Posted Jun 7, 2011, 12:55 pm
~Einstein Pig
Posted Jun 18, 2011, 6:55 pm
Posted Jun 21, 2011, 3:28 am
We went to the P.J. Hoffmaster State Park in Muskegon, Michigan. It has amazing sand dunes that are very complex! We visited the Nature Center to learn as much as we could.
The view out of the back windows, facing the dunes, was quite interesting! With me are [Cilly, Vanilla, and Riin and Eri. This is a bird feeding station. There was an informative sign that helped us to identify the visitors. I learned the difference between a gray and red squirrel and saw a number of frogs.
This is a greatly enlarged model of a typical quartz sand grain found on the beach.
I am reading about dune research.
This is a microscope showing sand grains. It was hard for someone my size to get a good view though.
This is a map of locations of dune complexes in the Great Lakes Region. I found were we are!
There were several dioramas depicting dune wildlife in teh different zones. Did you know that there are four distinct zones in a dune system?
AHH! I am very happy to learn that this is not actual size! It is an Ant Lion, a common insect on the beaches. They are much smaller than me in reality.
In another room we learned more about the wildlife. These are displayed birds that were preserved for learning and research.
I inspected this Cooper's Hawk specimen up close.
This is an Eastern Garter Snake. He has been living here for many years, Mel remembers him from when she worked here in her college days.
I also saw some local Bluegill fish in a tank. They did not have much to say.
The gift shop had many books to teach us more! I wanted to get one of each but Mel bought me a few postcards instead, because they were cheaper.
We then went for a short walk int the dunes themselves. There we say more squirrels and a chipmunk and several birds.
We did not go far today, Mel says perhaps later we will take one of the longer, less traveled trails. I think I would like that.
We did read more about the dune in front of us, named Mt Baldy.
Then Mel collected us to leave, but Googly Eyes decided to stay. He was determined to travel on his own, and he chose this spot to wait for his next host, despite Mel urging him to come with her. I wish him luck.
I am settling in well, Mel had promised me a browse through some of her geology textbooks while I wait for our next adventure. I miss you and my siblings but I will continue to write!
Posted Jul 5, 2011, 2:45 am
We only went downtown with the tourists to take her nephew Tyler some dinner, and there ere SO many people in town for the fireworks. Mel's migraine and lack of love for tourists have us staying home to watch from here, though. We don't mind much, we found more fun way to celebrate! It started when Mel realized we had two Brits, and two Americans visiting, and a German too... She couldn't resist....
We toyvoyagers present to you all the story of the American Revolution (as Mel remembers it from school)!!!
At first, the people in what would be America were mostly British and fine with that.
But over time, the distance and other problems made the colonists more and more upset with the British ruling them, and the Army had to keep order more and more often.
Finally the colonist just felt SO misunderstood and put-upon that they decided they could take care of their own people better, and they told Britain to go away and leave them alone! This happened around the Fourth of July, which is why that day was picked for the holiday.
Well, the British king didn't like that at all, so he sent more Army over to keep the noisy colonists in line and protect the loyal ones, and to protect his interests there. So there were two sides, and the advantages went back and forth a bit.
The British were spending a lot to fight that far from home, and the war didn't end nearly as quickly and neatly as they'd hoped, so they called in backups - Mercenaries from Germany, the Hessians!
The British sent the Hessians after the rebel Americans, and things looked pretty bad for the colonist's independence plans!
But luckily America could pull in some back-up too, they sent men over to Europe to convince England's old foe the French to come in on their side! (I enjoyed playing Franklin very much)
So the French and the Americans turned and won back some momentum against the English and Germans.
There was still a lot of fighting and hardships on both sides and many soldiers lost, but finally the British started to lose steam, as the money and distance made things harder and harder.
In the end the English king was forced to leave the rebels to themselves, at least for a while. Most of the armies that were left were called home or sent to Canada.
And the leaders of the United States were free to make their own government, for better or worse. And they did, and today is the day they celebrate taking that stand against the king (by not working, waving flags, having picnics, and being far too loud.)
(The French mostly went home, but a lot of the Hessians stayed, and we don't blame them.)
The End! Starring:
The English Troops! Quentin Ducky & Alex_Lion from the UK!
The American Troops! Vanilla & Einstein Pig from the USA!
The Hessian! Cilly from Germany!
The French! Uhh... they don't have names yet, they are Buzz's evil cousins or something. But we needed more toys.
From Mel's room!
It is getting dark, so we will probably go out on the porch soon and see the big fireworks! Happy 4th everyone, however you celebrate it!
Posted Jul 15, 2011, 9:06 pm
I'm not sure if you can see it in this photo of not. It is above the man in the blue hat. This was my first trip to the beach though, so I was enjoying looking around.
We sat on the beach enjoying the sunset while everyone else went swimming.
When they were done and drying off, we got to play with Madison for a little while! Look at all of those seagulls in the background! Some kids were having fun running at them and making them all fly.
Posted Aug 1, 2011, 7:01 pm
On Sunday, we took Mel's niece Madison and her cousin Krista down to Battle Creek (where all of the breakfast cereal comes from, we saw the factories for Kellogg and Post cereals on our drive!) for the Silver Leaf Renn Faire! Madison had gone before, but it the first trip for Krista and for us!
Quentin Ducky and Alex_Lion posed with the girls and these funny performers from a magic show! Then we went to see a funny Pirate show. They did some tricks too!
Then we posed with what we THOUGHT was a brave knight, but it was just some armor! The knight must have decided it was too hot and left it there! Do you see me on the knight's arm?
Then we danced to a Celtic group, The Rogues! They were very good, but we got tired long before the girls did!
All the way home we all played while Mel drove. It was a fun fun day!
Posted Aug 6, 2011, 10:17 pm
We picked Tyler up, had a good dinner, and a good night's sleep. The next day was the museum, which was more to my liking than the skate park, for sure!
We started with a t-rex!
I climbed up, though everyone else was too afraid. I know how fossils work, though. I knew I was in no danger.
There was a whole hall full of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals!
This is a model of a mastadon that was found right near where we were standing!
We all settled in to watch a show in the planetarium about the wonders of the world. I made sure I got a good seat! I learned also about some of the wonders of the universe. There ere many interesting photos f globular clusters, nebulae, and galaxies. Even a black hole!
Later after the show we watched this big globe go around and and talked about all of the placed we'd been and were all we wanted to still go. I said "Everywhere!"
In another part of the museum, we learned about the native cultures of North America.
I think they were very talented artists, I learned a lot!
Here I am learning about how water molecules link together when they freeze. It explains to me why ice is a hexagonal crystal. Did you know that ice is technically a mineral? Because it is non-organic and has a crystal structure?
Posted Aug 14, 2011, 10:29 pm
Saturday the highlight was the kids parade and costume contest! Mel and Madison were in it. Weren't the kids all so cute? Mel took second place for adults - I will tell you a secret though, there were only three ladies competing.
We sat and watched some shows! These ladies danced with fire!
I would never do that!
There were pirates and amazing costumes everywhere!
Mel chatted with friends and shopped, she bought Raven a new eye patch since he lost his Saturday, and some yummy scurvy-fighting rootbeer! These belly dancers were performing as we left. They were very pretty!
The festival was hosted by the local library. The library was a nice place to rest after the fun of the festival, while the kids were looking for books.
Mel says summer is almost over here in Michigan, but there is still plenty of fun things for us to do. Yippee!
Posted Aug 29, 2011, 5:11 pm
We wandered through some shops which had historical costume supplies and other interesting things. The girls were looking at hoop skirts and hats, but us boys thought that the uniforms and weapons were more interesting!
The big event of the day was a reenactment of the Battle of Bethel Church which happened in Virginia in June of 1861.
The Union troops lined up right in front of us!
Then they marched over the hill to attack the southern troops. There were canons also, that were really loud.
We missed a lot of the battle because it happened over that hill, but all of the good seats were taken.
The Union troops were attacking a fortified Rebel position with half as many men.
Despite having the advantage of numbers, the Union ended up having to retreat, mostly because of confusion between units, it seems. At one point in the real battle, some of the Union troops were shooting at each other!
Here the Union is trying to regroup for one last charge, but it didn't succeed and they retreated all the way back to the city. The Rebels only lost one soldier in the fight.
On the way out, Mel walked over to another part of the park to see if the big fountain was running, for BineHH, but it wasn't.
But we did find a 9-11 memorial with an actual part of one of the World Trade Center buildings. We decided it would be a good place for group shot!
Posted Sep 13, 2011, 2:22 am
