Less than Twelve Parsecs

It is Sunday after lunch. Four kids, aged 1 to 4.5 years, are bursting with energy in a little park. What do you do? You invent a game to keep them busy. Well, at least that's what I did. The Game:   "Find me a stick that is exactly This Big." [hold your hands at some steady distance apart, e.g. one foot]. Why it was great:  It encourages search and discovery, teaches size estimation, measuring, comparison. How it went: The first sticks the kids found were too big. I measured them by aligning my fixed-distance hands on the sticks, and gave them feedback: they need to be this much smaller. After several tries each, one child decided to try a minuscule length of about 2 inches. We measured that one too. Yes, we needed something way bigger than that. This kept them busy for about 10 minutes, everyone having a great time in the process. Even 15 month-old Gaius brought several sticks for measuring. The Ending: All was well, until I turn to a very straight-faced ...

Here is Mara, who drew our US family as spotted snails. They are holding hands because they are on the road. There is Daddy, Mommy, Sister and Gaius, then Grandpa and Grandma and MeeMee and PaPa. Here's a better view:

I was brushing my teeth one morning and Gaius came around the corner and brought me my glasses. Thinking of how to make use of this helpfulness again, I said: Gaius, can you go get me a shirt or some pants? He comes around the corner with this: A little small, but I can make it work. Next: Gaius, can you bring me a shirt? He goes back and comes back a bit later with this: Now I've got all I need to get dressed in the morning!

Mara: I want to make Icecream! Greg: I don't know how to make icecream, Mara. Mara: Ask the Internet how to make icecream! Greg: What's the Internet? Mara: The Internet is somebody that teaches people how to make icecream.

Sea otters in Monterrey Bay are so very special. The species was almost extinct after being hunted for the outstanding coat, but thanks to recent conservation efforts the population is finally in the rise. We went to visit their home in Elkhorn Slough , and got to see their slough-mates as well. Here are some snapshots and fun facts we learned from our naturalist guide. Meet our little "Otter Spotter". When Mara saw an otter in the water, she held her Otter Card way up high to let everyone know, and pointed to the animal so we can see it. We needed to be very quiet because otters are sensitive to sound. Irina, Otter Spotter Mara and the Otter Card Sea Lions: - Very social, like to pile up on each other - One of them was giving an important speech to the other as we were taking photos - Unlike seals, they have little ear flaps! - They have large front flippers so they can climb on rocks and piers - All the ones here are males; all the females are on ...

Being a 2.5yo is tough. You finally understand that just because an adult says something does not make it a reality. So you start challenging everything. You start negotiating, testing the limits, and "pushing buttons" to see what will happen. If it goes your way, great. If it doesn't, you gain knowledge. Mara is going through these episodes, and it is so much fun to watch Greg twist her words around to make her do his bidding: ----- Greg: Mara, come to me so I can put your shirt on. Mara, collapsing to the floor: But I can't! Greg: Why can't you come?  Mara, frowning in concern: I am a rollie-pollie. Greg: Alright, then roll to me so I can put your shirt on. Mara rolls on the floor towards Greg and shirt goes on. ----- I, on the other hand, am not so skilled at this game. This story is about one of these struggles to find out whether she can 'best' me. ----- Breakfast on a weekend. Daddy is asleep. Mara, Gaius and Mommy are at the di...

Greg and Elena joined Ultimate Summer League this year. Yay for more exercise, finally!! After the random draft, they both made it into Team 8,  and Team 8 needed a more personalized name than just, you know, a number. Consequently, a long email thread spawned candidate names that ranged from hints to current political or industry events to random puns for the number 8. Yes, when it comes to naming, this crowd often has a tendency for mathy puns. One of the proposed names was:  Octo-PI . Cute, but not enough to make the call. It would have gotten buried in with all the other silly names, had it not been for a key email response. What happened, you ask? Something that is also typical of this crowd: a pedantic comment. This plural version of "octopus" is questionable, because the word Octopus comes from Greek, not Latin. Thus, we should be using the Greek pluralization instead [ reference link ]. This is how this summer we became: Team  Octopodes!! ...