Frozen

Frozen bubble

One of our yearly “to do’s” when the weather is around freezing is to try to blow bubbles outside. This morning, we succeeded on our mission!

Bubble Shadow
Bubble Shadow

When we tried earlier this week, it was too cold and the bubbles never frosted very well. But it is neat to watch how the weather affects how bubbles behave.

It becomes more  fun when we imagine what people think as they drive by and watch a bunch of children outside blowing bubbles first thing in the morning in 0 degree or lower weather.  We decided they all drive by and think “they  must be home schoolers!”

Burst Bubble
Broken Bubble

 

 

Experimenting

BlurryI have been checking out many photography books from the library. The other day, I discovered a brand new one to read. I have only had time to browse through it, but found many suggestions that I would like to try.  I hope to have lots of time to experiment in the next few weeks.

This is one idea that takes me way out of my comfort zone; tell a story with an out of focus picture.  This one will never be a favorite picture, but I like how it turned out.

Old Acquaintance

I met an old acquaintance at the mall yesterday.  The parks department is hosting different programs to go along with the Photography Show this week. The program yesterday was about reptiles and amphibians.  The kids and I got reacquainted with Snuffy, the Corn Snake. I think this was the first time that Allan has met him.

I really don’t like snakes, and holding them is not my favorite thing to do. But when the kids were little, they did not want to hold them either.  I dared them to hold a baby Rat Snake  that a friend had. Well, they dared me back, and I ended up holding the Rat Snake too. Mark discovered that he likes snakes a lot!

I learned a very important Mommy lesson. Don’t dare the kids to do something I don’t want to do 🙂  I ended up holding a salamander once because of a dare too, but the photo proof of that is lost somewhere.

Everyone enjoyed playing with Snuffy yesterday except for Andrea and Megan.  Megan kept far away from Snuffy, and Andrea was keeping an eye on Megan. When we got home, she said she sort of wishes she could have held him too.

I still don’t want a pet snake, but Snuffy is okay once in awhile.

 

Puzzle Contest

Megan's puzzleTonight’s entertainment was a puzzle contest.  Each contestant chose a 100 piece puzzle and then raced to see who could finish first.  Megan had a slight handicapped and worked on her 9 piece farm puzzle.  Allan and I worked together, attempting a 300 piece puzzle.

Unfortunately, we forgot to time how long it took to finish the puzzles.  But all six puzzles were completed in less than two hours.  The winner–anyone who completed their puzzle–won a chocolate kiss.Allan's puzzlePuzzles

Hint of snow

On our drive to Canada, it started to snow. When we got up Saturday morning, we enjoyed a hint of snow on everything.

Megan did not remember the snow from last year and especially enjoyed learning about it. She did not enjoy how slippery it could be though.  We played outside until her nose and cheeks were a pretty pink, then we went inside to enjoy the warmth of the fire.

Braai

This evening we had a mini vacation in our back yard. We grilled steaks, corn on the cob and had Roosterkoek (braai bread). We opened up some pickles we canned and a bag of chips. We then enjoyed a lazy dinner.

The kids enjoyed playing outside. Adrian helped Allan with the fire. Megan sat and watched. The older kids got everything ready, and then practiced hitting a target with their “throwing knives”.

We would have made some s’mores, but the mosquitoes decided that we made a good dinner too. So we ended up in the house, eating ice cream sandwiches. Everyone enjoyed Daddy reading the last chapter of The Magician’s Nephew.

I hope that your evening was as relaxing as ours!