"a Ferris wheel you can drive to school"

This movie is from a science-museum trip on Saturday. Aunt Amy joined us for a little while before she had to leave for home. After that, Sam and I wandered around and ended up in an area where kids and parents can build with building blocks called Kid K'nex--21st century erector-set parts, I suppose. Sam really got into it, and together we built the Ferris wheel seen in the movie. And, happily, the museum allows parents to weigh and purchase what they've built, and for a price which certainly beats Toys R Us.

Another enjoyable element to this trip: I--and Sam, I think--learned new things about technology! They had several exhibits about generators, traffic lights, automobile blinkers, etc. I never knew bimetallic strips were so ubiquitous.

Joisey Shore

Spent the past week at the New Jersey shore sharing a house with the Westerville Collinses, and with Amy. Had a great time! Below are a few (?) photos and some highlights:

• Aunt Sue brought up a stack of books which Sam was delighted for her to read to him. (For those of you with an interest in children's lit, they are the Henry & Mudge books and the Poppleton books by Cynthia Rylant.) Aunt Sue even sent two home with him! It was a good book week for Sam--Aunt Amy also sent along a book/puppet, the charming Calm Down, Boris, and a Charlie and Lola puzzle book, I Wonder What Plant I'm Growing. What fun!
• Since this is in no particular order, I'll mention next mini golfing at Pirate Island Mini Golf. What a great course! 18 holes with all sorts of water features and tunnels, all built into a two-storey pirate-ship-themed structure. At the end where you return your ball, it falls into a pinball-like game, giving you a chance to win a new game. We all played Wednesday, and I took Sam back Friday afternoon. At the end of our game, he won a free game, much to his delight! During both of those games we were behind other families with small kids, and since Sam plays relatively quickly, we spent a lot of time lingering right next to them. Sam had a way of insinuating himself into their group, and if it had been close to dinnertime I bet we could have gotten a free dinner out of it for him. :-) At the end of the second game, lo and behold, he won another free game, so he played three games that day! When we played Tuesday Stu got two holes in one and an excellent score. I could match the score even in my subsequent games, but I did get three holes in one. Sam got several holes in two, which he, as only a four-year-old can, referred to each as a "holey two." The owner, a very nice woman, gave Sam eye patches and pirate tattoos since we were such good customers.
  
• One of the things which made this a great vacation is that every day we were able spend hours on the beach, during which Sam would play in the sand or run into surf... or lie with Aunt Amy or be buried in the sand. And let me tell you, no child sleeps better than he who spent the day in the 90-deg heat splashing in the surf!
  
• We saw some wildlife: The day after some blustery, rainy weather there were lots of jellyfish--which didn't keep all of us out! And lots of seaweed--which Stu called swimming in salad. The day after the rainstorm the waves were also very large, shown here. Later that day it calmed down enough for us to go out, at least Stu and I. Those were the first waves which were truly Tim-sized. But earlier in the week I took Sam out into the waves on my shoulders, which he found entertaining until we got deep enough that his legs were getting wet in the waves.
  
• We saw some more wildlife in addition to the jellyfish: One day a horseshoe crab washed up--the next day one of them drifted by on its side. We also dug up or ran across sand crabs of three different sizes. The last was alarmed to receive attention from a group of us walking on the beach. He faced us off boldly, and when Emily made a move toward him, he showed his moxie by lunging toward her as well, claws snapping. Made me miss "crabbing" in Maryland as a kid. Much to Susan's disappointment, no great white sharks came through snacking on seals.
  
• There was the occasional hilarity which ensues when this group of eight at in semi-close quarters. That included at one point spontaneous face-making--which is why you see Uncle Stu with antennas and Sam pretending to be a bug.
  
• One evening Aunt "Saint" Amy watched the kids while Stu and Sue and Susan and I went to dinner. We went to Braca's, where we had shrimp, blackened tuna, and crab cakes. I can't speak for the others, and I am no connoisseur, but the crab cakes were the best I've ever tasted.
• There was a running Scrabble game throughout the week between Susan, Stu and me. I was their foil; Stu early got a 96-point bingo, but Susan persisted and eventually got a word onto two triple-word-score squares. I, for my part, beat my person record for the most vowels in a game.
  
• Cousin Kevin isn't as well suited to the beach, and by and large preferred to stay inside. Anticipating this, Stu and Sue bought him a new video game (Game Cube Mario Party 7), which he happily played all week... and Sam was just as happy watching him, as you can see.
• Other highlights: Susan and Amy and Emily spent a day in NYC, during which Emily went to the center of the universe (the Nintendo Store), Susan did lunch with her agent Molly, and Aunt Amy... well, Aunt Amy enabled the other two and had fun doing so.
• What else? One morning Sam and I did what's becoming a staple of our vacations away from home, and went to the local library. We do this in Colton, NY as well as Aspen, CO. Aspen's library looks like a university collection by comparison to Sea Isle City's. But it was just what we needed, and we had a great time. We couldn't get cards, so we spent two hours reading there. At one point we took a break and Sam wandered the stacks, and shortly returned with a dessert cookbook. This, as it turns out, is one of his favorite things: finding dessert cookbooks and photocopying favorite recipes, all the while nursing fond hopes that one of these will make its way onto our dinner table.

Aunt Amy, Susan, Stu, Sue--what did I miss? Post comments!

Etch-a-Sketching

Two spaceships: one firing bullets, the other bombs, one good, the other evil and striving to be the evilest in the universe.

There's more, but you get the idea...

Four saintly friends

Some photos with captions:

First, I mentioned a while back an exhibit at the Science Museum which models synapses and dendrites. This is it. Sam's in heaven.

Second: Another example of the greatest rule of toy-making: You can't improve on a simple cardboard box.

Third: At the other end of the spectrum, two photos of the new Rainbow playset in our backyard. Rainbow, based coincidentally in Brookings, SD, makes excellent, redwood structures. And they stand behind them: They warranty all pieces against insect damage, so I need merely take a piece in to the local dealer and they will fetch me a new one for free. Not that I will necessarily need to--Ron has tooken excellent care of it.

I hesitate to call it our not because the transaction isn't final, but because it's still very precious to Katie and Sarah, shown here playing with Sam for a little while after dinner. We are in their debt--they have a lot of good memories of it, and wanted it to go to family friends.

Also shown: Ron and Dave, and Dave's colleague/student Greg (strong as an ox). They gave three hours of sabbath time to finish breaking it down, transport it, and rebuild it in our back yard. Such friends are as good as gold. (Thanks also to John, who helped for hours last weekend in the main disassembly phase.)

Finally: Sam on a new trail (to us) at Mendon Ponds.

What a weekend!