'Tis The Season

All the leaves are down.
And...

...it's beginning to look

and feel

a lot like Christmas.

Splendid

I don't know how my parents always escape the camera's lens,
but they were here for Thanksgiving.

I haven't had Thanksgiving with my parents for 14 years.

The food, company, and activities were...

...I'm trying to think of the right word...
wonderful?

No, splendid!

Thanksgiving 2011

In The Name of Science

Around these parts we sure love a good treat.
We've had a lot lately.
But I justify it because we are "learning"
Take for example the ice cream we made with dry ice.

Now for you Westerners, dry ice ice cream doesn't sound like a big deal.
But if you live in Massachusetts where the government protects you from everything, dry ice ice cream is like whiskey during the prohibition era.
Ok, dry ice isn't illegal, but it is really hard to find.
So, thanks to Jackie, we had carbonated ice cream (and it had the same effect soda does on us...and maybe we had a small burping contest, maybe).
Jackie also introduced them into the world of dry ice bombs.
Maybe Massachusetts should protect us from Jackie.

And this little chemosynthesis experiment took a while, but we got some good sugar crystals growing.

I think we are due for some chocolate experiments next.
Dark chocolate!

"You've Got a Friend in Me"

The Perfect Day Recipe

5 little munchkins
5 curious minds
1 trampoline
5 bikes
1 big pile of leaves
1 make-shift log see saw
The smell of leaves
One good Mom friend

Instructions

Mix it all together and enjoy!

Freezing Friday

+

=

My mad scientist friend Jackie pulled off another amazing Friday.
She brought in liquid nitrogen.
We froze and smashed roses, grapes, and an egg on my kitchen floor (the yolk in the egg was not quite frozen all the way).

But the most important thing we did with the liquid nitrogen was make...

Ice Cream!
You know, like the "Dippin' Dots" kind.

I love Fridays!

Things That Make Me LOL

Hibernation

The other day I taught the kids about winter.
I highlighted "hibernation".
I hid craisins all over the house and had them find them and feast.

As they feasted, I stuffed pillows and blankets up their shirts.
Making them nice and fat.

Check out this fat and happy bear.
Then I had them crawl into the bear cave (under the table) and sleep.
I took out the pillows and blankets, and wala...now they know about hibernating.

Work In Progress

Shhhhhh...we are making brain wrinkles over here.

Snowtober

We lost power during the last Nor'easter.

A tree branch broke off and took our electric main down with it.
Two days later, we were up and running again.

We decided we didn't want that to happen again.
So we are cutting that tree down and chopping it up for firewood.
I suggested we name the tree.
I thought we should name it

"Maher Shalal Hash Baz"

Quite fitting considering it's future.

Christian wanted to name it

*#$%@ $#$%@# *^%$#$%

Happy Halloween