Astronomy Postscript

I forgot I had bought these glow in the dark stars/planets for the kids at the dollar store last December. I finally gave them to the kids after our planets unit. They're on the ceiling above the kids' beds.

And I'm really sad that I missed it, but last Friday Jupiter, Venus, and a waxing crescent moon were all in alignment. Mercury can also be seen closer to the horizon but I couldn't see if from where I was. And if I had had a good telescope I might have been able to see Uranus too, which kind of blows my mind. Mars is up in the sky right now to the east. Actually, I'm going outside right now to see if I can find it.

Well, I can just see too many stars from where I live so it's kind of hard to tell which one is a planet. And even when I look on a map it looks kind of difficult to find and it's really cold outside. I don't really want to go back.

Anyway, here are my photos of the planets almost in alignment. Awesome. (One of the perks of homeschooling is I get to attend the classes too and I feel like I am learning so many awesome things.) Jupiter is the planet to the left of the moon just a bit, and Venus is farther down in the photo.

The kids (and even Derek) came out to look at the planets with me too. They thought is was really cool. But Abigail kept asking when we were going to see "satren." I think we'll be able to see it in August, but I'll have to look that up. I've seen Saturn before and have even seen the rings, but that was through a pretty good telescope and you have to get it on the right year, so I'll have to find out what we can get this year, if anything.

Below is a photo I took just a few seconds ago - when I decided not to find Mars. If I had a better camera you would be able to see the "earth shadow" which is when you can see the bright crescent of the moon, but also the rest of the outline of the moon quite a bit dimmer. The bright light is obviously light coming from the sun reflecting to us, but the dim light is light from the sun reflecting off the earth and onto the moon and back to us. Kind of neat, I think. In this photo, however, all you get is blur.

Just in case you are interested, if you live in the western US there will be a solar eclipse coming May 20th. You need to get special eclipse glasses if you want to see it but not fry your eyes at the same time. Info is here for Utahns but you might be able to find info specific to your location via google. Sounds interesting.

Happy Star Gazing!

I can't help myself anymore

I've taken about 4 times more photos this month than last and I think they are so cute that I can't help posting a few more. Here are a few from this evening.

Fun photos

I thought this was funny.

 Doritoes everywhere.

 (DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING UNTIL WE GET HOME!!)

 Chocolate for breakfast.

 The kids like to put jam, ketchup, mustard, nutella, etc., on their finger and either scream out "I'm bleeding!" or "I'm on fire!"

 Ok, this is so funny! Joshua said to me the other day, "Look mom, when I was younger, I couldn't do this, but now that I'm older I can." So this is was he can do.

 You see, because when he was younger, he could only do this. I'm so proud of my growing boy developing his many talents. ha ha.

Snow Day

My in-laws are out of town... so we went up to their house.  We were invited, so it's ok.

We drove up Sunday right after church. Monday we went shopping at the outlets. Tuesday we just played around a bit in the snow - before it all melted. And Wednesday we (I) cleaned everything up and we got home in time for cub scouts. Yes, I am so dedicated to my calling like that. Those cubs better appreciate me. (But they're 9 years old. They don't. I'm ok with that.)

Here are some of our snow pictures.

 On our way to the backyard we found this little injured bird. I poked him (gently) a little with a stick to see if he was very badly injured, but he wasn't interested in moving much. We left him alone to rest a little bit and said we'd check back on him later.

 Then we walked down this muddy hill. This was a bad idea. Our boots still have mud on them. And so did all our footprints in the snow after that. yuck.

 At about this point we started hearing a bunch of magpie's going crazy on the other side of the house. Joshua looked at me and suggested we go check on the injured bird.

 But first I took this quick picture.

 And this was all that was left of that pretty little hurt bird. I think the Magpie's ate him!!! I didn't know magpie's ate other birds.

 The kids got over it.

Party Time!

I'm not sure how long this will last, but with Abigail and Lukas having their birthdays within a week of each other, we're just clumping them together and celebrating on one day. One cake, one carton of ice cream, one mess. Since we figured Lukas didn't care about celebrating his birthday 6 days late, we planned today for the big day.

Today is Abigail's birthday. She turned three. It is still amazing to me that she is 3 years old. Anyway, I wont get all sappy. Here are the photos of our birthday celebration this evening.

 Curios George is going to be one of those favorite stuffed animals that kids cling to every night in bed until they are 10 or the stuffed animal finally wears out from too much hugging and loving. Lukas likes to hold George, look him in the eye, and giggle.

 The best thing about having your baby brother turn one is YOU get to open all their presents... and then play with them without getting in trouble.

 The one Ring of Power!!!

 It felt like Christmas... except Joshua didn't get any presents. He was pretty happy, though,to just play in all the wrapping paper debris.

 Of course a pink cake with pink frosting was requested.

Warning: All of the rest of the photos are of Lukas eating his cake. I know that I think this is adorable. But I'm not offended if you stop reading now. 

PS. If you like birthday cake from a box and frosting from a tub (both with a generous dose of food coloring mixed in) please, please, please come over and eat it for us. PLEASE. You don't even have to choose from either the pink cake or the blue cake. I'll give you both.