Pacific Science Center

(Yet another post with way too many pictures.)

For Memorial Day we went up to Seattle and went to the Pacific Science Center. It's in the Seattle Center, which we've been to before, but we'd never gone to the Science Center. In fact, the last time we were at the Seattle Center was also on Memorial Day weekend. It didn't occur to me that the Folklife Festival would be going on again. It was pretty crowded.

We drove up and parked below Pike Place Market, then walked up to Westlake Center and took the monorail from there.



We got lunch at the Westlake Center food court. I had soup and salad, and Doug went Indian.



Kate shares Dad's lassi.



The Westlake Center is quite the cosmopolitan spot--vast throngs of people from all over the world pass through there every day, speaking many different languages, and, presumably, spending money. Yet the only bathrooms in the whole place are up on the fourth floor, way in the back corner behind the food court. It's like a study in mixed messages. ("Yes! We want your business! But please, don't stay too long!")



Andy came along in his carseat, strapped to the stroller (we recently realized we can do this, even though they aren't a matched set). He seems to enjoy going places with his family.



The entrance to the monorail. I'd ridden it once when I visited Seattle with my roommate Christy. I don't think Doug had ever been on it before.



The view from inside, with the other train coming the other way.



Kate on the monorail.



The track goes right through the middle of the Experience Music Project (which Doug calls a "techno sneeze")



Going into the Science Center.

The first section was all dinosaurs, which Kate thought was very cool, of course.





Working a robot dinosaur.



This charming fellow was outside the insect exhibit. (Doug says, "Say 'apocalypse,' Raymond!" Ten points to anyone who gets that.)

We put Andy into the Snugli carrier, put the 100mm macro lens on the camera, and went into the butterfly house.



Lots of butterflies, and gorgeous tropical flowers!





(and a few goldfish!)



I did have a cooler onesie along for Andy. I should have changed him into it before we went into the butterfly house. It was really warm in there.





I wanted to get a picture of a Blue Morpho butterfly. They have such a brilliant, iridescent blue on their wings. I knew I was never going to get a shot of one in flight, though, and when they land they tend to keep their wings closed.



This one landed on Kate's back while she was leaning on a wall looking into a pond. I focused on it and waited for it to fly away.



I almost missed the butterfly, but I got a cool shot of its shadow!



I did finally get a picture of this one, which was fanning its wings while it was eating.







After the butterfly house, Doug and Kate went over to the kids' area while I took care of Andy.




Cool water toys!




A robot that plays tic-tac-toe.



Playing in the gift shop.




These are giant microbes. The tentacled one is e-coli. The spotted ones are, of course, Mad Cow.

Kate had a meltdown in the bathroom ("Noooooooo! I want to go potty at hooooooome!"). Once we were past that, we stopped by the Grossology exhibit, which deals with all kinds of bodily effluvia.



Andy, feeling inspired, spit up on me.



None of the displays really caught Kate's attention, but she thought this slide was pretty cool.



When we were done with the Science Center, we went over to the Fun Forest and went on a few rides. Kate picked the roller coaster, which was a lot like the one she went on at the fair.



She doesn't look very comfortable, but she had a good time, and rode it twice.



Of course she couldn't pass up a ride on a dragon!

It was time to head home, so we got on the monorail again, and then had a few blocks to walk to where we had parked.



Kate saw these pigeons and wanted to go bark at them.



Getting a shoulder ride from Dad. (She's holding her dinosaur Wacky, that she wanted to bring along.)



You can walk between the sheets of water in this fountain without getting (very) wet.



Looking tired!



We stopped at a gelato place right outside Pike Place Market and got a treat. It was nice to sit down for a while.




Andy was in full charmer mode and was flirting with everyone who walked by.

Long day! We're planning a trip to King's Island (amusement park) when we go to Ohio, so this was a good trial run. I think Andy did better than Kate did.

Andy at 21 weeks

This was probably the best picture taking session I've had with Andy yet. He was in such a smiley, chirpy mood. I put him down in his crib for this one, and I think maybe he was being cute to get me to pick him up.








We've been spending a lot of time outside since the weather's been warmer. All the girls in the complex love Andy and like to take turns holding him. (I make the little ones sit down first.) Andy says, "I am popular with the girls!"

Spring Evening

Sunday evening, Rebecca came over for some bacon soup. After we ate Kate wanted to go play sneak-through-the-long-grass over by the Seventh-day Adventist church. I had to go get my camera.







I've been having trouble getting Kate to smile for me. Perhaps I should stick googly eyes on my camera again.



The lighting was kind of tricky, but I got lucky with a couple shots.



She has a sticker on her hand from saying the prayer in Primary. I forgot it was there.

We sure had great weather for the three-day-weekend (or four-day--I know the kids in the complex were home from school on Friday too). It was beautifully warm and sunny all four days. Must have been nice for all the people who went camping.

Goldfish bread and walnut cookies (and seaweed!)

We've been getting to know our new Korean neighbors. I've had a few conversations with the mom while the kids are playing. My Korean is getting a workout. Some things come out just fine and some things I kind of get stuck on.

A few weeks ago she gave us some kimchi that she'd made, so I made jjigae. (I wasn't sure how it would agree with my nursing baby, but decided to give it a try.) We ate it with kim (roasted laver seaweed), which is, in my opinion, the very best way to eat it. And then we ran out of kim, so we had to go get some more.

We went down to Paldo World in Lakewood. (This was on a Tuesday, almost two weeks ago.) There are a whole bunch of Korean businesses down there on South Tacoma Way. And this sign:



which always makes me laugh, because in English it says "International Business District," but in Korean it says "Korea Town." (I think there are a few Vietnamese Pho places scattered in there, but obviously they don't count.)



Paldo World is a huge grocery store, with some other little stores and a food court around the edges.

I took along my camera because I wanted to get a picture of the goldfish bread and walnut cookie maker.



Here's the place, but there was no one there.



Then I noticed this sign, which says, "Every week on Tuesday, we rest. Thank you." (Why Tuesday is in quotes, I have no idea.) Bad timing on our part!

So I took a picture of this sign instead.

Goldfish bread and walnut cookies are both "street food" in Korea. I always wanted to get a picture of a goldfish bread maker on the street, but I never did. They use these big round irons over a gas flame--squirt the batter in, add some bean paste, close the lid, rotate the iron one stop, do it again--and by the time the fish comes around again, it's all done and ready to come out. A lot of foreigners don't like the red bean paste which is the filling (I heard that some of our missionaries once took a jar of strawberry jam to a goldfish bread maker and asked if he would make them a round with the jam instead of bean paste, and he wouldn't do it). I did like goldfish bread. Especially on a cold day when it's fresh and warm, right out of the iron. (I found some pictures on google--here's a good one.)

Walnut cookies are similar--little walnut-shaped cake things with walnut stuff inside. Chonan, where Doug and I taught English, is famous for walnut cookies. Seems like every place in Korea is famous for some kind of food.

Goldfish bread is boong-o bbang (붕어빵) and walnut cookies are hodo kwaja (호도과자). Which brings me to one of the few Korean jokes that I know. A girl buys a bag of walnut cookies on the street, comes back a few minutes later and complains, "There's no hodo in my hodo kwaja!" and the guy says, "Is there boong-o in boong-o bbang?" Ha.

We got our kim and a few other things, then went home and had jjigae for dinner again.



Here's one of the kim packages. We got a big pack that has twelve of these in it.



Kate couldn't wait for dinner but sat down on the couch with one of the packages and snarfed down the whole thing. And then had some more with rice.

Unfortunately the kimchi seemed to upset Andy's tummy. I guess I'll have to wait before doing that again!

Andy at 20 weeks

(last Saturday)





We can really see Doug's side of the family in this one.




He looks like he's expounding on something very serious. Or contemplating his future plans for world domination.

photos from home

Robot Kate ("Clang! Clang!")



Andy checks out his sister's rubber dragon.



An ordinary day on the railroad.

Just So.

Some time last summer, Kate ran across some of Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories on totlol.com. (Edit: It's gone to a pay site, but they're on youtube too) Such as "How the Whale got his Throat" and "The Elephant's Child." She seemed to especially enjoy the one about the whale, and watched it over and over. They're fairly good adaptations, though they do change things a bit.

One night at bedtime, Kate asked me, "Can you tell me the story of how the whale got his throat?" (At the time she was pronouncing it more like "fwout.")

I said, "I can do better than that, I'll read it to you!"

I got this bookwhen I was at BYU. Dr. Tunnel, my children's lit professor, had a copy that he showed us in class, and I fell in love with the illustrations--gorgeous paintings with intricate patterned frames and gold accents.



The stories are rather wordy, and the book doesn't have pictures on every page, but Kate enjoys listening. I have, at times, read to her from whatever book I'm in the middle of while she falls asleep. This is after the regular bedtime stories and books, of course. The current bedtime routine includes stories and books with Dad ("stories" usually means acting things out with her stuffed animals), then teeth brushing and family prayer, then three more books with Mom. I went through a brief Three Investigators revival a while back (must have been something with the pregnancy hormones), and I read to her from those. She'd ask questions every once in a while--enough to show that she was paying attention at least a bit--but even with that she'd usually fall asleep pretty quickly.

We've been reading a Just So story almost every night for quite a while now. She hardly ever falls asleep (except sometimes when we do one of the longer ones). They're just fun to listen to, with the rhythm and repetition ("the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever trees").

They're meant to be read aloud. It's not just about the stories, it's about the words. Which I can understand might not appeal to everyone. There's an introduction in the front of the book that includes an excerpt from a spoof "Very-Nearly Story" published in the humorous magazine Punch, which tells "how the Ruddikip got His Great Big Side!" The Ruddikip announces:

"I will now turn to the Small Children, and I shall address them in decapitated polysyllables."

Wherefore and 'cordingly, oh, Best-Beloved, the most and-altogether-beyond-record-'defatigable Ruddikip took his little pen, and he wrote. Then they took the writing of the 'defatigable Ruddikip, and put it in beautiful, big black print. For they knew, oh, Approximately Invaluable, that this is the kind of talk you like, and that you would thank the Ruddikip ever so much for tales written in just this way!

"Chuck it!" said the Modern Child as he rose and fled.

Ha. For the time being, anyway, we're both enjoying them. We have the Whale, the Camel, and the Rhinoceros in regular rotation, being the shortest stories. "The Beginning of Armadillos" is very cute, but quite a bit longer.

It's so fun to see Kate synthesizing and using things that she's heard. The other day she was playing with her Hungry Hungry Hippo game, and I heard her say, "And he swallowed the 'Stute Marble down into his warm, dark, inside cupboards!"

Andy at 19 weeks

(From last Saturday!)



I took Andy out on the back porch in his bouncer to take pictures. He was much more interested in looking around at the trees than looking at the camera, so I tickled him with a peacock feather to get him to smile.

More from Easter

Because I have been informed that it's never too late to post cute pictures!



After I posted the first set of photos from Easter, I remembered that we had this Easter bib to take pictures in.



Right after that, Kate started putting things on Andy's head.



"He looks like a bunny!" Kate says.



I hope these two will be good friends as they grow up.