Fibonacci numbers

(Note: This post was made by C)


A couple of days ago we did a one day study on the Fibonacci sequence. The Fibonacci sequence is a sequence of numbers where the next number is determined by adding the two before it. The numbers are: 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34....

The number of petals on most flowers are Fibonacci numbers. You have 5 digits on each limb,and that's a Fibonacci number. You can find Fibonacci numbers just about anywhere if you look hard enough.

Most spirals found in nature are Fibonacci spirals. You can draw a Fibonacci spiral by putting squares together in a spiral using the dimensions (inches, centimeters, whatever) of numbers found in the Fibonacci sequence, then connecting the squares on from corner to corner so it spirals through all the squares.

My Pyro, My Love

Remember the toy cellphone incident?

I forgot to check the broiler when I preheated the oven this morning.

The whiff of melting plastic was unmistakable:

It melted to about half its origional size. I'm glad it had water in it.

The accused:



Just so you know, we have always had this:

Free Range Kids

About a year ago writer Lenore Skenazy wrote this editorial for the NY Sun: "Why I Let My 9-Year-Old Ride the Subway Alone."

The backlash was huge--try this--google "worst mom in america."

She's a writer, so naturally she has a blog. She also has an upcoming book.

The introduction to her book is available on Scribd.

Freedom and safety are hot topics in these parts. I'll assume you know why, and move on.

For a lot of people, the question is "How has America changed since I was a kid?" A common perception is that it is more dangerous now. When we look at the statistics, it actually isn't.

We tolerate fewer risks now. Kids (mine included,) wear seatbelts, bike helmets, and sunscreen (paba free, thank you very much.) My kids drink very limited soda and their milk is organic. I've cleaned the kitchen floor with vinegar--just vinegar--for the past 10 years. I consider myself pretty conscientious.

I was really surprised today when two moms I didn't know chastised me for letting my girls ride their bikes "too far" ahead of me on the bike path. Really? It's a suburban park. The track is the size of a high school track--maybe slightly bigger, but not by much. It's in a nice neighborhood (ha--not the one I live in,) surrounded by well-kept homes. There is no litter. No graffiti. To be fair, a stream runs through the middle of the loop and the trees on it's banks partially obscure the view of a short section. But it's not like it's in the wilderness, and it's certainly not remote or unpopulated. This afternoon there were ten to twelve people walking there--mothers with strollers, dog walkers, elderly people...I even recognized some of them.

My girls are capable on their bikes. They're polite. They give elderly people plenty of room. They only stop at the playground. They don't go to the restroom or water fountain without telling me.

I'm not putting Lenore Skenazy on a pedestal. Being the small town girl I am, I'm not so sure I'd send my 9yo off on a New York subway...but I'm not willing to excoriate her either. To me, it's all about risk management.

Lenore says a kid's risk of being abducted by a stranger is one in 1.5 million. I haven't fact checked her, but that sounds about like what Gavin DeBecker's says in Protecting the Gift (great book, by the way.) I'm tempted to contrast that with the risk involved in riding in a car or falling down stairs, but as cars and stairs are so integral to our lives, I don't think that's a fair comparison. I do think it's fair to compare the risk of giving children a smidge of freedom to the risk of other optional activities--swimming, horseback riding, riding carnival rides.

It was a big deal when I first started letting the girls ride the loop ahead of me. They begged and pleaded for a long time. T worked all summer last year to be able to ride the whole thing at speed (a prerequisite.) Her sense of accomplishment when she finally did it was a milestone of her childhood. We went for ice cream.

It's a hard thing to maintain a commitment to rationality when emotions are running high.

Countdown to Pounce

T's Worms!

Hi, I'm T. I have worms! As you can see, my hand is full of worms (yes, it is really my hand in the picture.) I really like the worms. It was hard to take the picture because the squirmy worms made me giggle, and the giggling made my hand shake.

I bet you're wondering why we have worms. We have worms because their castings (which means poop) is compost, and compost helps our garden grow. Our worms eat orange peels, lettuce scraps and such. They also eat kind of rotten things, like the rotten spots on apples. We're starting an avocado tree in the worm bin! We read that a worm bin is a good place to start an avocado pit.

By the way, my hermit crabs need worm castings to eat, but the crabs are another story; I'm going to talk about worms right now.

We made our worm bin last year. C got to use a power drill to drill the holes in the worm bin, but that's because I wasn't there. After the holes were drilled, Mom and C filled the bin with shredded paper, and then added the worms.

[Mom's note--the bin & the worms came from a vermicomposting workshop subsidized by the county. It was a good program.]

There are some other creatures that live in our worm bin. I took a pill bug out the other day.

We keep our worm bin in the basement. It's cool and damp down there. Our worms like that.

We are going to do some experiments with our worms. One of the experiments is worm racing. Each contestant chooses a racing worm. The best worm racer worms are the longest ones. How worm racing works is you put two worms in a mound of dirt (you need some way to tell your worm from your opponent's worm.) The first worm to get out of the mound of dirt, wins.

If you want to learn more about vermicomposting, read this book Worms Eat My Garbage.

Clay Class

(this post composed by C)


I made a very beautiful fairy house at clay class.



It has a garden, a swing, a tree, a swimming hole, and even a ladder up to the balcony. It's very pretty, don't you think?

The tree house is my only completely finished work. I also have a basket that has been glazed, but it still needs to be fired. I have a still wet cereal bowl, and an unfinished tea pot--all built by hand, all built by me.

I love clay class! I really like the teacher, Ms. R. She's nice and funny and she's a very good teacher. She's great at building with clay. She made a beautiful clay basket in ten minutes (or less!)

Our basic class procedure is this: First Ms. R tells us what we'll be building and shows us how to do it. Then, we build our project. We oftentimes ask for help. It's not too hard, but some of the projects are a little tricky. Once we have finished the project, we set it aside to be fired, and then we have free clay time until it's time to clean up. On days that we glaze, it's the same class procedure, but we spend quite a bit of time beforehand painting on the clear glaze or the underglaze (the colored part.)

Cabin Fever Squared

Last Monday C had a some head congestion. No big deal--just the onset of a winter cold. On Tuesday she had a drippy nose--par for the course. On Wednesday she had a cough. Wednesday night she coughed all night--relentlessly. Thursday morning I called her doctor, but there were no appointments to be had until Friday morning. I took it. Thursday late morning I took her to Urgent Care (big thanks to my friend the nurse--I'm so grateful for your advice, and eternally grateful that I didn't have to drag my other two kids along to that big petri dish!)

Turns out she has pneumonia. It was so quick. She went from "just a cold" to "Oh My God," literally overnight.

We got the antibiotics and the inhaler and followed up with our doctor on Friday morning.

Thankfully, her turn around was just as quick as her fall into illness. She drank a bunch of sprite and miso soup, ate some juice pops, watched some movies, played on the computer, and today I found myself thinking "Ok, tomorrow we are going Somewhere--Anywhere! She has got to get out of this house!"

I'm relieved. I hate it when my kids are sick.

Mushrooms!

(click the picture for macro fun)

A dear friend gave us a portobello growing kit for Christmas. Basically it's a plastic lined box full of peat (or maybe coir)and another bag of substrate that had been inoculated with spore. We mixed it up, watered it, and stuck it under my desk and waited. Three weeks later we had a phenomenal pizza with fresh mushrooms, sausage and goat cheese. Really, we could not have gotten a pizza that good at Dewey's.

A week or so after that we had steak with mushroom sauce. Oh my. D is quite the grill cook.

Tonight we harvested what I suspect is our last big batch. I sauteed mushrooms and asparagus and we had it with pasta alfredo.

Wow. I love gardening in the dead of winter!