What-What?! Week of October 25th

So, this week's big disaster:

That is the husband's computer and associated electronics and papers strewn over the floor.  My two youngest kids got into a heated argument over cartoon characters, when Oz, who had been sitting at the computer playing video games, decided to beat his opinion into his brother.  Oz became entangled in the cords of the computer, and pulled the whole lot off.  The electronics were not unscathed, but they are entirely functional, so it could have been worse.  No children were hurt.

In other news, Saffron got her early birthday present, a loft bed:

(Husband for scale)

It is very tall, with plenty of space underneath.  In the future, we plan on getting Saffron a desk and a small dresser to put under there.  She's gunning for a giant doll house right now, though.  We'll see if that happens.

On account of this, the both boys are now in the bunk bed:

Corey is very excited, especially considering that we had originally told him that he'd have to wait until he was six to go up top.  Oz is less excited, but he has told us that the real bed is much more comfortable than his toddler bed, so he doesn't dislike it at all.

Yesterday, I took Saffron to a Girl Scout disaster preparedness event put on by the Red Cross and partially (or fully?) funded by Disney.  They mainly discussed earthquake and fire safety, and provided booklets with more information about other emergencies.  The other thing that each girl got was a pillowcase to hold disaster preparedness items, which is emblazoned a list of all the things you should have in there.  The girls were allowed to color them:

Saffron didn't quite get enough time to finish her pillowcase, but I'm pretty sure that I have some markers that will work for it here at home.  If nothing else, I have about a million permanent markers.

Later today, we'll be celebrating Saffron's birthday, which we're really excited about.  She's turning eight, which is both wonderful and slightly terrifying.  Photos from that will be posted next week.

What-What?! Week of May 31st

I finally feel not terrible!  This week has been a long series of nights without enough sleep.  Yesterday evening, I basically couldn't do anything other than stare at the TV, because my head hurt so much.  But I am better today, so that's nice.

Yesterday, I took Saffron to a Girl Scout event, put on by the Society of Women Engineers.  The scouts talked about what engineers do, women inventors in general, and made three different projects.  The first project was a book holder, made out of toothpicks and gumdrops, which had to hold the book above the surface of the table (they were pretending there was a flood).  Saffron's was actually functional, and held up two books.  The next project, the scouts used marshmallows and dried spaghetti pasta to make a stand to test pasta strength; they tested dried spaghetti, linguine, and angel hair pasta (there's a better explanation of this project here -- it's sort of difficult to describe).  Last, the scouts each made a "robot hand", which they used to pick up a plastic cup from a distance (about a yard).  Saffron had a great time doing the projects and hanging out with her fellow scouts, and is quite excited about engineering now.  Next time we hit the library, I'm going to look for some kid's engineering and science books.  We do already have a few, but they're bio/geo science topics.

Oh!  Also yesterday, in the early morning, we saw a rabbit in our backyard!  An actual cottontail rabbit, not a jackrabbit like we'd always see in California.  What's more, it didn't look like someone's released pet, and upon researching more, it's probably either a Snowshoe or an Eastern Cottontail.  Didn't see him (her?) out there this morning, though now I know to look.

(Takes five minute break to get the GIANT SPIDER off the keyboard.  So many spiders. D: )

We had an electrician at our house on Thursday; now the kid's heater works, and the garage outlets are fixed.  So that's nice.

The husband has been working on getting all the nerdy stuff unpacked; roleplaying books, tabletop gaming books, miniatures, novels, history books, all that stuff.  It's mostly been sitting in boxes since we moved to this state, and how we have missed them.  At some point, we'll have to move all that very heavy stuff out again, so I can paint that room, but I don't have a timetable for that yet.

Tomorrow's my birthday, and while I had planned on making myself a birthday cake, this past week has basically blown that away.  The husband got me a cake from Costco instead -- a huge chocolate one. <3

What-What?! Week of May 17th

With all the moving and other things going on, life has recently been more running around putting out fires than anything else.  The husband and I put pictures on the walls a few days ago, so now the place is officially home; we never took our family photos out of the box at the Everett apartment.  That place was never really home (or homey) at all.  We did have my horseshoe out and over the front door this whole time, for good luck.  We need all of that we can get. :P

Yesterday, we hit up the hardware store and picked up more things; a new faucet for the bathroom (my middle child can't operate the current one), patching compound to fix some divots in the wall, and a lawnmower.  I had been looking for a used lawnmower on Craigslist, but had no luck; I did find goats pretty inexpensively, but we really don't need those.  Suppose to pick up a new range hood, but they didn't have what we wanted in store.

At Saffron's Girl Scout meeting this week, she was awarded the Snack Badge, for learning about nutrition, making a snack for herself, and making a snack for her family.  She was also awarded the Discovery Key, which focuses on the scout herself, what makes her special, and how she can help her troop and family.  When I get them ironed on, I'll post a picture of her with them. :)

Later today, we'll be checking out the local library, which I'm excited about.  Going to pick up some books to read, because I need to do something that's not working or being mommy.  I've started watching more episodes of Alton Brown's Good Eats on Netflix, which is good entertainment, and not a bad jumping off point for cooking.  I'm also debating signing up for some classes over at EdX, but those don't start until June.

Was browsing Reddit, and someone mentioned Code.org's One Hour of Code.  Turns out, this is mostly aimed at children, so Friday I sat down with Corwin and did the first 20 exercises of the Disney's Frozen set.  He did need some help with the number of degrees (90 vs 45, etc.) for his character to turn, but otherwise did it by himself.  He got this certificate out of it:

The next day, Saffron sat down and got her own:

They had such a good time that I'm planning on working through some of the other tutorials there.  Even if they aren't interested in programming in the future, the logic and planning skills are really valuable.

What-What?! Week of March 1st

Last week was crazy, while this week was just a grind.  It hit Wednesday, and I was ready for it to be the weekend.

I spent most of my time at work this week reading drivel from sexist, racist, homophobic websites (usually any two, but some had all three!).  It has been a huge reminder of how repugnant people can be.

I have also read many conspiracy theories this week, but thankfully the people who frequent those websites seem to be far less offensive.  Sometimes quite strange, but probably harmless.

I still have it way, way, way better than the people who work as internet content reviewers.

Anyway, on to happier things.

Took my daughter to her second Girl Scouts meeting.  She had an excellent time, though it was a bit disorganized.  This is a new troop, though, and no one has ever been a troop leader before.  So, yeah.  It'll get better, I'm sure.  They learned the pledge, and the law, and some songs.

Yesterday, I took the two big kids to Lowe's to do the Build and Grow project.  For various reasons, we've missed the last two, so it'd been a while.  They both seem to have improved their hammering skills a lot, and did a lot more without help this time.

A Visual History of United States Spacesuits via Imgur

I saw this through Reddit, and it is a fascinating read.  All the facts that I checked seemed to be right on, so it's pretty accurate, too.  It was interesting to see how the boots changed over time; sometimes looking like plain old leather boots (that first one!), sometimes looking suitably astronautical.

There's also some interesting discussion and links on the Reddit thread here, though watch out, as Reddit can be vulgar.

What-What?! Week of February 22nd

This week has been so nuts that I haven't thought about what I'm going to write.  Today's post is going to be a bit short.  Oops.

Yesterday, I took Saffron to a Girls Scouts event to pick up her sash, pins, and books.  It was a kickoff for the summer camps, and had a bunch of different activities.  She roasted her first-ever marshmallow and made s'mores.  She tells me it was delicious.

She also got to 'ride' in a boat, and decorate her own picture frame.  It was a ton of fun.

News:  The Most Popular New Vehicles in Each State via Yahoo Autos

This was pretty entertaining, and about what I expected for Washington state.  When we moved up here, the farther north we got, the more Subarus we saw.  In Washington, you practically trip over them; I've even seen some of the more unusual varieties, like the regular sedans, the Justy, and the Baja.  What makes the numbers for Subaru more interesting is that Subaru doesn't generally have anyone buying the brand for commercial fleets, so nearly all those new cars sold are to consumers.  I'm part of the Subaru forum on Reddit, and have read about the waitlists for the new models.  Also, many owners live places where there is snow; the article mentions that, in many of the states where a truck was ranked highest, the highest ranking car was a Subaru.

What-What?! Week of February 15th

Happy day after Valentine's Day everyone! :P

The husband and I had a lovely steak dinner at home (first time we've bought beef in months).

Wednesday, Saffron had her first Girl Scouts meeting.  It's a new troop that the leader is forming because the waitlist for a troop was outrageous -- 38 people in Northern Everett alone, not counting any of us in the South end.  Saffron seemed to have fun, and the other adults seem nice enough.  I'm not 100 percent sold on Girl Scouts.  The curriculum activities seem very structured, and the program divides the girls into age groups that don't seem to interact with each other much.  But I've committed myself to sticking it out for a year, unless of course Saffron isn't enjoying it, or something decisively awful happens.

In other news, today is Flag Day in Canada, a holiday declared when they last chose a new flag in 1964.  The National Post has a great article about the process, and the various options that were mailed in.  Some are pretty good, while others are just terrible.  It's an interesting read for sure.

Book Review:  Scoundrels: Star Wars by Timothy Zahn

This story follows Han Solo through an Ocean's 11-type heist adventure.  Rated at 4.3 stars, this book has great reviews on Amazon.  But... I don't know.  There's nothing wrong with this book; the characters are lively and interact well, it's well integrated into the Star Wars universe, and the plot is good.  I didn't dislike it, not at all.  But I was expecting the book to be a Han Solo and Chewbacca show, with Lando thrown in for good measure -- it wasn't.  I was expecting this to be a fast paced romp, like many other Zahn books -- it wasn't.  With those two reservations put aside, it was quite enjoyable.  Like I said, the plot is good, though the pacing is sometimes slow.  The ensemble cast is filled with interesting, nuanced characters, who have believable interactions.  The antagonists are intimidating and powerful.  There is a twist at the end that would have been better either left out or integrated better with some of the other behind-the-scenes events.  I was disappointed that there wasn't more done with certain characters.  I do think this is a 4-star book, but not quite to my taste.

Oh!  My middle son has started getting into Star Wars, and was very interested in this book.  At one point, he begged me to read it to him.  He sat on my bed with me and listened to me read for a good 45 minutes.  This is a kid who can't sit still for a 20 minute TV show.  I was impressed.  I read it to him a few more times, too, which makes me think that I need to find some more Star Wars books to read. :P

What-What?! Week of February 1st

This week has been good, but busy; Peter worked a bunch of overtime, plus had to drive up to Seattle yesterday, so he's spent a good deal of time not home.  I was contacted by the local Girl Scouts coordinator, and now Saffron and I are RSVP'd for the first troop meeting later this month.  I'm excited to start getting Saffron involved in some real activities; I know that the time I spent in 4-H had a lot to do with my interests and competencies growing up.

News: How Regulation Leads To Low Literacy Among Teachers, Then Students via Forbes

I kind of hate citing Forbes, as I find that the articles tend to be written from a perspective that's a bit sideways of reality, but sometimes there are still good points.  This author is discussing the fact that teachers (K-12) who graduate from conventional education programs tend to score low on literacy and English tests.  I've taken some education classes, and to be honest, this surprises me little.  It has been my experience that education teachers tend to coddle students by giving them extended deadlines (even after they've been extended already!), subjective rather than objective projects, and very lenient grading.  My business school education was quite different. (Though not all education and business schools are the same).

Further, one of the issues I keep wondering about teaching and the teaching credential programs is whether it gives people too few options.  If teachers instead had a bachelor's degree in something else, then the option of leaving teaching if it doesn't suit them becomes much easier.  Granted, this country already has huge problems with teachers leaving the profession, but I think that making it more difficult to leave the profession is just poor policy.  While I don't object to teacher credentialing, I wonder if it's too strict in some ways; one thing that I like about California is that, in order to become a substitute teacher, you only need to pass a test, get fingerprinted, and background checked.  Washington state requires a full teaching degree and credential in order to substitute teach.  With all my experience in teaching in afterschool programs, I've been interested in teaching as a profession.  However, now that we're living in Washington, I have given up on it; the expense and time to get a full teaching credential is prohibitive to someone interested in testing the waters.    Why would I go to school for two years and spend all that money for a credential that is only good for doing one thing, especially one thing I'm not sold on, that also tends to be stressful and low paying?  How many other people, who may be good teachers, get shut out because of the credentialing process?

Shopping: Shoes of Prey

Shoes of Prey is a company that makes custom shoes.  Their online interface for designing shoes is really fun to play with, even if you don't actually go through with buying the shoes.  I ran into this company through work, and then spent a bunch of time designing shoes.  I haven't bought any, because they are expensive... but maybe someday.