Outdoor Hour Challenge: Crop Plants-Corn

This week we are going to learn about corn and hopefully you will be able to observe an ear of corn up close. In addition to learning about corn, do your best to spend some time outdoors enjoying the summer weather. If it is too hot in the afternoons, try going outside in the early morning right after breakfast or in the evening and see if that makes it more enjoyable for your family.

I found a YouTube video that I enjoyed watching that you may want to view and share with your children.



I like how it shows a lot of different aspects of corn growing that I never thought of before.

How about a video about popcorn?

I see something else we could eat this week!


Outdoor Hour Challenge
Crop Plants #3
Corn and Maize

Inside Preparation Work
1. Read in the Handbook of Nature Study pages 598-604. Highlight any facts about corn that can be shared with your children during the follow-up activity.




Suggested activity:
“Corn should be germinated between wet blotters in a seed testing experiment before observations are made on the growing corn of the fields.”
Handbook of Nature Study, page 601

Follow the same procedure that you did with the bean germination to germinate a few kernels of corn. The Germinator
http://pbskids.org/zoom/activities/sci/germinator.html
(This project was a part of Outdoor Hour Challenge #19 and the Bean Challenge.)

Outdoor Time
3. For this challenge, spend 10-15 minutes outdoors. Afterwards, you might include a trip to the grocery store to pick out some ears of corn to observe and then to eat at a meal. Check on any seeds or plants that you have in your garden for the challenges. Keep your eyes out for some clover if you have not had the chance to study some up close yet.

Follow-Up Activity
4. Allow time for discussion and a nature journal entry after your outdoor time. Follow up any interest in any subjects you observed during your outdoor time. You can use the questions in the Handbook of Nature Study on page 603 to help you observe an actual ear of corn. (If you purchased the Crop Plants notebook pages, there is a place on the corn page to record your answers.)

5. Prepare corn for eating and enjoy! You may want to pop some corn and have a popcorn feast as well. You may wish to view this YouTube video about popcorn: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2lKV02JzPc

Here is a corn coloring page for you to print for younger students:
http://coloringbookfun.com/vegy/imagepages/corn.htm

We are thinking about growing some popcorn next year. Here is a link with some information:
http://howtogardenguide.com/2008/03/05/growing-popcorn-how-to-grow-popcorn-in-your-garden/






New for this series of challenges are custom made notebook pages for each crop plant we will study. I have designed simple to use pages that will complement each challenge and will be an easy way to start a nature journal. Each of the eight notebook pages is in full color, but they are just as great in black and white. These notebook pages can be purchased for $2.50.

SAMPLE

As usual, you can complete the challenges without the notebook pages or you can use freebies from the top tab of my blog.

Skywatch Friday - A day at the Beach

Sun. Yes we had a day of sun. So we went to the seaside. A wonderful day at Brighton.

Don't forget to visit all the other skywatchers around the globe.

Breaking the Mould

As part of their War Beneath the Skin season, BBC4 last night broadcast Breaking the Mould: The Story of Penicillin.

Details:

"Whilst it is widely recognised that Alexander Fleming was the man who discovered penicillin, the truth is a bit more complicated than that and the extraordinary story of Professor Florey is hardly known.

Set against the background of the early years of the Second World War, this factually-based drama shows how it was Professor Florey and his team who persevered against incredible odds to make penicillin an applicable medicine, whilst refusing to patent it for commercial gain.

A revealing, poignant and witty character-driven account of a miraculous scientific breakthrough, Breaking The Mould tells the little known story of Professor Florey and the team of unsung heroes from the prestigious Dunn School of Pathology at Oxford University who were behind the discovery of penicillin, that changed the world of medicine forever".

A number of the Wellcome Library’s archive collections have a direct link to the story of penicillin’s development. These include the papers of Norman Heatley, including his laboratory notebooks and correspondence with Florey; Ernst Chain, who shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology applied to Medicine with Fleming and Florey; and Sir Edward Mellanby, Secretary of the Medical Research Council during the period, and an important figure in connecting the disparate research communities working in this field.

That the mass production of penicillin in this country was achieved during the Second World War was due in no small part to the creation in 1941 of the Therapeutic Research Corporation (TRC), a consortium of five leading UK drug companies. One of the members was the Wellcome Foundation Ltd, and the papers relating to the involvement of the company in the TRC are part of the Wellcome Foundation Archive.

Breaking the Mould is available to watch through the BBC’s iPlayer.

Heritage Wardens

I didn't know these guys even existed until the other day. However Heritage Wardens have been keeping us safe in Trafalgar Square since 2000. Apparently.

Jackie (8) O

Jackie and Aristotle Onassis leave an Athens club at 7 a.m. after celebrating her 40th birthday, 1969. Photo: Nicholas Tsikourias/Getty Images


On what would have been her 80th birthday, I'm going to suggest a revisionist theory - that Jacqueline Kennedy's years as Mrs. Onassis (from 1968 - 1975) were not the emotional wasteland and loveless rebound of popular opinion but an interesting and refreshing period of her life. My evidence is the pictures from this period selected by Life Magazine for their website. Judge for yourselves.

To me, in these pictures she looks happy and svelte and stylish, while Aristotle looks surprisingly hip in a proto-90s/Tom Ford jet-set way. I may be obsessing on consumerist values these days, but I feel like the current economic situation and society's economic and cultural values are so tied up with celebrity consciousness that there's much to explore and analyze.

So here's a view of Jackie - not as the demure First Lady, not the grieving widow, but a harbinger of the social x-ray, shopper celebrity, paparazzi target that we see so much of today.

Jackie Kennedy Onassis shops with her niece and nephew in Capri, 1970. Photo: Ron Galella/WireImage

Jackie on Madison Avenue, October 1971. Photo: Ron Galella/WireImage

New York, April 1974. Photo: Tom Wargacki/WireImage

Jackie and Aristotle Onassis dress for a night out, 1970. Photo: Tom Wargacki/WireImage

Lou Costello's Fractured Fairy Tale

Here’s something I learned from Bob Furmanek and Ron Palumbo’s Abbott and Costello In The Movies book: A&C signed a five-year deal with NBC in 1951 guaranteeing them fifteen million dollars to do twenty-two half-hour shows on film and four to eight live hour programs during the contract's first year. Over the next four, they would add forty-four TV shows annually, half on film and half live. Now … here’s my question: What did Bud and Lou contemplate filling all those hours with? Material they’d used for Colgate Comedy Hours clicked and led to the rich deal with NBC, but that was mostly burlesque mined since first teaming in the thirties. Gags at Universal had arrived at stale, as were features hosting them, that situation plain to both comedians. Television seems in hindsight to have been the perfect medium for A&C. They still conjured stage patter like no one else. I’d like to have been around for one of their Vegas shows, for I’ll bet these were leagues ahead of anything A&C did in movies. Home tubes were most hospitable to acts needing little more than a backdrop curtain fronted with seltzer-bottles. Complexity beyond that struggled against tiny screens and snowy reception. What if NBC spent some of the fifteen million on fresh writers for Abbott and Costello? Comic minds (Mel Brooks? Carl Reiner?) starting out with rival vid clowns might have given A&C a freshened lease on mirth-making, but could Bud and Lou have transitioned to unplowed fields of comedy, and would viewers have accepted it if they had? Being far removed from live programming of the day (despite surviving kinescopes) robs us of awareness of just how hot the team flashed with TV's beckoning. At that point, it wasn’t necessary for Abbott and Costello to come up with anything new. Home delivery of routines tried-and-true was enough to make them sensations again, but like their meteoric feature rise, it wasn’t built to last. I only have a couple of figures for A&C’s late-model Universal pics, but they must have done alright for continued parceling of them, and the team’s name was sufficient to raise monies for outside ventures permitted under their U-I contract (The Noose Hangs High and Africa Screams as of 1951). Could other teams have finagled loans needed to start and finish a full-length comedy during the late forties/early fifties? The Marx Brothers managed it twice, while Laurel and Hardy had only Euro dollars to back an offshore venture that would be their last. Abbott and Costello got independent-backed work all the way to the end (Dance With Me, Henry) and might have gone on doing so had they remained a team. With such boxoffice capital as they enjoyed in 1951, why shouldn’t Bud and Lou generate Abbott and Costello comedies to call their own?

Bob Thomas wrote in his 1977 team bio that Banker’s Trust fronted cash for Jack and The Beanstalk, a Lou Costello-produced venture to be released by Warner Bros. It was said the latter wanted to do business with A&C, so internal inquiries must have indicated commercial life left in the boys. Costello realized his audience was increasingly kids and planned accordingly. Jack would mimic The Wizard Of Oz and The Blue Bird in all respects but money spent for production values. Its gaudy Super-Cinecolor looked like a Van Beuren cartoon sprung to live action, while singing passages, other than a few by Lou himself, were grindingly bad (Costello personally talent scouted for Jack’s romantic relievers, Shaye Cogan and James Alexander --- neither performed much after this). Bob Thomas says Bud Abbott collected $200,000 as salary against costs of $450,000 incurred by Jack and The Beanstalk. Lou would then receive the same amount for Bud’s production of Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd, to follow within a year. Furmanek/Palumbo offer figures more reliable, to-wit a Jack and The Beanstalk negative cost of $682,580, including $115,000 each for the comedians, leaving $417,742 for the show after A&C's rake-off. Costello for once watched expenditures, as there was more potential profit for him to share in. Stars paying themselves often did so at the expense of what patrons eventually saw. William Boyd’s own Hoppy westerns looked mighty cheap toward the end thanks to monies he pocketed before cameras turned. Lou Costello’s venture lacked surface polish of even their poorest Universal output, which had at least resources of a major studio, even if the best of these were denied A&C comedies. I read of how Jack and The Beanstalk utilized standing sets from Joan Of Arc, a legendary budget-burner shot four to five years previous on rented stages at Hal Roach Studios. For all the pics alleged to have borrowed them, those Joan flats must have gotten pretty threadbare over a seeming decade of low budget re-use.

As was often the case, selling trumped producing for effort and energy. To make a picture is one thing, but to go out on the road on a hectic trip to help bring it to the attention of the public is something else again, said Exhibitor magazine in its coverage of the team’s twelve-city tour. Jack and The Beanstalk brought Lou Costello back to hometown Paterson, New Jersey for a premiere momentous beyond rewards to be found in his movie. There were Lion’s Club and Chamber Of Commerce socials to attend, plus checks for varied charities given higher profiles via their acceptance by Abbott and Costello. I wonder what became of all the scrolls and plaques received along the thousands of publicity (and philanthropic) miles (in this case 8,000) these comics traveled. When A&C appeared at your podium, it hardly mattered that their picture wasn’t much good. Ten years of stardom had made indelible brand names of both, and you really get a sense of what that celebrity (and now personal contact) meant to home-folks surrounding Bud and Lou during the Jack tour. As to rental figures, Jack and The Beanstalk collected $1.4 million domestic and $1.1 foreign, more than Abbott-produced Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd, which realized $1.2 million domestic and $892,000 foreign. Warner Brothers seems to have gotten overall better revenues out of A&C than Universal around that period, as U-I’s Abbott and Costello Go To Mars took $1.0 million in domestic rentals and Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde stopped at $979,000 domestic. Lou Costello was said to have "owned" Jack and The Beanstalk, which I assume means the negative, so did his estate allow it to slip into the public domain after an initial twenty-eight years of protection? I’d like to know what became of the negative itself, as what survives on present-day DVD is a port-over of Bob Furmanek’s laser-disc'ed 35mm print, which is striking in its SuperCinecolor, with original sepia opening and closings. That LD for Image is actually the preferred presentation of Jack and The Beanstalk, being loaded with extras unique to the disc, and unlike the DVD, acknowledging Furmanek's effort in presenting it.

I scoured YouTube, without success, for an oddball little subject that used to turn up on American Movie Classics back when that was a network worth watching. It was an inside Hollywood filler produced, I think, by Coy Watson, Jr. A Google search reveals these were made in 1949-50 (called Hollywood Reel) and featured stars engaged in offscreen hobbies and activity. One featured Stan Laurel judging a children’s swim meet. Another segment had Lou Costello showing off … what was it … an icemaker he’d invented? I remember being impressed. Too bad it’s twenty years since seeing it. Did Lou come up with something revolutionary that he never got credit for (or maybe never filed proper patent on)? I’d imagine ongoing royalties on the world’s first icemaker would pay higher than a hundred years of prat-falling in movies, but chances are better I’m just uninformed as to history of icemakers and who initially developed them. It’s just nice to think it might have been Lou Costello. The licking his reputation took (and like Joan Crawford’s, prevails to now) began with publication in 1977 of Bob Thomas’ Bud and Lou, a bio later revealed to have been largely the impressions of soured agent Eddie Sherman, who’d been fired/rehired and generally knocked about by the boys throughout most of their (high) commission-generating careers. For those couple of seasons needed to demolish A&C’s image (mostly Lou’s), there was this book and a scurrilous 1978 TV-movie based on it, also titled Bud and Lou. The one-two punch derailed Costello’s standing as a comic artist and demonized him personally. A persuasive rebuttal came from his daughter Chris in a 1981 memoir. I just read Lou’s On First again and am satisfied Costello got a bum rap from re-imaginers who clearly profited from hoisting him down (Chris got quotes from A&C co-workers who hadn’t spoken before, or since). Indeed, the 70’s might have been about the last decade wherein one could score meaningful publication/movie deals bleaching the bones of Golden Age stars. Three decades further on, it isn’t likely anyone will strike gold in those fields again.

You'll Absolutely Lovett!

As part of an event to celebrate the launch of the new issue of One Eye Grey, tonight in the Cuming Museum, Ross MacFarlane, Research Officer, Wellcome Library, will give a short talk on Edward Lovett and his collection of folklore objects.

Lovett collected thousands of healing objects from around the world during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, with one main area of interest being the beliefs of working class Londoners.

Lovett’s collection is now spread across many museums in the UK, though some of the items he collected are on display in the Medicine Man gallery of Wellcome Collection. The Wellcome Library also holds detailed correspondence between Lovett and the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum, on the acquisition of parts of his collection.

(Shown above is a blue bead necklace, collected by Lovett and on display in Medicine Man. It was worn to protect against Bronchitis)

Cafe Seats

The latest seats around the outdoor eating places in Camden market.

Said the Shark - True Love from Iwave records on Vimeo.

Great Sunflower Project

Today we did some observations as part of the Great Sunflower Project. We signed up earlier in the year to participate and they sent us some seeds to plant in our garden. Our job was to observe the sunflowers once they bloom and count how many bees visited our flowers. You are asked to observe until you see five bees or for thirty minutes.

We did not have to wait even a minute before we saw our first bee! We had five bees observed in less than five minutes.

Here is one sunflower that is just unfolding its bloom. I love the way it looks.


I love the patterns in this sunflower. You can really see how it is a composite flower with its rays and florets.


This bee couldn't wait for the sunflower to open...he had to push his way into the inside to reach the pollen.


Have you ever seen so much pollen on a bee before? I couldn't stop watching this guy and his overloaded pollen sacs. Wow! He is one busy bee.


This is my favorite sunflower in the whole garden. We grew it from a seed saved from last year and it is a Mammoth Sunflower. It is really tall and the bloom is huge.


This is my son who is six feet tall....he is dwarfed by this sunflower. Look at how large the leaves are!


This is what the finches are doing to the leaves. They sit and nibble every afternoon. I guess there is enough to share.

This is a really fun and easy project. Check out the Great Sunflower Project for your family next year.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom

REVEALED: THE BEST OF MANCHESTER 2009

With over 250 entries and a judging panel that includes some of the biggest names in British art, music and fashion, Urbis has announced the winners of this year’s Best of Manchester Awards.

We all love Manchester, there’s something of a northern cool about this place, look at its history with music – Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays, Stone Roses, Oasis, Badly Drawn Boy – need I say more? There’s also the uber cool Afflecks Palace and a host of museums and galleries, as well as the Manchester International Festival. You’ve got to admit, there’s something special about Manchester.


The Best of Manchester Awards, organised by Urbis, celebrate innovation in art, music and fashion. Open to anyone that lives or works in Manchester, candidates this year stood a chance of having their work judged by a panel of industry experts that included Peter Saville, Wayne Hemingway, the Turner Prize winning artist, Jeremy Deller, Tim Marlow (White Cube, London), Miranda Sawyer, Yvette Livesey (In The City) and Luke Bainbridge (Observer Music Monthly). Together, the panel of judges selected just three winners:

THE WINNER OF THE BEST OF MANCHESTER ART AWARD 2009 IS OWL PROJECT.

Owl Project is an art collective comprised of three artists: Simon Blackmore, Antony Hall and Steve Symons. Drawing on a wide range of influences and interests – including woodwork, hobby-style electronics and open source software - Owl Project has produced a range of semi-sculptural musical instruments that have been exhibited across Europe and premiered at events such as the Sonic Arts Network EXPO, Lovebytes and Futuresonic. These portable ‘rustic’ instruments, with names such as the iLog, m-Log and the Log1k, are working digital instruments that mimic popular handheld gadgets such as the ubiquitous iPod. The only difference is that Owl Project’s instruments are crafted from simple, untreated pieces of wood.



The Log1k was Owl Project’s first such foray into art, electronics and woodwork. ‘There was something about the image of the performer standing behind a log that made us laugh,’ said the collective, describing an artwork created at a time when many musicians were using laptops during live performances. ‘But it also felt really natural to be working with the raw materials of wood, batteries and switches.’ The Log1k evolved from pastiche to an instrument capable of producing complex polyrhythms, and drew interest from musicians, designers and software developers. ‘It stands in resistance to music made within the rigid structures of commercial audio software,’ said the collective.


THE JOINT WINNERS OF THE BEST OF MANCHESTER MUSIC AWARD 2009 IS JAYNE COMPTON AND MAX MORAN

For the first time, the Best of Manchester judges have decided to award a joint first place in the music category. This decision reflects the very high standard of entries, and the complimentary, but equally impressive, skills of both winners.

Jayne Compton was selected by the judges because of a diverse portfolio of work that includes the long-running experimental club night, Club Brenda, ‘a genuinely uncompromising underground art happening’, according to Compton, which blends live music, art and performance. Compton also won praise for her Switchflicker Records label and an upcoming Arts Council book, Strange Trees (which incidentally features illustration from BOMA art nominee, Rachel Goodyear). ‘Established in 2000, Switchflicker has given voice to some of Manchester’s most esoteric performers, such as Divine David and Chloe Poems, whilst remaining tuned into new pop talent, including 2008’s surprise hit, the Ting Tings, who launched their career at the label,’ said Compton. Compton’s current signing, Magic Arm, is fast becoming one of the most talked about acts in the country, while Compton herself says, ‘We bring Manchester’s contemporary art scene together with the underground music scene – following in Manchester’s punk/art tradition.’


Max Moran was selected by the judges for an energetic portfolio of work that includes the video-based music blog, ThisTownSounds.com, his sell-out club night, Hot Club, its laid back sister session, Hat Club and, more recently, Moran’s burgeoning record label, Hit Club. Running since 2007, ThisTownSounds has premiered White Lies’ first ever filmed interview, as well as early performances from the likes of Florence & The Machine. Moran won particular praise for his entrepreneurial attitude and his contribution to the music scene in Manchester as a whole. As well as managing much of the filming and writing for his blog, Moran also puts on club nights, handles their promotion, runs a weekly Friday night session at Trof in Fallowfield and is in the early stages of setting up a record label. ‘Hot Club has been constantly involved in the evolution of the Manchester music scene,’ said Moran, ‘whether it be its involvement with new venues such as Blink, The Chapel, Redrum and The Corner or its support of new local bands and artists.’

THE WINNER OF THE BEST OF MANCHESTER FASHION AWARD 2009 IS HOLLY RUSSELL

Holly Russell is an alumnus of Manchester School of Art whose shimmering, stunning graduate collection features hundreds of hand-sewn scarab beetle wings. Russell has also collaborated with a metal worker to incorporate aluminium into her designs and an astronomer to create embellished digital prints. ‘Working with unusual materials I am able to create interesting surface textures, which helps make my designs very bold and distinctive,’ said Russell. ‘I do not conform to creating generic clothing…I prefer to look at the body almost as a plinth to display beautiful designs and creations. When worn, I consider my garments as works of art that come to life.’ Hugely ambitious but with a realistic approach to the fashion industry, Russell has already taken part in a placement at the independent label, Aminaka Wilmont and, later this year, hopes to take up an MA in Fashion Womenswear at the renowned Royal College of Art.

Each category winner received £2,000, as well as a 12-month professional development package - designed to help them kick-start their career with the kind of contacts and professional development that money can’t buy. It’s well worth a visit, because, based on the stellar work of these individuals, I think we’ll be seeing much more of them in the future.

The Best of Manchester exhibition runs until 20 September.

www.urbis.org.uk

Teamwork

I think I found one of the pianos that have been installed around the city for the summer festival, in its new life. Playing their own tunes happily together. If only we could all live like this.

New Outdoor Hour Challenge Ebook! Garden Flowers

This ebook contains the Garden Flower Challenges as well as the Sunflower Challenges for a total of ten challenges! (Challenges 12-19 and 29-30)

Here is an excerpt from the introduction to the Garden Flower and Plant Challenges ebook:

"The Outdoor Hour Challenges are different from any other nature study program. These challenges are written for the parent, encouraging them to involve the whole family in nature study.

All ages will benefit from working through these garden challenges. Gardening, especially with flowers, introduces children to a whole world to explore. Within the garden realm lies not only beauty in shapes and colors but also a complex web of life. From seed back to seed again, the flower’s growing cycle will continue and our children will begin to understand the role of seeds, flowers, and plants in nature. This truly is nature study that can be done right outside your own back door. "



What is Included in the Outdoor Hour Challenge Garden Flower and Plant Ebook

• Ten Garden Flower and Plant Challenges
• One suggested field trip
• Two art projects
• Four garden projects
• Ten custom notebook pages
• Lots of photos and examples from our nature journals
• Additional materials and resources
• Links to various types of nature study information that will help you complete the challenges
• Tips and ideas from the Handbook of Nature Study blog
• Links to my YouTube videos
• Larger photos and nature journal examples
• Sample HERE.
  

This fifty page full color ebook is available for the price of $6.95.

I will be sending this ebooks personally to the email that is attached to your Paypal account. Please allow 24 hours for delivery although it is usually much quicker than that. I listened to the families that reviewed the first Outdoor Hour Challenge eBook and included even more photos...larger than before. I have kept the same simple format with lots of suggestions and examples. I have made even more connections between the challenges and the notebook pages and I hope these pages help you get started with your nature journals in a painless way.

This ebook is appropriate for families with children of all ages and you can adapt any of the challenges to your particular locality. You can complete the challenges in any order and they are written so that you can have the flexibility to have a focus on garden flowers but still enjoy and learn about whatever kind of nature captures your child's interest.

This is a book that will appeal to families that are just starting out with gardening as well as veteran gardeners. I am hoping that this ebook will arouse a passion for nature by observing the plants and flowers right in your backyard or neighborhood.

Review
Would you like to read a review from an Outdoor Hour Challenge family that used this Garden Flowers Ebook?
Rhonda and her children share their experiences at Preparation Education.

You can use this book at any time of the year with any flowers you have in your local area. You do not have to plant the flowers from seeds, but you can visit your local nursery and purchase a flower in a pot if you prefer. You can also use flowers in your local park or neighborhood to observe and study using the Handbook of Nature Study.

If you have already completed the Outdoor Hour Challenge-Getting Started ebook, you can now move on to the Garden Flower and Plant Challenges ebook.

My sincere hope is that this new Outdoor Hour Challenge ebook will be an inspiration and a guide to many families in the coming months. Please email me at any time if you have any questions about how to get started with the Outdoor Hour Challenges. harmonyfinearts@yahoo.com

Barb-Harmony Art Mom

Yosemite Amazes Me

We had a great camping/hiking trip to Yosemite National Park...it was a little bit hot in the valley so we tried to stay cool by hiking up in the high country, swimming in the river, and generally keeping to early morning hikes and activities.

Here are a bunch of photos in random sort of order just because I don't feel like moving them around now that I uploaded them to Blogger. (Some might call that lazy...)


The meadows were filled with wildflowers and it was a feast for the eyes as you hiked along. This lovely bunch of flowers was at McGurk Meadow. This place is along Glacier Point Road and is about a three mile round trip hike from the road. The insects are thick but if you keep moving they pretty much leave you alone. The Indian Paintbrush was the predominant flower on this day.


The California Coneflowers were in full bloom at Crane Flat and this one was as big as my hand. It almost looks like a flat sunflower it was so big.


One of the many nature journal entries that we worked on back at camp. The Locoweed was thick at Crane Flat and it was fun to sketch and paint.


How about this wildflower? Elephant's Head was blooming alongside Lukens Lake.



Here is Lukens Lake on a summer morning. The hike from Tioga Pass Road to the lake is about 1.5 miles and it is worth the effort. It has a beautiful meadow that you could hike across until last year when they closed it for restoration. You now walk alongside the lake the whole way and can only see the meadow from a distance.


Nothing like a swimming hole in the high country on a hot summer day. We were hiking along the John Muir Trail when we stopped to listen to the water falling down the rocks into the pool. Some fellow hikers tried to convince us to jump in but I knew the water was ice cold. We did end up taking our boots and socks off and sitting with our feet dangling in. It is amazing how fast your feet go numb in the icy waters. This is the Tuolumne River just outside Tuolumne Meadows hiking towards Rafferty Creek.



Here is another high country lake with crystal blue waters. We ate lunch one hot afternoon here and there really were quite a number of other folks around...some kayaking, some swimming, some wading in and cooling off, and some like us just enjoying the view.

This is actually just behind our campsite at Crane Flat. The meadow is in full bloom right now and it is tempting to walk out there and take photos. I did obey the sign and we stayed off the meadow. We did see a bear coming out of the meadow a short way from here but it was busy trotting off somewhere and didn't even notice us.


This was the insect of the day at McGurk Meadow. Dozens of these guys were fluttering around on the flowers and this one was nice enough to sit still for a photo. I actually think it is a moth...research to be completed soon.



Here is another photo of the same kind of insect.

Now this flower I knew! Mariposa Lily and there were quite a few growing in a bunch alongside the trail at McGurk Meadow. It is just so perfect. Sigh.



Here is another photo of the meadow as we hiked along. The meadow was damp and it made it sort of steamy in the sun. Hiking in the shade wasn't so bad but out in the bright sunshine we got a bit hot....okay, we got sweaty. It was a good thing we had packed lots of water and Gatorade to drink.



These blue butterflies were landing on the damp ground. I learned from Casey's blog that they call this puddling. They were definitely landing in the moist earth of the meadow and staying there awhile. It made a great chance for me to snap a few photos.


The star wildflower on this trip was the Indian Paintbrush. We all agreed it was our favorite flower in the meadow.

This trip was a boys trip and my dear husband decided to teach the boys to whittle. He had purchased each of them their own knives and presented them to each one once we set up camp. It must be a guy thing. :)

Here is dad giving them a lesson on safety and how to use the knife to whittle. They whittled the afternoon away and I finished reading two good books.



It was a great July vacation and we already have plans to go back next year. The boys have plans to hike to the top of Half Dome. I told them that they could go and I would stay behind and have dinner ready when they got down. :)

I am not really all that great with heights and since they are both teens now, they are eager to test their strength on a long, strenuous hike. Their dad is undecided about whether he wants to try it or not....we have some time to think about it.

Hope you enjoyed some scenes from our trip....grab the chance to go to Yosemite if you ever come this way.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom
I recently added a Squidoo Lens on Yosemite books: Yosemite for Families