"At Last I See The Light"

One night I made dinner of tamale casserole and easiest Spanish rice, both from A Season of Family Meal Plans, volume 4. That's right. I have been using these books all year and I have reached the last volume with the Fall recipes. Woohoo. I'm sure Jordan Page would be pleased.

Anyway... first of all I forgot I made homemade bread to go with this until after I took the picture and had been eating for a while.

Second of all, I had this conversation with Jr. Jr.-

Jr. Jr.: Why do you have pickles?

Me: I don't know. I thought it would round out the food.

Jr. Jr.: I figured out why you have pickles. Because they are dill-icious.

Mom: Heh heh.

That night I went to a Relief Society activity where I got to make a cute Fall wreath and eat yummy Fall snacks and socialize. I do like to socialize.

When I got home, we headed right out to look for the Northern Lights again, this time with a little better success. They were there where we were at Jordanelle Reservoir overlook this time. It was cloudy, though.

When we first got there and found a parking spot among all the other vehicles who were there for the same purpose (lots of people had been seeing them that night already), we didn't see anything. Jeremy was getting tired and did have work the next morning so we sat in the van and he said, "Let's wait 15 more minutes then I'll check one more time and we'll head home." When our 15 minutes were up, Jeremy got out and looked around and saw there was a change happening in the sky. It was still cloudy but there was definitely something different. Certain parts of the sky were a very definite red that could even be seen with the naked eye.

We got some bad pictures because I don't know how to do really good settings on my phone camera or on our birding camera. But we saw them. Hooray! I would love to get better pictures sometime.

Annular Solar Eclipse

The morning after "Creatures of the Night," we got up really early and drove down to Fillmore. The reason? Another solar eclipse.

The last one we went to in 2017, we drove to Idaho (that was a long day) because it was a total solar eclipse and we wanted to be able to take off our eclipse glasses during the time of totality. That was an amazing experience.

This time, it was an annular eclipse, which meant in the path of totality there would be a "ring of fire." We weren't able to take our eclipse glasses off at all this time while looking at the sun but it sure looked cool through them. We got to experience a similar eclipse with friends back in 2012.

Because this eclipse was also a big deal, numerous places were planning on having eclipse viewing parties. We were able to get a couple eclipse glasses at events in September at the Orem Library then Jeremy bought us a few more for not too much.

Orem wouldn't have the "ring of fire" so that's why we headed down to Fillmore. Jeremy's done balloons at Fillmore Library a number of times so he got a hold of his contact down there to find out that they were having an eclipse event there for the public (and where it was because it wasn't in the main library building) and we were absolutely invited. Such nice people.

So as I said, we drove down to Fillmore early to miss traffic (not as early as when we went to Idaho) and to make sure we got parking, then napped until it was time for the fun to start.

The library had some great activities. We made beaded bracelets that glow in the dark and change color in the sun. 

We used stencils and a black light to create images on paper.

We made an annular eclipse simulator that showed the path of the moon over the sun to create the ring of fire.

Lucky popped a balloon using a magnifying glass.

There was an inflatable planetarium we went in to see constellations and planets.

Outside, there was a telescope set up with a special filter to look at the sun. Lucky was the 200th person to look through the telescope.

The eclipse was of course awesome and a great family activity. Outside we were again in a park with many people like the last big eclipse. There was music playing, people getting excited when it was getting darker (not as dark as a total eclipse obviously, but enough to be noticeable), and when the ring of fire part of the eclipse happened, whoever was in charge of the music put on "Ring of Fire" by Johnny Cash. I loved that.

Lucky managed to get pictures with his little camera and eclipse glasses. Way to go, son.

We had fun looking at the shadow crescents made from the light shining through the tree branches when the sun had moved again.

We had lunch in the van before heading back toward home. The traffic wasn't too bad heading back. It got busy at some places but some places were pretty clear. It was definitely easier than our Idaho eclipse trip. 

On the way, we ate Oreos, and I made a "ring of fire" out of mine. Ha Ha Ha. I am so cute.

We got home in the afternoon, not the night. Yay.

For dinner that night we had breakfast burritos because October 14 is Breakfast Burrito Day in Denver. How random can we be finding reasons to celebrate?

It was a great day and well worth the effort.

Orem Library Told Us To!

In the children's section of the Orem Library, there are calendars with daily activities you can do with your youngsters, from reading to crafts to games to all sorts of fun learning experiences.

Since July 5 was Graham Cracker Day, we followed the suggestion for making edible rainbows. They were fun to make and fun to eat.

Jr. Jr.'s Birthday

We got to celebrate Jr. Jr.'s birthday in October. He is now old enough to join in some of the big kid activities at the libraries so he has already done a couple at the Provo Library. One was Teen Minecraft Club. The other was Teen Takeover: Choose Your Own Adventure. The three oldest kids went to that and got to do different activities based on different book genres. They came home with ideas of new books to try. Love those libraries.

While celebrating Jr. Jr.'s birthday, Jet got excited about the candles on the cake. He knew what was supposed to be done to them so he kept blowing them out while I was still lighting them. Finally we got them all lit and he managed to blow out a line of them since I placed them in the shape of a 1 and 2. Jr. Jr. thought that was hilarious since the 2 was the only thing still lit. "Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha! Now I'm only 2." We finally managed to get them all to the point Jr. Jr. could blow them out himself.

And in true shelf cooking fashion (i.e. learning to substitute), since we couldn't find moose tracks ice cream, we took chocolate ice cream and added mini peanut butter cups to it.

And of course he got to pick his birthday dinner. At first he wanted both garlic bread and soft pretzels but once he decided he wanted sloppy joes, Dad suggested making the pretzels into pretzel buns to put the sloppy joe filling in. He was fine with that idea.

Happy Birthday, Jr. Jr.

Summer Reading Finishes

More Summer library activities with both Orem Library and Provo Library.

We did the escape room at the Orem Library. 

 

We did activities at the library.

 

We did crafts from both libraries. 

 

We played board games. 

Jeremy created a new piece of art- Bob Ross out of ramen noodles.

We did more Provo Story Trails.

"Dotson'Sa, the Great Raven, Makes the World" at Paul Ream Wilderness Park.

 

"Crocodile's Treason" at "Lakeview Park.

We picked up prizes from both libraries. 

We went to Stories in the Park.

Jr. won a ticket drawing prize from Orem Library, a Harry Potter decorative quidditch set. See my post about Southern Utah for why I don't have a picture to show of that.

National Brownie Day 2021

Jr. asked what to have for after school snack. I told him to make brownies. December 8 was National Brownie Day. A little while later he came to me and said, "I think I may have put too much flour in the brownies. What do I do?" I told him I'd come look. By the time I got out there, he said he'd added a little more milk and that helped. I mentioned that besides being National Brownie Day, it was also Pretend to Be a Time Traveler Day. Jr. said, "I wish I could travel back in time to fix the brownies." 

The brownies turned out fine and Jr. Jr. and Lucky took some to an activity they had that evening. 

And brought back even more treats.

Light the World, "Full Attention," that day encouraged us to really listen and give attention to those talking to us. After a rough start in the morning, and some apologizing and forgiving, we had some pretty good talks later. I really put effort into that for my kids that day. Lucky came up to me at one point while I was trying to get something out of the freezer and said, "Mom, talk to me. I need to look in your eyes while you're talking." It was hard to get what I was looking for in the freezer when Lucky wanted to look in my eyes and I didn't have something I needed to say right then. It was funny but hey, he was trying. He's so cute.

Summer Reading

We completed Summer Reading Programs for Orem and Provo Libraries. Yay, us!

There was plenty more reading.

We went to more Stories in the Park.

We had more picnics.

We went on more walks.

Apparently Jet decided to go trick-or-treating on one of our walks.

We went to more Provo Story Trails. 

"How the Brazilian Beetles Got Their Gorgeous Coats" at Spring Creek Park.

"The Three Billy Goats Gruff" at Paul Ream Wilderness Park. That is the same place we acted out that story last year so we thought it was fun that the Provo Library put that story there this year. Of course we had to act it out again after reading it.

"The Golden Crab" on a sunny day at Lakeview Park.

Lamington Day is an Australian holiday. We happened to go read a story adapted from an Australian tale at Carterville Park on Lamington Day, July 21. "How the Kangaroo Got Her Pouch." Ha Ha Ha. We also heard the song, "I Come From a Land Down Under," on the radio while we were driving to that park. Ha Ha.

One evening we drew portraits with everyone starting with a head shape then passing the paper to the next person who drew the eyes then the next person who drew the nose, etc. etc. It was so fun to see how different they all turned out. It was a fun family activity and we got credit for Summer Reading. The library reading programs really do have great ideas for activities to do as a family.

We did some activities at both libraries including the Fairy Tale Escape Room at Orem Library

and getting pictures with the Provo Library.

We went to the "Knight Night" Summer Reading Finale at Orem Library. They had members of the Salt Lake City Crusaders talking about armor and doing fighting demonstrations. People were able to ask questions as well. Nichole has been into drawing armor lately so she made sure to bring paper to sketch. And when they talked about different parts of the armor, she knew what they were talking about.

We picked up prizes for Provo's Summer Reading Program as well.

Another successful Summer of reading.