The Green Family Blog: February 2014

Pack 1592 got the opportunity for another cool overnight trip, this time to the Chabot Observatory in Oakland. All my years in the bay area and I never went, never even knew it was a place to go hang out and tour.

They had this exhibit where you press a button, go stand on a pad and jump in the air,and they take a picture and email it to you. This help explain what you'd look like in space with zero gravity.

Nate and I in front of one of the 3 large telescopes they have open for viewing. All three were trained on Jupiter. Each got more powerful and the last one you could not only see Jupiter, the four Galilean moons and a shadow of one of the moons onto the planet.

This space suit had an area in the back you could climb up and put your face in, so you could see what you'd look like as an astronaut. Nate is a little small for it, but still neat to see, especially after touring NASA in December.

Here's Nate climbing in a model of the Gemini rocket.

Mission control, do you copy?

They had an exhibit on the MIR space station. This is a toilet they used. Fun to see the kids reaction when you tell them about the water conservation being a big deal on the space station and that they astronauts have to drink their own pee, despite after filtration it comes out cleaner than our tap water.

The smallest telescope, Leah, built in 1883 has an 8" aperture.

"Rachel" has a 20" aperture and is approaching it's celebrating its 100 year birthday this year. Not pictured is the newest telescope, which was built in 2003, and has a 36" aperture.

The dome in the front is home to Leah and the one on the right is where Rachel is.

Our sleeping arrangements for the night. After the viewings if Jupiter and the show in the planetarium we laid down and watched "The Never Ending Story"

Maria and Frances completing the next step on their journey to 13.1, they completed their first 5K. Congratulations!

When Nate and I got up Sunday morning after Chabot, we had some time, so I decided to take him to the Oakland Zoo for a bit before we headed home. It's been a long time since I've been there.

Nate brought along his phone to take some photos, including this selfie of us.

The big turtle exhibit, Nate trying on shells to find one that fit.

Nate in front of the elephants.

Giraffes and Gazelles

I'm not sure what this was, but supposed to help you hear like a rabbit. I thought it looked funny.

In early March, we have the Pinewood Derby, which means it's time to start making the car. Here's Nate working the saw to get the front carved just right.

The two grooves are where he wanted to put the wings for his batrmobile car. You'll see the final product in next months update.

The weather has been too good. The kids had to get into the pool Got to be a competition on who could stay in the longest. Here's Wyatt, impressive since he gets cold so quick.

Nate seemed to have no real issues with the cold water, would have stayed in longer if Mom wasn't yelling about hypothermia.

For Valentine's day Barry and I made our second attempt at Beef Wellington. The meat was cooked a little too much, closer to medium than medium rare, but otherwise it turned out beautifully.

For dessert I made a 5 ingredient molten lava cake. These are amazing. Filled with melting chocolate and topped with raspberries, blackberries and powdered sugar.

Here's what we did for Nate's valentine's day card. The suckers are actually through the picture, but with the photo it looks like he's holding the sucker.