"To lack an education in the arts is to be profoundly disconnected from our history, from beauty, from other cultures, and from other forms of expression" (Larson, 1997)

"A painter takes the sun and makes it into a yellow spot.

An artist takes a yellow spot and makes it into a sun. (Pablo Picasso)

"Imagination is more important than knowledge." (Albert Einstein)

"You can't depend on your judgement when your imagination is out of focus." (Mark Twain)

 

(All quotes are from my sister's art textbook "Arts as meaning makers", which she is using as part of her studies to become a teacher.)

 

Someone once told me that the best way to foster a love of art was to start early, so that's my excuse for letting Elizabeth chew a variety of art supplies.  That and the recommended approach of allowing Elizabeth to create artwork with her cake doesn't need any encouragement...

 

We tried a Valentine's day colouring sheet this week.  Actually, Elizabeth loves to "colour" with pencil crayons and I'm fascinated watching her figure out what mom is trying to show her.  She's starting to understand that the crayons make marks, but frequently tries to use the wrong end.  She also spent a lot of time trying to pick the colour that I had put on for her off the sheet, before giving up and deciding to eat the paper.  At the end of our art play time there was very little crayon on the sheet but she was having so much fun making music with the pencil crayons that mom let her keep them for a few minutes while she talked on the phone.

 

This may have been a mistake as Elizabeth finally figured out how to draw quite a beautiful line... on the underside of my desk.  Daddy wasn't impressed, but I'm keeping it forever.

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I was a little bummed out that we were unable to go to the Winterlude opening ceremonies.  Free Museum of Civilization admission! Extra crafts! Mythical stilt walking creatures! A guy playing water-based instruments in a bathtub with water, ice and steam! Musical fireworks!  And my favourite percussionist Jesse Stewart (this is the guy who we saw play the canoe paddles in the summertime)!  Trouble was the action started way too late for Elizabeth (7pm).

 

So we didn't go on Friday.  Instead we decided we'd go to see the ice sculptures at the Crystal Gardens in Confederation Park on Sunday after church since it's an easy walk.  Once I realized that both the bathtub guy and Jesse Stewart were doing a repeat performance at the Crystal Gardens that afternoon, I was pretty excited.

 

The bathtub presentation by H2O Orchestra was very strange but extremely cool.  People kept walking by and then doing a double-take. Why are there girls in bikinis sitting in a steaming bathtub?  They really wanted to know!  Answer: they were playing a water organ that can only be played from underwater - I think it was an Idratmosphone, which is a type of hydraulophone.  I think. There was definitely a hydraulophone being played, an ice xylophone called a pagophone (water sound instead of wood sound) as well as a flute that used fluid instead of air.  In any case, the members of the orchestra were playing various water-based instruments, using a theme of the ancient elements of Earth, Water and Fire.  As the inventor of the instruments (Professor Steve Mann) explained, earth is defined as anything you can stand on, so ice would be considered "Earth".  "Water" is really liquid and "fire" is really anything in a gaseous state.  We enjoyed the orchestra very much, especially their last piece when the mythical stilt walkers made an appearance, dancing gracefully around among the crowd while various Winterlude volunteers nervously shooed people out of the way.  We actually ran out of space on our memory card (I know!) so sadly we didn't end up getting a video of them for you, but they were beautiful.  Afterwards I took close-up pictures of the instruments with Steve Mann standing only a few feet away, but between being excited about the upcoming Jesse Stewart concert and the stilt walkers I didn't really look at him.  This is a shame, because if I had I might have noticed his eyecam and realized that he was THAT Steve Mann - Canada's first cyborg.  I am completely kicking myself for missing the opportunity to talk to a really interesting man that I have been reading about for YEARS.  Brendan's comment afterwards was that he knew the name was familiar but he didn't figure it out either until the moment had passed. Full disclosure: I might never have realized the connection without Brendan.  My inner geek is so, so sad.

 

The sharp-eyed among you will notice that some of the sculptures don't look very icy.  That's because some of the sculptures were made out of recycled plastic as part of an art project by students across Canada and from around the world.  During the H2O concert, Elizabeth and I hung out by the enviro-pledge table for a while, keeping warm in the sun.  We didn't make a pledge to help the environment during the next week because I didn't really want to take home a plastic bracelet which I'd then have to dispose of...  I thought that kind of defeated the purpose, to be honest.  I was very amused by one lady who really wanted to make a pledge but "couldn't think of a single thing [she] could do to help the environment that [she] wasn't already doing".  The rather enthusiastic student told her she could pledge to continue doing what she was doing so that the lady could take home her bracelet.  I think the lady just wanted to boast about her environmental ways because she spent a good five minutes talking about all the things that she did to help the environment.  Meanwhile, I'm listening to her say that she recycles and composts (basically) and my inner voice is thinking - really?  Not even one single thing?

 

We ended up not hearing the entire Jesse Stewart concert because a certain long-suffering husband was in danger of losing his toes.  Elizabeth was starting to get pretty fussy too, which was not surprising since she hadn't napped or eaten.  So I tore myself away and we headed home for a long overdue lunch.

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With apologies to Eric Carle.

 

In the light of the chandelier a little girl played with her food.

 

On Monday and Tuesday her mommy and daddy wondered if she was eating enough.  So they started to write it all down.

 

On Wednesday she ate nine tablespoons of fruit, cereal, rice and bread. But she was still hungry and mommy had to feed her six times.

 

On Thursday she ate fourteen tablespoons of fruit, cereal, rice, cheese, chicken and vegetables. But she was still hungry and mommy had to feed her eight times.

 

On Friday she ate fifteen tablespoons of fruit, cereal, rice, cheese, lemon and a cookie. But she was still hungry and mommy had to feed her nine times.

 

On Saturday she ate 3 peach slices, 1 piece of cauliflower, 2 pieces of broccoli, 2 slices of cheese, 2 handfuls of cheerios, 3/4 cup of rice pasta and tomato sauce, a handful of blue berries, a tiny bit of vegetable root soup, 40 mL of blueberry, carrot and blackberry juice (diluted with water) and a small piece of cherry chocolate cake.  Altogether that was twenty-three tablespoons worth!

 

That night she gave mommy a break.

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My niece Erika loves our "Cooking with Mama" wii game, so we helped her "crack" eggs, "stir" pots and "make" hamburger patties for an hour or so this afternoon.  Then I got hungry and we went and made some real food for supper.  Video game cooking with a nearly four year old is much tidier (we had a little accident with the sugar), but I'm impressed by how careful she is and a little frightened to realize that 'her' apron actually fits her now.   Erika was able to make Grandpa J some Rice Krispie squares almost all by herself.  She even stirred the pot on the stove all by herself though you can be sure I kept a close eye on her.

 

Elizabeth spent the afternoon alternating walking and push-crawling her push mower, which is suddenly a very popular toy.  Her steering abilities are not very good (our poor paint!), but with some parental guidance the collision rate dropped dramatically.  Erika was quite impressed to see her "walking" and even more impressed when Elizabeth accidentally tipped over backwards.  Elizabeth's daddy swooped in just in time and caught Elizabeth before she cracked her head.  "Uncle Brendan SAVED her!" she told me in an awed tone of voice.

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Guest Post!

 

Auntie Janice here... Today I had a study day, which in teacher's college means "a day where you can actually schedule a doctor's or dentist's appointment without missing classes or practicum". I wasn't organized enough to actually get around to scheduling such an appointment, so instead I decided to abduct my niece (with permission) and take her on our first ever field trip together.

The plan was to take Elizabeth to the Museum of Nature, scout out the exhibits before going with my Brownie Unit next month, and give Mom a bit of an afternoon break... so I bundled munchkin up (no easy feat since she's graduated into a new, fuzzier snowsuit that is bigger and harder to put on) and wedged her into the stroller.

And then I realized that there were stairs between the house and the sidewalk, an added complication that I hadn't anticipated. Once I'd gone very slowly down the stairs (with munchkin giggling at my efforts), it went pretty well, although I was surprised at how difficult it is to roll a stroller in light snow. It was a nice walk, and despite getting a bit mixed up as to the exact location of the museum, we did eventually get there.

Once there, I was impressed at the updates they'd made since last time. There was a very nice little cloak area right by reception, and tons of lockers for valuables. The staff were friendly, and had no trouble finding the right codes to admit me under the reciprocal agreement (I work at the Aviation Museum, so I am allowed to visit other museums to learn from them and get ideas). They even gave me a members collector's card, which is pretty cool. Elizabeth was quite happy to get out of the stroller, but a bit frightened by the feel and sound of the elevator.

We started on the 4th floor (Birds), which is my favourite exhibit because of the Northern Pygmy Owl (my favourite type of owl). They even have computers that plays the bird call of every bird in the exhibits. Elizabeth liked the touch screen a little too much, and it was rather loud because the exhibit was mostly empty of other visitors. I'm not sure what made touching the mallard wing SO scary for Elizabeth- I thought it was cool but she got very clingy all of a sudden... maybe it was the hawks and falcons that made her nervous.

Heading into the mammal exhibit they've put up a large iceberg, which is cool, but Elizabeth decided she would much rather just cuddle her face into my shoulder instead of face the scary polar bear. The polar bear fur was also far too scary to touch, especially after the mallard wing experience... But she did warm up to the "urban mammal" hallway, maybe she felt more at home hearing the familiar raccoon sounds instead of looking up at the bison and wolf diorama... She calmed down enough to play a bit of "let's chase the aunt" in the hallway, which made the Security Guard laugh at her unique crawling style. After the fun we tried on the costumes- and Elizabeth tried to pull them off :)

Our last stop was the dinosaur exhibit on the first floor, which has expanded to include a part up some stairs. Once again, Elizabeth was terrified of touching the manipulatives, but she calmed down once I let her play with one of the cool touch-screen computers. She also liked the security guard on that level the best: he played peek-a-boo with her, and said it was probably a good thing that she wasn't likely to touch the exhibits.

I'm excited to see what other exhibits will open up in May, but as it is I still love the Museum of Nature- we spent 2.5 hours there without really trying very hard. It has lots of things to touch and move around, and the big slow-moving elevator is perfect when there's more than one stroller in it. There are washrooms all over the place, which is good because the ones across from the elevator were being cleaned when I tried to use them. All I had to do was go around the corner into the lunchroom and use the family washroom, which was perfect- it had a nice changing table and enough space to maneuvre a stroller one-handed.

My only wish is that the museum's doors would become accessible- it was hard enough to open all doors with a stroller in one hand and a baby in the other, but I can't imagine how difficult it would be for someone in a wheelchair to try to open a door and go through it simultaneously. There are lots of ramps and accessible washrooms, but if you can't get into the building, the lunchroom, or any of the exhibits... it's not an accessible building.

I can't think of anything else to report, so I suppose I'll turn the blog (and the baby) back over to my beloved sister. Love ya sis! Janice out.

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