big zero (draws). Inside of it I am drawing smaller and smaller zeros, so infinitely many. So that's infinity zero. Like our eyes and heads are infinity zeros because like eyes are round and then there are circles inside like zeros and then pupils are made of atoms. And there are like so many of them. Also, if we look for zeros around us in the universe, there are infinite many of them - planets and galaxies and atoms. Squares are also infinite but it's harder to find them 'cause like we don't have square heads or eyes or anything square in us.</div>
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Me (worried that he doesn't understand what zero really is): Ok, but you know, a square is a shape. Is zero a shape? </div>
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Him: No, it's not. It looks like circle, but zero is when there's nothing </div>
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Me (relieved): ok, so what's now?</div>
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Him: you see this wooden block? It's square and we can cut it into many squares (shows how to cut into thin squares with same area as the original wooden block)</div>
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Me: so how many squares would you get that way?</div>
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Him: a lot, depends how thin you can cut it. Can be a hundred, a thousand or more.</div>
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Me: and if we use a laser that cuts very-very thin slices?</div>
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Him: yes, can be many-many squares. </div>
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Me: what if we want infinite number of square slices? How thick would they have to be?</div>
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Him: very-very thin</div>
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Me: will they be zero thin?</div>
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Him: no, not zero. They will only get zero thin when we run out of wood. But they will be super thin almost zero and there will be infinite many of slices. So that's infinite zero.</div>
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Then he goes of to draw lots and lots of nested circles, nested squares, nested ovals, saying how all are infinite. Then he says, looking at all those nested shapes:</div>
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Him: You know, + and - always work the same in infinite circles and in infinite squares or anything else infinite.</div>
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Then he mentioned something that was "zero infinity", so I asked him to explain. Here was his explanation:</div>
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"Imagine you are on an island. It's infinitely big. But you don't see anything at all"</div>
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Me: why can't I see anything?</div>
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Him: because there isn't anything on this island. Because it's a zero infinity island.</div>
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Me: ok, my mind is officially blown, I gotta write it down.</div>
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The end.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-71838695319873228702014-07-27T21:20:00.001-07:002014-07-27T21:20:49.194-07:00Awesome Time Travel Camp - Blackbeard's Last Fight<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD6XXd1a5bYTHboMfmRkwI5rjlPzBfHTRRIvlkImlaR5XcO1FtTBquRIq9_j_50MxPPTaXIUVZTHjL0Wi2wXrUzIjv86Kf-SlyrbgA66B81k-7v6MzYS3r6Tj2eBw9BRJOqbW4YttwCSOn/s1600/IMG_0626.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD6XXd1a5bYTHboMfmRkwI5rjlPzBfHTRRIvlkImlaR5XcO1FtTBquRIq9_j_50MxPPTaXIUVZTHjL0Wi2wXrUzIjv86Kf-SlyrbgA66B81k-7v6MzYS3r6Tj2eBw9BRJOqbW4YttwCSOn/s1600/IMG_0626.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
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That was the boys' choice for the second "cozy camp" (that's what I'm calling it 'cause it's just the two of them). Both boys were very well prepared after their other pirate camp in Bath, NC earlier this summer. Both have read the Treasure Island, watched Pirates of the Caribbean, read lots of books about pirates and all that. Additionally, M got to go to the Tall Ships at Cape Charles festival a few weeks ago, participated in their pirate parade and school, won a medal and was overall a very experienced pirate.<br />
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This time around we started with another great book, Blackbeard's Last Fight. It is very well written, lots of interesting details and a spooky ending (sure, we all knew how it would end, the title kinda gave it away, but there were a couple of small details that were unexpected).<br />
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After the story the kids got to put their knowledge to the test. I played a "silly professor" who was going to read a lecture about Blackbeard's life and adventures. But the silly professor makes a lot of mistakes and some of them are easy to catch and others - not so much.<br />
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Next both boys had a lesson in the proper terminology for the many parts of tall ships. We had a couple of 3-mast models with sufficient details. So each boy had a model ship and as the captain gave orders, they were to show which part of the ship they had to climb on, which sail to take in, and such.<br />
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Then it was time time for sword-fighting, of course! Even though we reminded them the safety rules, we had to stop this part after about 10 minutes as it was getting way out of hand. Instead, I suggested to turn it into a game M loves to play at his fencing practice. It's basically the good old "red light - green light" game, but with a twist. Here's how it's played:<br />
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Kids line up at the start line. An adult is at the finish line facing the kids. Kids can move using proper fencing moves. Kids can move only when the adult is not looking at them. As soon as the adult looks their way they have to freeze. If the adult notices a kid moving, the kid is sent back to the start line. Everyone took turns being "the adult" in this game. It was way fun except we were all getting hungry.<br />
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So we hurried back into the house for some lunch at a seaside tavern. A simple fair of bacon and eggs with some crusty bread and a mug full of grog (orange juice with water) all tasted delicious. Now it was time to search for treasure on a LEGO island. First, we replayed the last battle with the two model ships we used earlier and with some LEGO mini-figs. We did change the gruesome end a bit though. According to our story, Robert Maynard found Blackbeard's treasure chest, but there, instead of treasure was a note with some coordinates. Using these coordinates, kids had to find the island on the map, sail to it in their ships, walk through a labyrinth solving a few puzzles along the way and find the treasure.<br />
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This was going to be the final activity, but they didn't look ready to wrap things up. So I suggested they would make their own treasure maps of their own treasure islands. We cut up a brown grocery bag and the kids set to work drawing and labeling. Among the notable place names were "Davy Jones's Tooth", "Skeleton Cave", "Bloody Lake", "Tall Grass Flats" and a few others. This was exciting and it got even better once they started working on aging their maps - crumbling, stomping on them, burning the edges, burning holes through the middle with the magnifying glass, pouring candle wax and rubbing raspberries (blood) on them. Pretty soon the maps looked very old and just about impossible to read. Happiness galore!<br />
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Next trip, it was decided, was going to be to Apollo 11's historic Moon landing.<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-58696581016178177502014-07-27T20:46:00.001-07:002014-07-27T20:46:25.973-07:00Awesome Time Travel Camp - Samurai School<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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A friend came up with a great idea to run a series of playdates that are all about travelling back in time and exploring different countries and historic events. Well, his original idea of "everything will be made out of and role-played with LEGOs" had to be substantially reworked because the kids didn't care for it much. So M and I suggested limiting or even eliminating LEGOs from these playdates and doing lots more hands-on stuff like crafts and battles and food.<br />
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For our first adventure both M and his friend chose to go to medieval Japan, to the time of the samurai. With this in mind, we got together at our house a couple of weeks ago for a morning of samurai school. First, we read the You Wouldn't Want to Be a Samurai book and chatted a bit about samurai training.<br />
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Then the kids learned some Kanji (I was amazed that M actually remembered most of the symbols from that one little exercise a few months ago when he wanted to learn some Chinese). The idea was for them to pick a symbol or two to paint on their banners. Both ended up with "Volcano" and drew almost identical banners to take into battle with them.<br />
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We then read a legend of Susanoo and the 7-headed serpent and the kids drew their own illustrations - lots of blood and snake guts. It was interesting that both M and his friend were so busy drawing the battle itself, that neither of them bothered to draw the right number of heads on the monster. M came up with a creative explanation that he drew the remaining heads after Susanoo already chopped some off.<br />
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It was time for some origami next and we made paper cranes. This is a very challenging origami even for adults, not to mention antsy 7-year olds. But they persevered through the difficulties and got nice looking cranes as rewards.<br />
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But after this they were DONE sitting down. They demanded to go out to the backyard and run around. Fortunately, the second half of the samurai school involved some archery practice (supervised) and sword fighting with foam swords. So this was great fun until, after about half an hour of non-stop sword fighting and jumping around in the heat both were tired and cranky and fighting over something. Blood was shed as M's friend hit M right in the mouth with a stick, bad enough that the somewhat-loose tooth got really loose and there was a cut on M's gums.<br />
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After everyone was calmed down and ice administered, the kids once again made friends and, realizing that they were starving, asked to make sushi. The day before this camp, we went out to a Thai restaurant, M asked for sushi and got to watch the chef make the rolls. Our sushi didn't turn out nearly as pretty, but the kids didn't seem to mind.<br />
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Afterwards, they wanted to jump around and sword-fight some more. But I wasn't all that eager, so instead I offered to try their hands at making zen gardens with rocks and sand. M had a good idea of what a rock garden is because we went to the one in the Raulston Arboretum. It also helped that he understood the ideas of meditative space (thanks to yoga) and wabi-sabi (thanks to an awesome book titled Wabi Sabi). M's garden also had a house on the sea shore (wavy lines on the sand) and was guarded by a twisty wavy sea serpent made out of rocks.<br />
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So that was it for the 4-hour camp. The kids decided that next week they wanted to visit pirates, specifically, Blackbeard, on the day of his last battle.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-10538732926939249062014-07-19T14:10:00.000-07:002014-07-19T14:10:00.359-07:00Almost a Year?!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Has it really been almost a year since my last post? Wow, time sure flies when you keep promising yourself to "post tomorrow evening". No sense it trying to play catch-up now - too many things happened, too many pictures were taken and all that. Let's just say we are all a year older now. And are totally into pirates.<br />
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And I got a new camera. It's not fancy, but a big improvement over my old one (RIP, little SONY point-and-shoot). Except this camera has too many options and the only way to figure them out is to download this huge and terribly confusing manual. Which I've done. But now I have to read it and, well, it's another case of "I'll just do it tomorrow". So for now there's no noticeable improvement in picture quality. So I try to go someplace really scenic to make up for this. Fortunately, Virginia is only a couple of hours away although since Chris's been back we don't travel there every weekend.<br />
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Ok, won't be dragging this out. After all this is meant as a short post to get me back to the blog. Hopefully next one will be dated July 2014, not July 2015.<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-16226366103949215852013-08-02T12:00:00.000-07:002013-08-02T12:00:06.726-07:00Exploring Virginia - Virginia Kids Museum, First Landing and the Crater<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Hey, what d'ya know, I'm almost caught up on the pictures! These ones are very recent, from last weekend when we decided to drive an hour and a half to Portsmouth to check out Virginia Kids Museum. Thanks to our awesome membership at the local Life and Science Museum, we get free admission, so why not go.<br />
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We were glad we went. It is a very nice museum, very hands-on. Unfortunately, M wasn't old enough to try the Crime Investigation Lab. It's better suited for kids 8 and older. But maybe next year... We did check it out and at first he was quite interested. But there was just too much other stuff going on, things like giant soap bubbles...<br />
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and here's M and I working on getting a bubble wall around us.<br />
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And a giant and surprisingly comfy giant chair...<br />
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And a chance to captain a boat, put out a (fake) fire, drive a bus...<br />
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... ride on a police motorcycle with flashing lights...<br />
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... play a slapophone aka a pipe organ...<br />
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BTW, Chris got some job-related training operating a gantry crane. M was curious about it and spent quite some time moving 40-foot containers from ship to shore and back.<br />
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And then there's the entire second floor! Which was a bit quieter and a lot more fascinating. It was almost entire taken over by an exhibit about energy and ways it can be transferred. Yeah, I tried it too and got all nostalgic about port operations.<br />
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There were simple machines, of course, and you could try to lift an elephant (with a long lever) or hoist yourself up using a pulley system (which made me feel like I was only a little bit lighter than an elephant)...<br />
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And you could launch an air rocket and a hot air balloon. Or see sound waves. Or pretend you were having an epic battle between Darth Sidious and Yoda, controlling the Force with your bare hands.<br />
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And you could watch iron filings dance to the music...<br />
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Aside from the energy exhibit, there is also a sizable art lab on the second floor. The best part was playing with this wall, making prints in it. This is our family portrait. But we also left butt prints there too (ok, those were quickly erased, but boy was it fun to watch them appear!) M made countless impressions of himself playing the "carbonite freeze" scene.</div>
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He then tried his hand at building with architectural blocks. At first, he felt inspired by the Parthenon.<br />
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But once that was done (sort of done, actually, 'cause there weren't enough blocks), he built a hasty carbonite freeze chamber<br />
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The afternoon was going great and we decided to drive 30 min more to the First Landing park. Good choice. Sure, it wasn't the ocean. And sure there were lots of people there. But it was very family friendly; the water was calm and stayed shallow for a while; the sand was soft; and there were some treasures to be found (a pottery shard, a sun-bleached bird bone, a couple of mermaids' purses, some flotsam).<br />
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Turns out, there is a nice camp ground there and some cabins for rent, lots of hiking trails around, bike rental, lots of ranger-led activities pretty much each day. What a nice place!<br />
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But it was getting late and we were starving. So we drove another 30 min or so to a pizza place in Virginia Beach. And then walked over to a Ben and Jerry's. What kind of a perfect summer outing would it be without ice-cream?!<br />
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Only then did we realize that it was well past 8pm and we had about 2.5 hrs to drive back to the hotel. Oops! We definitely needed to spend the next day doing something low-key. In fact, I just stayed in bed for most of the next day. And Chris and M stayed around the hotel, playing Frisbee, remote-controlled cars, going to a pool and whatever else they did. Then late in the afternoon we all went on a little tour of the Petersburg Battlefield. This time we got a map even though we knew our destination, the Crater.<br />
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So we explored as much of it as we were allowed (you can't climb into the Crater or on the earthwork on the battlefield). We talked about digging a narrow, low tunnel in utmost secrecy, narrowly avoiding hitting the enemy mines, staying quiet as a mouse, hauling dirt out and spreading it around to avoid detection. We also talked about what an explosion must've felt like (without the gory details given M's age).<br />
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M seemed to be particularly interested in the cannons and how they worked and how they were sighted and how they were moved from place to place. Which reminds me, maybe we should try building a potato cannon? Anyway, we go to the battlefield pretty much every weekend we're in VA since it's right outside Chris's hotel. And it's nice to be able to explore it bit by bit.<br />
<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-55695011254853838162013-08-01T20:42:00.001-07:002013-08-01T20:42:07.058-07:00Pix from the NC Zoo<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Yep, I'm totally lazy. So lazy that I don't even bother to come up with a title for this post. But this photos are way overdue. Anyway, we went to a zoo in Asheboro with good friends.<br />
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It was a long hot day and one of the first animals we got to see was this awesome polar bear. It was his meal time. The zoo keeper would throw fish to the bear and the bear would lumber around looking for it. Sometimes it would step of the rocks into the cold water. We hoped he'd jump and splash us, but that didn't happen. But the kids got to crawl into this fake ice-cave and they claimed it was nice and cold there.<br />
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The big attraction in the Asheboro Zoo right now is the Dinosaurs exhibit. So we bought the add-on tickets to see that. But first kids wanted to ride on a carousel.<br />
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And then they wanted to watch a 4D movie. We figured out (belatedly), that the 4th dimension was the part where you are sprayed with water and, most painfully, kicked in the back by your own seat! It seriously hurt! But the kids had a blast and that's all that matters, right?<br />
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Now, I loved the dinosaurs - they are huge, some move and even the ones that don't are extremely life-like. But the kiddos are spoiled by the excellent Dino Dig experience at our local Life and Science Museum (in Durham). So they pretty much strolled by. The only two that really got their attention were the alarmingly realistic and blood-thirsty giganotosauras<br />
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and the much-smaller carnivorous dinosaur that spits poison at you when you stop near it (ok, the one in the park spits water, but the point is it SPITS it and that, if you ask any 6-year old, is the important part)<br />
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And then we walked some more and saw lots more animals, including giraffes and zebras and elephants (one of them pooped which also was exciting, as you can imagine). And the kid got to sit on all sorts of (fake) animals - a dinosaur...<br />
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a giant honey bee and<br />
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a baby rhino, to name a few...<br />
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But the biggest hit of all were the various playgrounds all through the zoo. They seriously rock! You can go to the zoo and just spend a day there on the playgrounds. I could! And the kids were all for it too. Even after they got very tired (walking the entire length of the zoo!) and hungry and it was very hot, but they just wanted to stay and play.<br />
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They especially liked the playground closest to the North America entrance. It was very simple - no slides, no climbing equipment, no fancy stuff at all. Instead, lots of random objects to make little hide-outs with, to bake mud pies with, to play with water, old tires, a wheel barrow, and various odds and ends.<br />
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Unbelievably, even after pretty much an entire day of walking, running, climbing and playing, the kids were ready for more fun. So we stopped at the Mills Creek Orchard. Unfortunately, the pick-your-own peaches and grapes weren't ready yet. But we picked yummy thorn-less blackberries and some late season blueberries.<br />
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And then the boys got to drink freshly made no-sugar added peach slushies (yummy!!!!) and swing on tire swings.<br />
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And everyone was very happy.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-92196012172643839952013-07-20T20:39:00.002-07:002013-07-20T20:39:49.549-07:00Exploring Virginia - James River and Hampton<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Since we spend so much time in Virginia now, I picked up a map of attractions and scenic routes and set out to see as much of the state as possible in the next couple of months. So here are some places we visited and some things we've done while there.<br />
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I love the old-fashioned maps. I mean, sure, GPS can be very convenient and you can look up directions online too. The problem is you have to know where you want to go. But a map lets you roam and discover things you've never thought of before. It leaves a lot more room for serendipity. <br />
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Even before our first trip to VA this summer, I looked up the nearest beach other than Virginia Beach. Well, Buckroe Beach came up in a search and that's where we went a few weekends ago. I was pretty skeptical 'cause I've been spoiled by the beautiful Kure Beach here in NC. Well, I must admit that Kure is a whole lot more scenic, less crowded, and has lots of beautiful shells (I will post pictures soon) that Buckroe seems to lack. But Buckroe Beach is worth a visit (unlike way overcrowded and trashed Topsail Beach).<br />
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First, Buckroe is a family beach. It's got lots of open spaces for kids to run apart from the beach itself. There is a park with a huge lawn and a nice playground. There is also a small pier. The beach itself is clean. Lots of families with kids and yet plenty of room for everyone and you don't risk being hit in the face by a beach ball or strangled by a runaway kite. There are no fishermen on the beach itself, so in that way it's even better than Kure. And before you peg me as a fishermen hater, the only problem I have with fishermen is that they are typically too lazy to stand or sit by their rods and warn you about getting tangled in the lines. And those lines are hard to see even up close!<br />
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Another hugely attractive thing about Buckroe is its facilities. I'm talking parking and bathrooms here. Both are plentiful even on a hot summer day. And on a family outing a convenient parking and a no-wait-necessary bathroom are a top priority.<br />
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We spent most of the time at Buckroe building sand castles. See this poopy thing next to me? That's Chateau de Stinko or Poopy Castle. In the background, M is building his own castle. Sadly, it got washed away before I had a chance to take a photo (I was too busy building a moat around my Chateau).<br />
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Remember the map I told you about? Well, I didn't look at it for the first couple of visits and that's how come we kept driving on US-64 and it wasn't exactly scenic and the traffic sucked every single time. Map to the rescue! We discovered Rt 5, the scenic drive that takes you to Williamsburg which is just a short drive to Hampton.<br />
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It's such a pretty road! And there's a lovely bike path that goes alongside it for miles and miles. It'd be awesome to bike at least a part of it when the weather cools a bit (and M learns to ride a bike and we get bikes, so lots of "ands" here and likely not to ever happen).<br />
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So last weekend we went to Hampton again, but this time not to the beach the reason being I overslept and got up around 11. So it was too late for our original plan of driving to Washington, DC and going to the Air and Space Museum there. Fortunately, I looked at the map and noticed that there was a Virginia Air and Space Center in Hampton. And it was a member of ASTC which meant we would get in for free thanks to our membership to the Life and Science Museum in Durham.<br />
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The place was terrific! M loved everything about it. He asked me to take pictures of him in front of the REAL (as in "not a replica") Apollo 12 Command Module!<br />
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He tried his hand at all sorts of simulators - Mars landing, Mars rover control, Shuttle landing... Sure, he crushed on all of them. So did I. Those are tough simulators. Yep, even the one where you are trained to give signals to pilots on deck of an aircraft carrier.<br />
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We all took turns at it.<br />
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But M successfully planned a Lunar mission and launched a hot air balloon.<br />
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And piloted a DC-9. And co-piloted it.<br />
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And he took a billion very detailed pictures of various instrument panels, electrical and hydraulics systems and such. He really gets into it and does a very thorough job documenting even tiny details.<br />
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By the time we were done, we were starving. But finding inexpensive food in Downtown Hampton without a guide or an area map was tough. We walked to a nearby seafood place but it was way expensive. Fortunately, there were preparations under way for the Rolling of the Bulls.<br />
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So we got some delicious fish and shrimp tacos for us and a corndog for M and made ourselves at home on the downtown Hampton's sidewalk.<br />
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Turns out, it was a half-mile run (around the block) and the runners were chased by the ladies from the local Roller Derby team swinging wiffle ball bats. And afterward there was a huge water balloon battle. If we are in the area next year, I'll consider taking part in both!<br />
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Very satisfied with our serendipitous finds, we took the scenic Route 5 back. It was awesome! And we discovered that Chris's hotel is only 30 min or so away from Shirley Plantation. Naturally, we went to Shirtley the very next day.<br />
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Turns out it is the oldest continuously operating plantation in the US. How cool is that?! In fact, for the last 350 years or so it's been owned by the same family. The 11th generation of the family still lives in the Main House. How cool is that?! Although it must be a bit weird to basically live in the museum.<br />
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But there were lots of cool things to see there, including the old kitchen, the old tools and implements (M took a lot of pictures of everything with gears), and the ice house with its 15ft well that used to hold several tons of ice. It looked spooky!<br />
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I'm already planning our next trip. We're saving Colonial Williamsburg for cooler months and the mountains are a bit far for a quick day trip. There are lots of battlefields around, including one right outside of Chris's hotel, but M's a bit too young. And we're trying to stay indoors or on the water because of the heat. Well, we'll think of something.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-19170202957297256412013-06-03T15:04:00.000-07:002013-06-03T15:04:00.705-07:00Playing Catch-up - Birthday and NY Trip<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I almost forgot that we were in NY in mid-April. Which, of course, means that M got to see his grandparents 3 times this year (so far). One time was when they drove to NC for M's 6th birthday, making it just in time for his birthday party. Then there was this April trip, a return visit for Grandpa's birthday. And the most recent trip we just got back from.<br />
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I have hardly any pictures from M's 6th birthday party. Which is pretty sad 'cause it was the first big party for him and he was very excited. See, M's birthday is in early February, the time when many kids come down with sniffles, coughs and all sorts of viruses. In the past, we had years when all M's friends were sick and we had to cancel, when Grandma was sick and we had to cancel, and when M himself was sick and we had to cancel.<br />
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But thanks to a very mild winter this year there was not a sniffle among M's little friends. And so the party was on. For various reasons (ok, just one overwhelming reason), we had to do the party at home. If you've been to our house, you know it's a small one. There's not one room with lots of running-around space. There's no dining room and the dining table in the kitchen is barely large enough for 4 adults.<br />
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That's why we had to limit the number of friends M was allowed to invite to his party. Still, we ended up with a list of 15 kids, mostly boys, and all 7 years old and younger. M wanted a Star Wars themed party. Well, ok, so I got this idea of setting up a padawan training camp for the kids complete with light sabers made out of pool noodles. Sounds perfect, right? Well, have you ever tried buying pool noodles in late January?!<br />
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That's why we ended up using heavy cardboard tubes which was not idea from the safety standpoint. Nope, nobody got hurt and kids had great fun. But it took all my vigilance and effort to keep things from getting too crazy. As a result, no pictures, except this one before the party started (M wanted to dress up as Boba Fett. Also notice Darth Vader poster on the wall)<br />
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I think next year I'm just going to host a party at a park, rain (or snow) or shine. And ask everyone to bring Nerf guns. <br />
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Since the weather was so nice and the grandparents were in town for a few days, we did all the usual fun. We took Grandma on scenic walks and treasure hunts. And we tried to invite Grandpa along, but he said he'd rather nap.<br />
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Then just a couple of months later it was our turn to drive to NY to Grandpa's birthday. And again, we did the usual stuff. M and Grandma gardened, baked and played with Guinness, a super-smart and super-sweet chocolate lab Grandpa was pet sitting.<br />
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And Grandpa got to talk to Chris (here seen holding a couple of birch logs for future craft projects).<br />
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And Chris got to eat mother-in-law's food. Always plentiful, practically always delicious.<br />
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And M got to spend a lot of time digging through his favorite space in the Grandparents' tiny house, the attic. There are all sorts of fascinating things there in addition to the regular assortment of seasonal clothing, my brother's camping gear, and dusty books that Grandma plans on reading "right after she retires". It's also a place where I keep some toys, games and books for the times when we're in NY and have nothing to do. There's also an old kids drum set there. M wanted it downstairs, but no way!!! We compromised by clearing some floor space in the attic and letting M go wild there with a song he titled "Loded Diper" (if you read "The Diary of the Whimpy Kid", you know).<br />
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Fortunately (for our eardrums), M would get tired of the "Loded Diper" song and come down to either cook with Grandma or play the treasure hunting game, again with Grandma. The original game was too easy, even boring, so Grandma made some of her own rules. But she also came up with tons of little "treasure" rewards. So when it was time to leave, M had several small boxes of tchotchkes he collected.<br />
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Fun times!<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-52591830301654934232013-06-02T20:25:00.000-07:002013-06-02T20:25:02.458-07:00Playing Catch-up - Beach Outing<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I'm still playing catch-up after disappearing from this space for like forever. And I'm just now downloading pictures from my camera. So it looks like we got to go to the beach a couple of times so far, both times in April. Which is funny 'cause then we tried going the entire month of May, but it was always too cold or rainy or the weather service forecast called for thunderstorms on the coast.<br />
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Anyway, first M and I went together with two other Russian moms and their kids. So we had a little field trip - 3 adults and 4 boys. We were outnumbered! But the kids had fun. And, thanks to a friend, I discovered a beautiful beach not far from Raleigh. It's as close as Carolina Beach, but is way more interesting, especially if you are not into relaxing with a book or your kid is not into building sandcastles for hours on end.<br />
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Our first trip to Kure Beach was amazing. The water was still too cold for swimming or even jumping in the waves. But it was ok with us because we found some amazing and pretty rare shells. And then we found sea urchins and starfish, some dead, but others very much alive and bobbing about in the shallow warm water.<br />
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Now, that was super exciting and I decided that we should go back as soon as possible for more awesome finds. The second time we went, it was purely a family outing - Chris, myself and M. The day was a whole lot windier and colder, so we didn't see any starfish or sea urchins this time. There weren't even that many shells. But we did find lots and lots of crap claws, all different shapes and sizes. Most were very stinky, so we left them be.<br />
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Finally, we found one that used to belong to a blue crab. It was so beautiful that we decided to put up with the smell. We figured, we could bring it home and put it in the sunniest spot on the driveway or next to an ant hill or something. Well, to make the long story short, it didn't work out that way and even after a couple of weeks the claw remained too stinky to be allowed inside the house. And outside, if the wind was blowing at just the right angle, the smell would make you do a double-sniff followed by an inspection of the soles of your shoes and thoughts of seafood poisoning. We ended up throwing it away.<br />
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But it's not like we didn't find any other treasures that day. Sure, there were no live sea urchins, but we did find one and a half sand dollar (ok, one whole one and one half of the other one). And there were lots of pieces of a very beautiful bright yellow seaweed. Oh, and lots and lots of little pieces of brain corals, perfectly sun bleached.<br />
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We let M use our camera to photograph his own finds. It's a great practice for him for the moments when we need him to take a photo of the two of us. If he pays attention, he usually does a very good job. Of course, we still end up asking strangers to take the photos of the three of us. But just wait 'til we get a pet monkey and train it in the art of photography!<br />
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Well, that's about all for our beach outings to date. Wew!<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0Fort Fisher, 1610 Fort Fisher, Kure Beach, NC 28449, USA33.9717513 -77.9175991999999848.4497168000000009 -119.22619319999998 59.4937858 -36.609005199999984tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-80458858144006682532013-05-18T19:45:00.002-07:002013-05-18T19:45:42.012-07:00First Ever Camping Trip<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This happened a while ago, on Easter weekend to be exact. We went camping, hooray! Now, you might not think it's such a big deal. But last time I went camping family-style I was in elementary school. And I'm not sure Chris has ever been camping before.<br />
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Fortunately, we have terrific friends who are seasoned campers 'cause they go camping a lot and also 'cause they have a camper. They also have a ton of gear, doubles and triples of many things which was helpful. And my brother was able to join us. He's just about the most adventurous and outdoorsy person I know. Which is great for real backwoods stuff, but is not particularly useful at a nice family-style campsite. But what's really useful is that my bro is an awesome camp cook.<br />
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One thing you gotta know about camping with Russians is that there will be lots and lots of food. The entire day will revolve around cooking and eating food. Since food is so important to the success of the outing, it won't be any ordinary stuff like sandwiches. No freaking way! Instead, there will be some sort of soup (why do my American friends think soup is so complicated? it's just about the easiest thing to cook!), lots of veggies - fresh (scallions, radishes, cukes) and cooked (roasted corn, baked potatoes) and, of course, shishkebabs.<br />
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Anyway, the three of us - Chris, myself and M - were total noobs at this whole camping thing. But I think we fared well. M loved it. The first night we tried getting him to sleep in the camper with his friends. At first he was all for the idea. But as soon as the lights were out, he asked to sleep in the tent.<br />
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The second, last night, was particularly awesome. I let M stay up late. I wrapped him in a warm blanket and he sat by the fire, listened to his bedtime story, ate s'mores, watched the stars. Then he just sat and watched the fire and listened to the adults talking and fell asleep. It was just about perfect, I thought.<br />
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Here's the picture of the delicious shishkebabs my brother made. I fixed a salad to go with them. And we had grilled corn and baked potatoes too. Now, let me say a couple of things about baked potatoes. If you cannot enjoy a real baked potato, yes, the kind with ash on its skin 'cause it wasn't wrapped in foil, then too bad for you! You are totally missing out on things.<br />
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Here's the (now, in retrospect) funny thing about this camping trip. We forgot M's warm clothes. Yep, we sure took warm jackets for ourselves. But somehow we forgot M's sweaters and warm pants and, well, even a rain jacket. That's some parenting, I tell ya. Still, the kid did great and was happy and warm throughout the 3-day trip.<br />
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Since returning from our first ever camping trip, we traded our giant 6-person tent for a more modestly sized 4-person one. Our friends upgraded their popup camper to a better model. And we vowed to go camping again soon, as soon as we get a camping stove.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-80636146644976935312013-05-18T18:55:00.002-07:002013-05-18T18:55:21.192-07:00Oy Vey, It's Already the End of May!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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... and it looks like I've been absent from this here space for a number of months. But not to worry, nothing extraordinary has happened here and we're all doing just fine. Simply put, I was way overwhelmed and reached a total burn-out point. Couldn't stand looking at the computer screen unless I absolutely had to (for work).<br />
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But I'm back for now. So let's see, what's going on around here...<br />
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First of all, the biggest news right now is that <a href="http://www.moebiusnoodles.com/thebook" target="_blank">Moebius Noodles</a>, the book my friend/co-author/math wizard/fellow homeschooler and I've been working on for the past couple of years is out and it's awesome (or so I hear). So <a href="http://www.moebiusnoodles.com/thebook" target="_blank">GET A COPY</a> for yourself, your friends, your kids' teachers and so on. We've heard the book makes a great baby shower gift. PDF is pay-what-you-want (just remember, we worked real hard on this book and it's awesome) and you can order a hard copy too.<br />
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I'll post more updates about the book as things happen. So far, Maria and I appeared in a guest article on the <a href="http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/budding-scientist/2013/04/29/adventurous-math-for-the-playground-set/" target="_blank">Scientific American blog</a>.<br />
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Ok, so that's that. On to the latest house/yard project. We're slowly, but surely turning our backyard into an amusement park. A few weeks ago we bought a used 15' trampoline on Craigslist. It seemed like a good deal - the huge trampoline was in a very good shape, including the safety net. But it turned out to be a GREAT deal, unbelievable awesome deal 'cause, check it out, the people who were selling it gave us a swing set, complete with swings, fort, sandbox, fireman's pole, and a slide. And to top it all off, they gave us a zipline. Yep, they just gave it all to us!<br />
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So Chris was very busy the last week or so. First, he had to take the playset apart and get it to our yard. Then he was busy setting up the trampoline. Then he put up the swings. Today was the zipline day. And next week the rest of the playground will be done (hopefully).<br />
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Now, I was going to take pictures of Chris setting up the trampoline. I figured, it'd take an hour or two of work tops. But turns out, putting together a used trampoline is very different from all those youtube videos of putting together a new trampoline. So it took us like 3 days, including rust-proofing, cleaning the springs, and lots of hammering. Besides, turns out, trampoline assembly means spending most of the time in very uncomfortable positions, usually bent over. And straining to connect the stupid parts. Not very photogenic.<br />
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So the only picture of me that I allowed here is where I'm doing light work - ducttaping parts together (that's also not in any of the videos).<br />
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Ok, fine, I'll including this one. Although it's obviously a staged shot (to Chris's great annoyance I never lift with my legs). But M took this picture, so I'm including it.<br />
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Yesterday we had friends over for a little trampoline-jumping playdate. It was awesome! We just need loads of Bug Off spray, mostly for parents 'cause kids don't seem to be bothered. Another option for adults is to stay in the house. You see, the trampoline is so giant that it can be seen from pretty much any window of the house. But the best view is from the sliding door which, coincidence I think it isn't, is by our kitchen table.<br />
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BTW, if you are wondering about a zipline adventure tour for yourself... Sorry, the zipline we have is not designed to hold adults. I mean, it will hold (it held me), but you get like no speed on it. Plus we set it pretty low to the ground - good for little kids, but a pain for anyone above 5' tall.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-59543175828793456142013-01-03T20:39:00.002-08:002013-01-03T20:39:15.944-08:00The Books We Read This WeekOk, so the week is not over yet, but I better post these books now so I don't forget to do it later. Since our old car was not driving all that well plus so many of our friends spent their winter break either travelling or being sick or both, we spent more time than normal at home in the past few days. So we read a lot.<br />
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I picked up the book of Bazhov's tales last time I was in New York mostly because I wanted it for myself. The language seemed quite difficult for a young child to understand. There are a lot of words that fell out of use long time ago. Kids in Russia might be exposed to some of these words through fairy tales and old cartoons. But my son is not one for fairy tales (he'll ask to read and re-read the Complete History of Star Wars instead) and the only Russian cartoons he is still interested in are Smeshariki, Fixiki and Pin Code. So I was very surprised when M liked the stories, kept asking for more, remembered the names of the characters and even talked about what if he was in those stories. I'm going to try to show him some of the old Soviet cartoons based on these stories.<br />
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This is another one of my favorite childhood books. I tried reading it with M months ago, but he wasn't too interested. The language is not difficult and the stories are funny and engaging. I think he was too much into his rockets and space exploration phase though. So by the time we picked up this book again, we've already read about Paddington Bear and Emil from Lonneberga, much longer and more involved stories. As M is getting older, he's becoming a lot more thrilled with mischievous characters yet he still wants them to be cute and cuddly. I think that's why this time around Kuzka stories are such a big hit.<br />
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Angelo is the first book that I insisted on not translating into Russian. M didn't like the idea of me reading a book in English. But he became too absorbed in the story after just the first couple of pages. To keep things consistent with our one parent one language approach, I plan on only reading in English during our English lessons. Our evening story time will remain in Russian for the foreseeable future. As for the book, M found the story more sad than happy. I saw him blinking away a tear or two as the story moved along. We talked a bit more about this story (in Russian) which gave me an opportunity to introduce a few new Russian words, such as штукатурка, штукатурщик, херувим, строительные леса, etc.<br />
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M liked this book, the Perfect Square, enough to pick up a square of origami paper and scissors and do his own little collage. I hoped for more, but what can I say - M just doesn't like cutting, tearing or gluing paper.<br />
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This week we also read two more math books. The first one was 1+1 = 5 and Other Unlikely Additions. I tried it some time ago, but without much success. This time, however, M was thrilled. He insisted we read the book a couple of times and then he retold me the entire story. We even tried coming up with our own unlikely additions. What I liked most was that both number recognition and addition were present, but not central. M used both without even really noticing it since he was so absorbed figuring out the attributes in each picture that really made each addition work.<br />
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The last book I want to share is Roman Numerals from I to MM. No, I'm not teaching M Roman numerals. But I wanted him to see how using different numerals affects how we write and read numbers. He liked the idea that numbers could be written as letters. He LOVED the fact that his letter, M, was used for the largest single-symbol value (M = 1000). It didn't hurt that the pictures of cute piggies were so darn... cute. He immediately recognized them from Hogwash and Pigaroons books. I like this book and will try going a bit more in-depth with it in a few months.<br />
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Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-20320768576386230542013-01-03T19:44:00.003-08:002013-01-03T19:44:43.398-08:00Happy New Year!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Happy New Year! I can't believe it's only January 3rd. The past few days have been a whirlwind. To begin with, I cooked a TON of food... again. Yep, after the giant Thanksgiving dinner complete with the everlasting turkey, I promised to myself that the New Year's застолье would be a very modest one - just some cheese and olives and a store-bought dessert. Oh, and maybe just a tiny bit of the Olivier salad. Oh, and Chris wanted red caviar, so of course a tiny jar of that. Plus, to add a bit of color, a small bowl of the beet salad.<br />
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Yeah, right! Somehow I ended up with two giant bowls of salads - one with Olivier and the other one - with the beet one. And I baked brie in puff pastry with the secret-recipe cranberry sauce and almonds. Oh, and not to forget, a giant cast iron pot of жаркое. So it was a whole lot of food after all. The good part is I haven't had to cook for the past few days. Which is just as well because we were busy looking for and buying a car.<br />
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So now we have a new certified pre-owned car. Hooray to us! Our old car which we bought genuinely new back in 2002 (when we were young and naive) has seen better days, much better days. We haven't been taking it on highways or anywhere outside of the 30 mile radius from our house for about a year. We'll be sad to see it go (when and if we sell it) 'cause it's been a great car to us even though pretty much everyone we know told us from Day 1 that it was total crap and we made like the biggest mistake of our lives.<br />
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Nor was buying our first car as much of a pain and a time-suck as buying this one. Seriously! I hate the entire process now and hope to not have to go through it again for the next 10-12 years. And by then we'll have bullet trains and moving sidewalks installed everywhere anyway.<br />
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Ah, I forgot to mention the gifts our very lucky son got for the New Year! A very indulgent Ded Moroz, the Russian Santa, got him<a href="http://www.gosphero.com/" target="_blank"> this awesome thing</a>. Needless to say, M is in love! He spent what seemed like the entire New Year's Day alternating between driving Sphero around the house and driving us up the wall complaining that Sphero wasn't charging fast enough. For now M uses Sphero mostly for flipping virtual cupcakes to Sharky the Beaver in the augmented reality game (at the end of each round Sharky says "sugar coma" which apparently M finds super funny; he also pointed out that Sharky must have lots of cavities).<br />
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M also got more lose Legos, something he really wanted for his ambitious construction projects. But at this point nothing could compete with Sphero.<br />
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Finally, this week we are back to homeschooling. Seems like our winter break lasted forever! But more on that later. For now, Happy New Year to All and to All a Good Night!<br />
<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-65176147945566957632012-12-29T18:46:00.001-08:002012-12-29T18:46:30.836-08:00Last Christmas Cookie<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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... has been eaten and I'm just now getting around to updating the blog with all the Christmas related stuff. Yep, we celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas. What's more, we also celebrate my most favoritest holiday of all, the New Year (so stay tuned for that one). And yes, there are gifts for M for each of these holidays. So we try to keep it very low-key in terms of gifts - 1-2 gifts for each holiday and nothing over the top. More about gifts later.<br />
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This year we had the most elaborate run-up to Christmas ever. Last year everything was very low key because, with Chris deployed, I just didn't feel like it. Nor did I have much time for things other than a tree and a gingerbread house. But this year, oh my!<br />
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First, we made the gingerbread house with the lovely kit from Trader Joe. This is my favorite gingerbread house to date and I do hope they sell it next year too. It didn't have weird ingredients, was super-easy to put together, looked very nice and cost only about $7.<br />
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Once the gingerbread was up, it was time to go get the tree. A couple of years ago, when we had a very snowy winter (yep, we do get those in the Piedmont area once in a while), we went to a nearby tree farm and cut down our own tree. Which was fun. But this year we waited until like three days before Christmas to get the tree and knew that all the good ones at the farm were already claimed. So instead we bought ours at the farmers' market.<br />
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Next, it was time to bake Christmas cookies. I had very ambitious plans for baking sugar cookies, gingersnaps, and making chocolate almond bark. Except I also planned on cleaning the house. So in the end I had no energy for the big production. Chris and M did the sugar cookies and I put together gingersnaps. BTW, both were Alton Brown's recipes and turned out delicious!<br />
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A couple of days before Christmas we already had gifts for M, but not for each other. Since our car required some expensive repairs just before Christmas, we didn't feel like getting anything pricey. Instead, we all went to my favorite thrift shop. And, much like Alton Brown, this thrift shop never fails. We bought a couple of nice ornaments for our tree, a Rumertopf unglazed clay bread baker for Chris (he said he always wanted one) and a hand-carved wooden chips and dip tray for me. All for like $7.<br />
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The day before Christmas we went to our good friends. M had a lot of fun, as usual, playing with the boys. And the adults were able to have an almost uninterrupted conversation punctuated with good wine. Which sounds idyllic except I had to leave the party 'cause of the most horrendous headache ever.<br />
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Ah, so what did M get for Christmas? He got three gifts. Two were Lego Education kits - Simple Machines and WeDo robotics. These are not cheap, but we got them free as part of the <a href="http://ourmilitarykids.org/">OurMilitaryKids.org</a> grant (for M's participation in the JrFLL Lego club earlier this year). And the third gift was the Angry Birds: Star Wars game I finally downloaded to the iPad.<br />
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So the Christmas day was spent building with Legos. The first thing M built with Chris's help was a crane. But he got bored with that quickly and insisted we built and programmed an alligator with a light sensor. The gator turned out to be the Rebel gator and bravely fought against several Imperial troops and Lord Vader himself.<br />
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<b>P.S.</b> I was also busy putting together a 72-hour emergency food supply as part of my <a href="http://www.ecentify.com/blog/2012/12/11/co-founders-post-getting-ready-for-emergencies-a-planned-approach/" target="_blank">Challenge</a> on <a href="http://ecentify.com/">eCentify.com</a>. M got totally into this (he loves anything that has to do with stockpiling for difficult times ahead) and built this "emergency surprise tower" of food. Notice, he remembered the tea tin (so you can make tea, Mama), fruits (so that we can make fresh juice) and a kitchen timer (so we know what time it is).Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-44591759787940019402012-12-18T17:58:00.000-08:002012-12-18T17:58:00.075-08:00Hanukkah<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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With all the excitement of yard mega-projects and Lego League, Hanukkah just about flew by. The coolest thing was that my parents came to visit us. They arrived on the first evening of Hanukkah and stayed for 4 days, just about the record (except for when M was born and when I had surgery).<br />
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We had great time too. My Dad is not big on going places and doing things. He loves spending time with M as long as it's in or around the house. Which explains why we have like no pictures of him (oh, and he doesn't like being photographed either). My Mom is just the opposite. She loves going places as long as we don't have to drive after dark (she gets motion sickness) and she doesn't mind being in a picture.<br />
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We didn't have an overwhelming "program" for the visit. We had a nice first evening of Hanukkah. The next day Grandpa took M to the store and got him the one toy M's been dreaming about (and asking for) now that he's all about Lego Hero Factory once again. Of course, he asked for Stormer XL (saw the darn thing on the LEGO YouTube channel). At first M was puzzled over what XL stood for. After repeating it several times though he realized that sounded just like "excel". And once he put Stormer together, he also saw that it was quite big, bigger than all the other Heroes, so XL was also extra-large. Which reminds me...<br />
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a few days after getting his new Stormer XL, after clearing up the mystery of what XL stands for, M was telling me something about his new Stormer and I said something along the lines "well, in this regard he's a bit like you, isn't he". A little while later, I overheard M's conversation with Papa:<br />
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M: "Papa, you know, Mama said that I'm kind of like Stormer XL."<br />Papa: "Oh, yeah? How so?"<br />M (totally serious): "Well, maybe it's because I'm kind of large for my age"<br /><i>(the kid is at the bottom of the weight chart for his age and just around the middle of the height chart).</i></blockquote>
Grandma got to go to M's Lego League showcase and also to the Life and Science Museum. That plus our regular phys therapy appointments and homeschool took up a large chunk of our time.<br />
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Then the evenings were spent cooking (unlike me, my Mom can cook just about anything out of just about anything without cookbooks and it will be delicious), baking (my hubby, who's rightfully famous in my family for his bread-baking was doing a master class for my Mom), and listening to my Mom's lectures on alternative medicine, food additives and healthy lifestyle (sorry, Mom, you're right, you're right, but sometimes it gets to be too much of a good thing).<br />
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All in all, it was great. I just wish they stayed for longer than 4 days!<br />
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The rest of Hanukkah was hectic and we didn't get to play dreidel until the last day of the holiday. This year M learned to spin it pretty well and, when we added chocolate coins to the game, quickly remembered all the rules. He would get all dramatic about it too, exclaiming "Gimmel for me!" and "Oh, I got Shin again!" But he was pretty lucky. I, on the other hand, kept spinning one "Shin" after another. It was ridiculous, I'm telling you. That dreidel must'd been loaded. Even M eventually exclaimed (again, with great drama): "Why does Mama always get shin?!" Which was, if you think about it, a hilarious question.<br />
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So after a while M ended up winning all the chocolate coins. But he did share his wealth with us and then with all his friends who come over to our place. This new generous and very polite (says "please" and "thank you" all the time) M is really a joy!<br />
<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-62247986513197759842012-12-17T19:58:00.001-08:002012-12-17T19:59:57.497-08:00Lego Stuff<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Last week M had his first real Junior First Lego League showcase. The JrFLL team he was on, The Lego Bat Panthers, presented their solution for the Super Seniors challenge.<br />
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From the description of the challenge on the <a href="http://juniorfirstlegoleague.org/2012-super-seniors-challenge.html" target="_blank">JrFLL page</a>:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Can Junior </span><em style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">FIRST</em><sup style="border: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">®</sup><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"> LEGO</span><sup style="border: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">®</sup><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"> League teams improve the quality of life for seniors by learning about the obstacles some people face as they get older? </span></span></blockquote>
M's team of 6, most of them - under 6, had a tough time choosing just one quality of life aspect. Instead, they decided to create a solution for ALL the potential problems faced by seniors. As a result, they created a robot-butler (M keeps calling it "robot-bocaler"). <br />
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Essentially, it's a motorized contraption that does just about anything a person might want or need to do daily. It has attachments for cooking, cleaning, vacuuming, dusting, bringing groceries from cars, digging garden beds, and blasting off door handles. Yep, that's, they all agreed, was the coolest way to solve the problem of door knobs (since, as they learned, seniors develop arthritis that makes it painful and difficult to twist door knobs). Unwittingly, they recreated the awesome SIMON, Lara Croft's robot from the Tomb Raider movie.<br />
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As part of the showcase, the team had to come up with the name, the T-shirt design, and put together a poster about their work. The name, Lego Bat Panthers, might seem strange unless you have experience negotiating a team name with a group of boys, each of whom has just the greatest idea for it. So then you take one word from each terrific idea and string it all together and voila, they miraculously agree on it.<br />
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Now, the T-shirts were largely designed by moms, but kids did vote on the color, the font and the idea of having flames. The bat panther iron-ons were added to the sleeves. And the poster... well, we took the easy way out. Each child chose photos he liked from a pile of photos taken during the JrFLL meetings. They cut them out and also colored the words in the team's name. Then they drew the pictures of other awesome robot-butlers. None of the kids wanted to deal with the messy and sticky glue, so the gluing down part was done mostly by the moms.<br />
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Then it was the showcase time. During the showcase, the kids have to be able to answer questions from the panel of judges and tell a bit about their team and their project. I wasn't there to see it, so not sure how it went. M really dislikes this part. He just wants to build, not talk about it with strangers, lol.<br />
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Back home, M built his own, smaller and non-motorized, version of the robot-butler. So that was really cool. He also discovered the Lego YouTube channel. First, he kept watching Lego Star Wars episodes which are hilarious, I must admit. Inspired, he started building Lego scenes. The latest (I don't have a picture) is called "Imperial troopers are having lunch break while building a new base on the planet Hoth".<br />
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But then he wanted to watch all the Hero Factory episodes which are not at all funny 'cause they are basically just commercials for the Hero Factory stuff. So now he's spends all his spare time playing with his Heroes. He even built them their own Hero Factory. It has the production floor where Heroes are assembled and their quaza cores are inserted (I did help a bit with some of the machines here). There's also the control room for Zib and Quaddle. This room has lots of computers and important buttons, but also a solar panel and some garbage and recycling cans. Heroes also have a spacecraft.<br />
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But the masterpiece of the setup is the high security jail. It has 4 cells for villains and has detection and alarm lasers. It's very strong and well-guarded. Unfortunately, villains escape from it on average 10 times an hour. So the Heroes are always busy chasing them and/or improving the jail.<br />
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M doesn't know yet, but he's getting more Legos for the holidays, including lots of gears, a motor and a battery pack. Hooray!<br />
<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-63952376156408130142012-12-17T19:16:00.004-08:002012-12-17T19:16:52.535-08:00Our Giant Deck and Other Projects<br />
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I usually don't write much about Chris. Mostly it's because he spent the entire year deployed. But now that he's back, he's catching up on a whole lot of different house projects. Ah, home, sweet home!<br />
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The two major things going on are the yard and the deck. First, I'm going to show you the yard project. Basically, <strike>I </strike> we decided to move the veggie garden from the front yard into the side yard. A couple of years ago we (and now I do mean "we") cleared the area of all the overgrown bushes and ivy and covered with black plastic (big mistake). So all we needed to do now was to get rid of <strike>weeds</strike> torn plastic, break the heavy clay soil and clear it off as many roots and rocks as possible. </div>
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Oh, and also, <strike>we</strike> Chris needed to tear down the old rusted through metal shed (see what's left of it laying on the ground?). Which meant he had to drag all the rotten and rusty junk out of it first. Only after all this prep could he start building new raised beds.</div>
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But after the first two beds were built, we had to hit the pause button on this project. That's because we decided to cut down a maple tree (shucks, wish it was pine). It was a good tree, but it was shading a large part of the garden and, more importantly, leaning over the fence into the neighbor's yard. So we decided to be nice and neighborly and take care of this issue. </div>
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Since the tree cutting company had a 2-week lead time, Chris decided to start on the mega project of refinishing the deck. This project has been at least 5 years overdue. But you see, we have a huge deck - 3 levels (used to be 4, but we tore one down 'cause it was built right on the ground and rotted through by the time we bought the house). The lowest quote we ever got for refinishing the deck was $2500 + materials. </div>
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Actually, the deck looked so ugly that I thought there was not a chance it'd ever look good again. I thought we'd need a new deck altogether. Good thing I have my hubby who's not as panicky about things. When faced with a challenge, he usually reaches for the nearest instrument of destruction - a hammer, a chainsaw, a power washer - and gets right to work.<br />
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And that's exactly what he did this time around. First, he removed the horrible lattice and sanded the railing all around. We figured, trying to sand all those 2x2s was too much of a pain in the neck. It was easier (and saner) to just replace them with the new ones. Luckily, whoever built our deck, had no idea about building codes. So they spaced those 2x2s too far apart and, as we were told, not safe for children. Now that our child is old enough to know better, we had a lot fewer 2x2s to replace. Hooray for incompetent builders!</div>
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The belt sander did a terrific job on the railings. But we needed something bigger and better for the deck floors. Turns out, you can't use regular big floor sander on a deck. Something about the nails or whatever. Instead, we had to rent a power washer. Which was a bit of an issue 'cause you know how little our car is. There was no way a power washer could fit in the trunk. Since the rental place is within walking distance from us, Chris considered walking the washer to the house or, better yet, I'd drive and he'd pull the washer alongside the car. For some reason the rental place folks didn't like this plan. Instead, they decided to deliver the washer themselves. Whatever... </div>
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Power washing must be a whole lot of fun... for guys. I mean, I don't care for it one way or another. But both Chris and M were thrilled. What's the big attraction? Beats me. But it was pretty cool to watch them work. Especially Chris since M left after just a few minutes and went back to his toys.</div>
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Anywho, the washer was excellent. Turns out, our deck wasn't rotten after all. It was just incredibly dirty. Once all that grime was taken care of, we had a very nice red oak deck. Who knew?! </div>
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Then we had to wait for the deck to dry so Chris could put stain on it. So we spent a lot of time looking at different stains. Unlike paints, stains don't have attractive names. So I chose the one that sounded the prettiest, Cinnamon. Makes you think of all the wonderfully delicious breakfasts, lunches and dinners out on the finished deck. And the picture in the brochure looked nice too.</div>
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But stains are trickier than paints. Turns out, they look different on different wood. So this one had a whole lot of red in it to M's delight. I'm ok with it 'cause you know, it's still a ton better than the old look. </div>
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It took Chris more than a week to finish staining the deck. Mostly because all of a sudden the weather turned rainy. And the local weather forecast tends to predict just the opposite of what the weather is really like. But eventually the deck was finished with two coats of stain. And it looks wonderful and amazing and unrecognizable! It better, I say, 'cause it took 5 gallons of stain. We had to go to Lowe's for more stain like 3 times. The guy at the paint counter must've thought we have no idea how to calculate the area; we do, but our deck soaks it all up. </div>
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But again, it looks amazing! Come check it out if you're in the area. Oh, and if you have an old crummy deck, Chris says he'll help you get it in tip-top shape... at a competitive price. </div>
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Except right now he's a bit busy with the veg garden again. The tree cutting company came out and cut down the maple. We are keeping the logs for yet another project (more on this when it actually happens, but it'll be very handsome!) The final raised bed should be finished in a day or two. Then - the new compost bin and a gravel path along the veg garden. I'll post pictures as soon as that's done.</div>
Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-70875675090356035652012-12-02T19:38:00.002-08:002012-12-02T19:38:22.807-08:00Osso Bucco? Osso "Bleh"-cco!!!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I already mentioned that I picked up Tim Ferriss' new book, <i>The 4-Hour Chef</i>, with a hope to finally learn how to cook without recipes. Well, this is the end of Week 1 of actual cooking and here's my update.<br />
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This week I was supposed to make two dishes - lamb "osso bucco" and scrambled eggs.<br />
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<b>Osso Bucco</b> was a definite FAIL. I did follow the recipe. And I did buy all the right (namely, fresh and/or organic) ingredients. I even used the same brand of canned tomatoes. Yet the end result was disappointing. It looked good, but tasted fatty and flat. Not a good combination. Then again, I never tried lamb before and, in general, I don't like meat all that much.<br />
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There was also a WHOLE LOT of braising liquid left. I felt it would be too wasteful to just get rid of it. And from my previous experience (mostly reading "Stone Soup" and the part in "Three in a Boat Not Counting the Dog" where Jerome K Jerome talks about Irish ragu), I knew that just about anything can be turned into a delicious soup.<br />
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I kept the broth and the day after I boiled it with the remaining carrots, some orzo, canned tomatoes, and leftover chopped lamb meat. Oh, and more salt and pepper. Now it tasted much better, but still it was missing something. Luckily, I remembered a jar of аджика (Georgian chili paste) in my fridge and added some to the soup. That did it! Now it tasted just right and somewhat like харчо. Must'd been хмели-сунели spice blend that was one of the ingredients in the chili paste (the rest were just various chilies, garlic and salt).<br />
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<b>Scrambled eggs</b> - I did not have fried parsley for the Middle Eastern version and I didn't feel like eating eggs with mint (the Northeast African version). Instead, I added scallions, fresh ginger and some soy sauce for an Asian take on scrambled eggs. I totally eyeballed the spices too. But the eggs turned out great. I don't know why I never considered adding herbs and spices to the scrambled eggs at the end, instead of at the beginning of cooking them.<br />
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<b>Lessons learned:</b><br />
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1. Lamb - not for me<br />
2. There are no shortcuts to building layers of flavor in a dish<br />
3. If it doesn't turn out all that great, make a soup out of it<br />
4. Scrambled eggs with soy sauce - delicious!Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-34173733118346152122012-11-26T13:42:00.002-08:002012-11-26T13:42:22.753-08:00Still Learning to Cook<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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You'd think that after about 10 years of marriage, I'd learn how to cook. Nope, not even close! I mean, I've come a long way since Chris and I first moved in together. Back then my specialty was salads and pasta (plain or with a sauce out of a jar). Now I can get an entire Thanksgiving dinner ready without much flipping out. And it'll be delicious as long as I have a good recipe to go by (yeah, I'm shacking my finger at you, Paula "One-Stick-of-Butter" Dean; your cornbread stuffing was a #fail).<br />
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And that's exactly the problem - the recipes. I can make just about anything given a recipe. But without one, I can't even make a Russian staple, fried potatoes with mushrooms. Ok, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, but just a bit. The bottom line is I <b>CAN'T COOK WITHOUT RECIPES</b>.<br />
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But this is about to change, I'm telling you! I'm working my way (very slowly) through Tim Ferriss' new book <i><b>"The 4-Hour Chef</b></i>". So far I'm loving it. I've just started reading about specific dishes and am yet to try the first one, but my cooking seems to have improved already. Like, we're still dealing with the left-over turkey. So last night I made spaghetti with turkey marinara (what would be a fancy name for this dish?). It was absolutely delicious, both Chris and M requested seconds and thirds.<br />
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Today I turned even more leftover turkey into a shepherd's pie. Again, delicious, and I almost didn't need a recipe for this one (I did use Alton Brown's recipe, but only as an inspiration and to know the proper oven temperature).<br />
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The nice thing is that so far, not counting the cost of the <b><i>4-Hour Chef</i></b> book itself, it hasn't cost me a penny more to cook better food. But things are about to change as I'm approaching the first how-to of the book - Osso Bucco.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-4661462914712491742012-11-25T08:58:00.000-08:002012-11-25T08:58:00.437-08:00Islands<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Lately M's been very busy building islands. I forgot how it all started, but next thing I knew he build the first island - just a few stones with a couple of angry birds stranded on top of one.<br />
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Then shortly after Chris got back, M decided to build a Family Island. So he got out all the stones he collected during our list trip to NY, added some tree rounds, pine cones, tree bark to the mix, and put up a lighthouse and a windmill and populated the island with as many toy animals that would fit on it.<div>
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Almost immediately he decided to build a larger island for more animals and with plenty of room for the boats to dock. He also decided that his two collectible angry birds will swim to the island in a shell boat. </div>
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Then came the island of Every Kind of Animal and Astronauts and Aliens Island.</div>
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After the flamboyancy of the Every Kind of Animal island came the minimalist and uninhabited Three Bridges Island...</div>
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... which didn't stay uninhabited for too long .</div>
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Check out the awesome bat on top of the lighthouse! And the penguin isn't bad either.<br />
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Then a TIE-fighter landed...<br />
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And the island became deserted once again.<br />
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LEGO mini-figs were the late-comers, but they quickly got rid of all the non-essentials, installed a lawn for sunbathing and running around...<br />
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... and built a rocket launch pad.<br />
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Last I've heard, the TIE-fighter left the Dark Side and instead joined the mini-figs in their space exploration quest.</div>
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Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-10857367268168698482012-11-24T20:35:00.000-08:002012-11-24T20:35:06.044-08:00Homeschool Catch-up Post<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Yes, we are still homeschooling. And no, we aren't planning to change it just yet. So lots of things are going on in our little school and lots of new stuff. The big news is that I'm now teaching M English reading. Phonics sounded too crazy for me, so instead I settled on a book called <i>"Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons"</i> and I absolutely love it (so far).<br />
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We've done just over 30 lessons and M reads! He reads words, sentences and even short stories. And he understands what he reads without relying on a picture. Besides, his reading is very smooth and he blends the sounds well (better than he does in Russian, actually). This book is so simple to use! It provides very clear step-by-step instructions for parents and there's like no prep time for the lessons.<br />
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I'm also greatly relieved that with the DISTAR method used in the book we don't need to worry about sight words. One of the reasons I wanted to homeschool was to avoid just this type of rote learning ever-present in alphabet songs, rote counting to ten and back and sight words. <br />
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I was a bit worried that starting English with him would interfere with his Russian reading especially since his progress was so uncertain. So far it doesn't look as if it does. There were a few times that he mixed up Russian and English sounds. But I realized that if I teach English first, then - math, then a longish (an hour or so) break before teaching Russian, it helped. Another thing that helped was reminding M which language we were practicing reading.<br />
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One of the totally unexpected things about introducing English reading was that it actually helped M blend sounds better when reading Russian. Now he almost never reads individual letters, but instead the entire syllables which makes for much faster reading and better comprehension.<br />
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Last time I was in NY, I picked up this reading workbook at the Russian store. It's for kids ages 5-6 and M is finding it pretty easy (we end up skipping some of the easier exercises). But the book cover says that it's for "gifted children". Hmm... maybe they are playing to the parents' vanity. I don't let this get to my head. For now we practice lots of two- and three-syllable words and play games that work on fluency and actually reading a word vs guessing it.<br />
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And, of course, we also do math. I set aside the RightStart book for now. He was doing very well with geometry, but not so good with number facts past 7. So I decided to back up a bit, work on very basic stuff, like adding by 1, number facts to 5, etc. It's a bit frustrating for sure. Especially since if I replace numbers with any other symbols, he gets it and adds and subtracts without any difficulty.<br />
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At the same time, M's been intensely interested in very big numbers - a million, a billion and a trillion. He keeps asking me to re-read the <i>"How Much Is a Million</i>" to him. But more about this one some other time.<br />
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Apart from the homeschool, he's been busy at his Jr First Lego League and also at home building vehicles and Star Wars scenes with Legos, making islands, helping Chris in the yard and playing with friends.<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-52791411820589460472012-11-11T13:00:00.000-08:002012-11-11T13:00:03.307-08:00Epic Climb<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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On Day 2 of our stay in NE, Chris got it into his head to climb a tree in Grandma's backyard. I guess, raking leaves was getting to be too boring. Fortunately, I was there to take pictures of his fit of strength.<br />
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<i>"Not sure what got into me, but I can totally do it! Totally!"</i></div>
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<i>"It ain't nothing. I work out!"</i></div>
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<i>"Hey babe, check this out! Told ya I could do it!"</i></div>
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<i>"Crap, this is pretty high to jump down from"</i></div>
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<i>"No worries, I'll figure something out. Will try climbing down the other side"</i></div>
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<i>"Hmm, the other side is also pretty high... Ok, gotta go back the same way, I guess"</i></div>
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<i>"If this was yoga, this would've been a Panda-asana."</i></div>
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<i>"It'd suck to fall and break a leg. Should I tuck and roll?"</i></div>
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<i>"The Eagle has landed!"</i></div>
Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-53946145334478794622012-11-11T12:30:00.000-08:002012-11-11T12:30:00.141-08:00Nebraska in November<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Let me tell you one thing about going to Nebraska - it's a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG drive! How long? Well, let's put it this way - at some point half through the drive, M <u><b>voluntarily</b></u> gave me the iPad back saying that he had enough of it. So you can imagine what the second half of the drive was like in terms of the frequency of the "Are we there yet" and "I'm bored!" sentences.<br />
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To be fair, M didn't just play on an iPad all the time (I wouldn't let it happen no matter how many "Are we there yet" he threw at me). He spent a lot of time drawing too. On the way there it was mostly Star Wars stuff. But on the way back it was all about dinosaurs, dinosaur bones and him and his friends digging up dinosaurs. And he took lots and lots of pictures of Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Iowa... all looking pretty much the same.<br />
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The highlight of the trip there (for me) was seeing a trailer hauling a wind turbine blade. The thing is unbelievably huge and absolutely beautiful, especially up close.<br />
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M loves taking pictures. He's careful enough that I trust him with my cheapie camera. He doesn't know how to navigate through the menus or, say, turn the flash or the macro options on and off. And sometimes his hands shake so much that the pictures come out impossibly blurry. But other times he takes great pictures! The best part is he is not at all afraid to find just the perfect spot for the picture, even if it means crawling under furniture or climbing up on the kitchen table. And he rarely takes "a picture of everything", preferring to focus on just one or two elements at a time. The downside is he takes A LOT of pictures. I mean, hundreds. Which makes my job of sorting through them that much longer.<br />
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But I digress... By the end of the drive to Lincoln, M was so sick of being on the road and so bored, that he kept saying how he wasn't going to be nice to Nebraska and how he was going to not like it and kick it. And how he wasn't going to talk to anyone in Nebraska.<br />
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And then we got to Grandma Phyllis's house and parked the car and M looked around and said "And you dragged me here for this?!" But then two things happened. One was M got to go out into the yard and play in a huge pile of leaves. And then he got to eat spaghetti for dinner. Well, actually there was a third thing - M got to see, touch and pretend-call a friend on a very old telephone that was hanging on the wall downstairs right above a huge old wooden trunk (M's dream possession). All this was just too great to stay mad. So M cheered up and even conceded that "Nebraska was turning out to be better than he thought".<br />
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Then the next day M got introduced to American football as we spent the afternoon with Chris's family watching the game on a humongous TV, the biggest TV M has ever seen. At first he was bored with the whole thing. After all, we don't have a TV set at home and he's not used to watching anything, not even cartoons, much. Plus he's never seen American football before. But by the end of the evening he said he understood what the game was all about and liked it. And the next day he came over to me and asked me to switch the TV channel to a game.<br />
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Honestly, I don't care much about football. Yeah, it's an American thing and all and maybe I should learn a bit more about the game. But it seems pretty boring even compared to soccer (which I don't care much for either). Still, I must say that I had a great time at Aunt Sharon and Uncle Sam's house spending time with the family. Too bad we had to leave kinda early 'cause M was so tired that he actually kept asking to go to bed (another first).<br />
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Over the next two days we didn't do much. One day we went to this little museum on the U of N campus. It was terrific. We were in luck 'cause they had some kind of Science Sunday event with all the fun activities for kids. The best one, IMHO and according to M, was the one about making edible scat (that's animal poop, in case you don't know). I always knew Tootsie Rolls were good for something.<br />
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M was absolutely in love with the place. And that was just after looking at mastodons and dinosaurs and trilobites on the first floor (and making edible poop). Then we got to the second floor where they have a great collection of rocks and minerals. Oh, boy!!! I think if M could stay there overnight, he would had. He was all teary-eyed when we had to leave 'cause the place was closing for the day. The next day he kept asking to go back.<br />
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But instead we went to the zoo in Omaha. And we spent pretty much the whole entire day there. I love that zoo. Except I never get to see it when the weather is warm. Seriously, I've been there 3 times - in the winter, in late fall and in early spring. And each time it was cold and miserable. So I haven't seen the entire zoo, not yet anyway. But what I've seen is really terrific. And M seems to agree, mostly.<br />
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The very first place he wanted to see was, of course, the Desert Dome. It's the most visible structure as you drive up to the zoo and it looks so cool too! At first M wanted to see and take pictures of everything there - the cacti, the birds, the "cave paintings", the snakes, the meerkats and so forth. But after about 20 minutes or so he started to get overwhelmed and was ready to move on.<br />
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And so we braved the cold and wet weather and went to see the big cats (tigers were having lunch of what looked like chopped steak), the orangutans, the gorillas and the giraffes. Of all these, M seemed to be most interested in gorillas mostly because they had a baby gorilla who kept trying to annoy the daddy gorilla. Plus in the same structure there were displayed skeletons of various primates for comparison. M spent quite some time in front of them, discussing the difference between human and gorilla skeletons.<br />
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Then we went to the aquarium. And that was pretty much it. Once we got inside, M did not want to leave. He just wanted to look at everything over and over and over. And when he got to the end of the aquarium, he wanted to start the tour all over again. He tried taking pictures, but that was tricky because of the lighting. So he asked me to do it and kept pointing to hundreds of fish and corals and anemones, asking to photograph them all. Apparently he had this idea that once home, we'll print all those pictures, cut out all the fish, etc, glue them to blue paper and we'll have our own aquarium.<br />
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After we took pictures of every fish in the aquarium... twice, we all went to eat at a cafe in the Lied Jungle pavilion. It's definitely the best place to eat at the zoo. The food is actually good and not at all expensive. And you can get a table with a great view of the family of monkeys. That's exactly what we did. It was great, watching Mama Monkey, Papa Monkey and their two kids. Except M got it into his head to act like those baby monkeys for the rest of the day which was funny only for the first 10 minutes or so.<br />
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We then tried going through the Jungle pavilion which is my favorite place at the zoo. Except M was dead-set on going back to the Aquarium. So after just 2 minutes in the jungle he asked мама, ты уже наджунглилась? And after another 5 minutes or so he started the "Are we there (at the exit) yet?". Which turned the whole thing into an exercise in parental restraint. So we turned around and went back to the aquarium... and, of course, to the gift shop.<br />
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On the way back from the zoo I noticed a sign for the Strategic Air and Space Museum. But I kept quiet because it was already around 4pm (and the museum closes at 5pm). Pitty. But maybe next time. Besides, they do not allow kids under 48" tall on their multi-axis trainer rides and M would'd been pretty unhappy. He tried this ride back in NY and loved it. I finally found a video of it.<br />
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And the next day it was time to drive back to NC. Another two-day drive, grrr. This time it was especially long for some reason. Missouri seemed absolutely endless! But then, late in the evening on the second day we finally got home. As Dorothy would've said "There's no place like home!"<br />
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<br />Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7596541368739628586.post-79667455198767734832012-11-10T18:48:00.003-08:002012-11-10T18:48:53.095-08:00Home for Halloween<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Home for Halloween... For a whole year this was my standard response to M's endless questions about when would Chris get back "from the Army". And whadda ya know! He did get home just a few days before the Halloween! (Ok, so it was fairly easy to predict since Chris left last year right before Halloween, but still, things happen and we didn't know the exact date until the very last moment).<br />
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Once we knew the exact date, we had just about enough time to rent a car, get M into his astronaut costume and drive to Greensboro airport. Why astronaut costume, you ask? Well, first M said that since Papa was going to be wearing his Army uniform, it's only fair that M would wear his astronaut uniform as well. Once we got to Greensboro, M saw that some of the families there had Welcome Home signs. So he said "See, Mama, I'm wearing this spacesuit and Papa will see me right away, better than if I had a sign". Which was definitely true.<br />
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So Chris was home in time for going to a pumpkin patch and taking M trick-or-treating on Halloween night (that was something M was REALLY looking forward to for months).<br />
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The pumpkin patch we all went to was new to us and it just might be the best one around here. It has so much stuff - animals, a giant slide, an air pillow (also giant), hay to jump in, hay to slide off of, hay rides, a little castle thingy to run around, a train, and a ton of other things.<br />
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It was a very cold day though and we didn't stay for too long. Just long enough to do the most fun things and to pick pumpkins.<br />
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Chris and M then carved one of the pumpkins before going trick-o-treating. This year M actually helped to scoop the seeds out. You see, last year he absolutely refused to get his hands into the pumpkin or touch the "gobly-goop" inside. But this year he came up with this idea of creating a mitten out of a Ziploc bag.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0LIMjJ4PWmonYpr8D_zo03aRCGePfFQzmQrRvtizde2ZbHzpNMafBW66Mi6JRCSSTrV0vo_1nMc5egq9CCYM6t9a5hdxZzspd0U230Oy3uEfWWq4PIXPljQuXbb6ffbXOPhjKWRDP6k8n/s1600/DSC04029.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0LIMjJ4PWmonYpr8D_zo03aRCGePfFQzmQrRvtizde2ZbHzpNMafBW66Mi6JRCSSTrV0vo_1nMc5egq9CCYM6t9a5hdxZzspd0U230Oy3uEfWWq4PIXPljQuXbb6ffbXOPhjKWRDP6k8n/s320/DSC04029.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
And then, the day after Halloween we left for Nebraska, to see Chris's family. But that's another story.Yelenahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14694419115983802067noreply@blogger.com1