High Maintenance Mom

Now that B is three, we've started to go to a larger number of museums and parks. Previously, we went to the zoo. Now we've added children's museums, natural history museums, and science museums. The membership pays for itself if you go to the museum/park several times a year and I find not having to wait in the ticket line to be well worth it. Because we have enjoyed our local memberships, I looked into the pricing for memberships at the San Diego Zoo and Animal Park prior to our trip. It turned out that the membership was cost effective for our visit with my inlaws and everyone was happy to avoid the lines...

We've been wondering when the next Backyardigans episode is scheduled to air and just found out that four new (to those of us without Noggin) episodes will be shown next week. Tuesday's episode is "Eureka", the dinosaur one I've been waiting for ever since I read the episode guide. The Backyardigans CD includes "Those Bones" from "Eureka" and it sounds like the dinosaur they are putting together is a Bactrosaurus (one of the earliest known duck-billed hadrosaurs - more on dinosaurs after the episode airs). The CD also includes the song "Castaways", from Monday's episode, "Castaways". Wednesday's episode is "Polka Palace Party" and Thursday's episode is "Cave Party"...

The USGS Earthquake Hazards Program has published a new handbook called Putting Down Roots In Earthquake Country—Your Handbook for the San Francisco Bay Region. The information is applicable to many other situations so it's not just for people who live in areas that are prone to earthquakes. See the associated links as well.

Today B and I went to the library to turn in our summer reading sheets. I had to run back into the house to grab my library card and somehow in the chaos of getting out the door, missed the reading logs. Luckily, our local library let me fill in new sheets and we all received our books...

The Perseid meteor shower, possibly the best display of meteors or shooting stars, will peak on the morning of Aug. 12th. At its peak and away from the lights of the city, you can often see 50 to 100 bright meteors per hour. Which means that with patience you will most likely still be able to see a few from your home. Of course, if you want to go camping away from city lights, you will see many more...

We watched Super Size Me the other night and I highly recommend it. For anyone who hasn't heard of it, you get to watch Morgan's health deteriorate as he eats only McDonalds for 30 days...

Thirty-six years ago today (July 20th, 1969) at 10:56 PM EDT, Neil Armstrong stepped from the Eagle lunar landing module onto the Moon's surface and said, “That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind.” He was followed shortly thereafter by Buzz Aldrin; Michael Collins remained in the Command Module...

We watched The Backyardigans "Race to the Tower of Power" this evening where Yucky Man Pablo and Dr. Shrinky Tyrone raced to steal the key to the world from superheroes Weather Woman Uniqua and Captain Hammer Austin. It was one of our first superhero themed shows with B (3 yrs old). He was scared for part of it but immediately wanted to see it again and talk about it. We are just starting to discover superhero play so I was interested to see how the theme was handled in our favorite show...

On July 4, 2005 (EDT), NASA's Deep Impact mission successfully collided the first man-made spacecraft into a comet, revealing some of the secrets of its interior. The collision jettisoned materials from the comet into space for analysis and generated an immense flash of light...

I attended the GeoKids workshop last night on Language and Literacy. The workshop covered language development and writing; the beginning reading part was skipped because we ran out of time. I would summarize the language development piece with the statement that it's important to engage our children. For example, a child points saying, "nah nah nah" and we respond by labeling the things the child might be looking at, even if it's the fifth time that day. I would summarize the writing piece with a paraphrase of Stacey's Literacy Manifesto -- through many experiences in play and in living we need to convey to children that literacy is powerful. Once they realize the power, they will have a reason to learn to read and write...