Maker Faire 2011

We visited the Maker Faire again last weekend. This is our third year attending and we have yet to repeat any activity. There were the usual mechanical contraptions: this is a giraffe named Russell that 'talks' in response to touch.



There were lots of hands-on activities: this year the boys both had a go at turning wood on a lathe:



Fin also made himself a catapult at the Society for Creative Anacronism while Adam tried on armour.

We also got to design some metal pieces (although we didn't get to use the oxy-acetelene torch ourselves). We watched a whiskey barrel velodrome; and the Eepybird coke-and-mentos fountain.

There were both static and interactive sculpture:

I loved this dragon peeping out from a fence.



This sculpture played 'noises' based on either a kinetic hand-on component or when connected to this electric guitar -


Adam was playing "Smoke on the Water".

We had a super day - yet again I didn't visit any of the fiber arts, in fact we didn't go inside all day. We also didn't bump into any of the friends who also attended the same day. The boys are already looking forward to next year.

Mothers Day

We spent Mothers day morning in Santa Cruz at the Marine Discovery Run. The run raises money for the Marine Discovery center and lab which we have visited with the boys in the past. It's an interesting place to visit, they rescue and study marine mammals, as well as a little museum/exhibition of other local marine life and issues.

The location of the run was lovely: around Natural Bridges State Park and along Westcliff Drive. The day was overcast with rain threatening - but most of all windy!


This photo was taken in front of the whale skeleton just before the start - we had left our sweatshirts and were waiting for the 5K to start. The boys were cold - but we soon warmed up. We all ran together - Adam encouraging us all - and finished the race in 37 minutes. My last 5K took me 39 minutes and so I was pleased it was faster - although not the 36 minutes I was aiming for! Fin sprinted the last 200 yards or so, so his time is slightly faster! Nigel, Adam, and I ran over the finish holding hands.

After the race there was fresh fruit, and an excellent goody bag, as well as flowers for the Mums running today.


It was a really well organized race, and pretty small - I think there were less than 100 doing the 5K. There was also a really cute kids 1K where everyone cheered the little ones along - some of them were really small!

We headed home - stopping for coffee and the doughnuts that Fin had been motivating himself with! Once we got home. I opened my lovely mothers day gifts: a home-made spoon rest, a pollock-inspired painting, and a home-made candle, then we repaired to the spa!

Winter sunshine

Monday was a school holiday here for Martin Luther King day. The sun was shining and so the boys and I headed out for the beach. We went, as usual, to Rio Del Mar beach in Aptos. I didn't take my wetsuit but I wished that I had. It was mid-60s on the beach, with a lovely clear blue sky.



The boys boogie-boarded and skim boarded for about 4 hours!

Lambtown 2010

A couple of weeks ago we visited Lambtown again. We last went 2 years ago to this sheep festival in Dixon, California. Now the event runs in October rather then August there is more incentive to head up there as it's not so stiflingly hot in October - although it was plenty warm enough. The show includes a variety of entertainment and wildlife.

Adam had fun snuggling with this Chincilla - he wanted one as a pet until we pointed out that Charlotte would think he had bought her a substantial snack!

This year Lambtown was combined with Calpaca - the California Alpaca show - and there were also alpacas to pet as well as sheep. We watched some of the alpaca show judging which was interesting. Some alpacas are more friendly than others (you really don't want an alpaca to spit on you!).


There were a number of other stands there - young farmers, 4H - here are the boys doing needle felting with the 4H.


Finally - we got to some sheep - here is some shearing. This chap is shearing the bottoms of the sheep before the shearing contest. This part is not something you do quickly. They also do this before lambing.

Again, we had a good day out at Lambtown; at lamb, saw sheep. Sadly no sheepdog trials this year (which was a highlight before), and the whole show seemed much smaller and less well attended than last time we went. Hopefully it will grow again next year.

Riding along on the crest of a wave

Well, not actually riding - more at anchor in San Francisco. This week the US Navy were in town for the annual Fleet Week. The boys and I went up on Monday as they had a day off school.


We did a tour of the USS Chief that was at Pier 37. The Chief is a minesweeper - and we learned loads about detecting, avoiding, and disarming mines. (The sailors told us that their favourite method is to shoot the mines out of the water!) We were shown around by Chief Petty Office Nissen who was both informative and entertaining. The boys were fascinated - especially when they had a go at 'firing' a browning machine gun. We pretended to shoot cars off the Golden Gate bridge!


I had a go too - and I could not even prime the gun (here Adam is being helped - I had to be helped too!). We had a great little adventure. We have not done this before and the boys made me promise that next year we could come back and tour a Destroyer.

Maker Faire 2010

After our first visit to the Maker Faire last year, it was a dead cert that we would be going this year. We spent all day there on the Saturday. Of course we saw the usual wacky inventions and the steampunk vehicles:


we all had a go on the handmade wooden bicycles (some easier to ride than others)



Adam and Fin built a solid fuel rocket:


...and went outside to launch it:


No photos of the flight - but it went 100s of feet into the air - very impressive!

The boys leaned to solder and made flashing light badges:


We visited to Society for Creative Anachronism and Adam tried on a suit of armour:

before we watched a couple beat seven bells out of each other! We talked to this couple as the suited up in their armour and they explained that even with the armour on, it was painful to get hit, and they were both sporting a variety of bruises.



We had a great day, and saw so much more than this. Yet again, I never made it to the fiber arts - but I figure that stuff I can do anyday!

Visitors

We had visitors over the last few weeks: my parents came out at the beginning and end of thier fabulous Alaska Cruise. Their stay seemed brief, and because of school and cub events we didn't seem to do too much.

But not too much was sometimes rather nice: like my Dad playing cards with the boys after school:



We did manage a trip to the beach with a wonderful warm day at Rio Del Mar although we didn't get Farve onto the Boogie Board (without a wet suit you would not get me in the water either!)



and of course we went out to eat - here at Aldo's:



It was a lovely visit which passed far too quickly.

Weekend on wheels

At the beginning of May the town holds a criterium bike race The Cat's Hill. It's an all-day affair and pretty exciting as the riders get up some speed - especially on the downhill parts of the course!



The boys decided that although they were getting too old to enter the kids race, they could not walk to the race so we adopted a variety of wheeled transport (actually Nigel and I walked).

Fin practiced his tricks on his scooter:


Adam went on his new roller blades:

When I first moved to Los Gatos I bought some roller blades and took lessons, but never achieved the elegance (or confidence) that I hoped I would on them. The skates have been in the shed for the last 10 years when the boys found them. The practiced with my skates for a few weeks and Adam saved his money to get his own skates - rather predictably he is instantly confident, fast, and elegant on them.

Fight; Love; Live.

I celebrated a birthday last week; 29 again of course. I had the day off work and messed about all day with no particular agenda - it was lovely! I spun the rest of the meriboo fiber and listened to the radio, read my book, and of course, ate cake!



On Friday I went with Fin's class to Filoli Mansion. The name is derived from the original owner's motto: "Fight for a just cause; Love your fellow man; Live a good life."

The class had a nature hike, each small group with a docent.



Our docent, Dave, was great - and the children were really attentive and well-behaved for the whole 2 hours we were walking around the grounds. At the end of our nature hike we walked through the formal gardens which were a riot of colour:



Fortunately the rain held off until after our walk - then it chucked it down!

All aboard!

Last weekend Nigel and Adam had an adventure with the cubs: they went to an overnight camp at the Balcutha, moored in the Maritime Museum in San Francisco Harbour.

They checked in at 7pm and were put to work raising sails, hauling water, swabbing decks and so on. (Nigel was pleased that only the cubs had to do all this work - the accompanying parents just had to look on).
Here are Adam, Jacob, and Logan raising the sail. In the background you can see the lights on Ghiradelli Square. The slept in sailor's bunks


In the morning they were roused at 6am to swab the decks with water they hauled from the bay:



They had a great time!
Fin and I joined them in San Francisco and spent the night at the Argonaut hotel which turned out to be an inspired move. Nigel and Adam joined us for breakfast (and a much-needed shower) when they left the boat at 8am.

Little House in the Big Woods

As a girl I read all the Little House books, and endlessly played 'little house' with my friends Clare and Laura. Laura always got to be Laura Ingalls because she had the right name. (No one wanted to be Nellie Olsen). I have copies of all the books and re-read them every now and again. I've read the first few books (before they get too 'girly') with the boys, which they enjoyed - I was surprised - they liked the accounts of making bullets, travelling in the wagon, and the stories about hunting!

I'm in Rochester Minnesota again for business. I left San Jose bright and early at 6:30 so ended up with an afternoon at leisure so I decided to make a trip to Pepin, Wisconsin, to Laura's birthplace.

The drive from Minneapolis to Pepin was gorgeous: I took the Great River Road, along the Mississippi until I got to Pepin. Lake Pepin, which the Ingalls family crossed while it was frozen, is part of the Mississippi River, and again, was just beautiful in the crisp autumn day.

Pepin itself is a very small town. It boasts a Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum, but it didn't really have anything of Laura's: just some contemporary stuff. The Little House itself is no longer there, but a replica is on the site.

The little house is indeed tiny, and still seemed isolated, although it sits on one of the main roads out of Pepin. There are no woods any more, the area is really agricultural now, but it was peaceful and pretty, and I was glad to spend my afternoon in Wisconsin.

Tonight there is snow forecast in Minnesota - I'm glad I bought my coat, but fear I didn't bring enough knitwear - what an opportunity missed!

Gold Rush

We spent the Labor day weekend in Gold Country. We took the boys to Columbia State historic park which was a great success. Columbia was an early Gold Rush town, and at one point it was one of the largest towns in California with some of the richest gold deposits.

A surprising hit was some children's toys that the park rangers had available. Finlay was a demon with the hoop rushing up and down the street.

They also enjoyed the tug of war...

We visited the school house where they were appalled by the dunce's cap, and we stopped for a sasparilla at the saloon where the major attraction was being able to throw peanut shells on the floor!

Finally, of course we panned for gold. The boys took this very seriously and were thrilled to be rewarded with some tiny flakes of gold which they bought home.

Sunday we visited Railtown 1897 in Jamestown where we rode on one of the steam locomotives.

We had a great weekend in Gold Country, staying again in Murphys with the obligatory trip to Nelson's Candy store.

Russian Ridge

On Sunday we went for a hike up at the Russian Ridge OSP. It's part of the huge peninsular open space preserve on skyline blvd. Russian Ridge is basically above Portola Redwoods - but is worlds apart in terms of landscape.

This view looking westwards from the trail.



Nigel and Adam had previously been to Russian Ridge with the scouts and been rained on while in the valley we had a nice day...so we were expecting it to be cool. San Jose on Saturday experienced record-breaking heat, and Sunday it was still HOT up on the ridge.

The trail was quite sandy and we were able to see a lot of animal prints: coyote, deer, and this one...



Quite a substantial mountain lion print!

Last day of summer

On the last day of the school holidays the boys and I went to the beach. Rio del Mar beach again by popular request.

We took a picnic and Adam's new skim board. They have been earning extra pocket money doing hard labour in the garden!

For those who have not seen one in action a skim board is like a small flat wooden surfboard. You throw it into shallow water at the water's edge, while the wave is receeding, and ride the board out on the wave. I can assure you that it's much harder than it looks!

Finlay and I stuck to the boogie boards. No Sea Otters this time but there were a lot of dolphins and seals, one of which came up very close to have a look at us.

Surfin' Safari

The last few weeks have been rather frenetic here at Ferretworld - more details shortly. In the meantime some photos from the last few weeks here. We spent our vacation close to home - mostly at the beach!

Nigel and the boys at Rio Del Mar beach

At Rio Del Mar with Julie and Flossie

We get Jules into the water!

The boys at Sunset SB

Adam just bought a skim board so I anticipate another trip to the beach in the near future!