Florida Discoveries 15: Great Blue Heron in Action!

24. July 2011 · Comments Off on Florida Discoveries 15: Great Blue Heron in Action! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,

First of all, I learned that it’s “heron” and not “huron“.  Oops.  I was wondering why my Google searches kept directing me to Michigan-related websites…

Last night Dave and I went on a good old fashioned DATE!  The kids are visiting grandparents in the northeast through next weekend, and even though Dave’s hard at work these two weeks, we had a fantastic weekend!  Yesterday we went tubing on a creek in the northern part of the Florida Panhandle, then we went parasailing and wrapped up the evening with a delightful steamed seafood dinner.  I’ll be blogging about our parasailing next, but for now I wanted to share this cool series of iPhone pictures I took of this Great Blue Heron* enjoying some fish.  I didn’t have my good camera with me, since I didn’t want to lose it on the parasailing boat.

I thanked the family who bought the fish feed that lured the fish for the bird to eat…

*Yes, I’m capitalizing the full name of this species of bird, per this journal article.

He started out on the dock, staring intently at a patch of water near the public fish food machine.

Staring hard…

Now he’s on a floating platform just below the fish feed machine…he moved to this spot after a kid put 50 cents in the  machine and got a handful of fish food.

Splash!  He quickly darts his beak into the water as the fish come up to get the feed.

He got one!

After swallowing the first fish, he’s immediately on the lookout again…

Splash!

Another one!

You can see how the fish has enlarged his neck.

Change of Command

21. July 2011 · 5 comments · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Last Friday was Dave’s change of command.  He took command of the 2d Combat Weather Systems Squadron.  For any no-longer-actively-serving-in-Air-Force-Weather types, the squadron stood up in early 2010 combining personnel from the AF Combat Weather Center at Hurlburt Field with the Weather System Support Cadres from Robins and Tinker AFBs.

Both sets of parents, Dave’s brother and our niece came into town to see the ceremony.  It went off without a hitch, and here are a few pictures of our day.

I think I’m looking at someone else taking a picture of me, but I wanted to show off one of the pretty corsages all the ladies in our family were wearing.

Dave presented me flowers.  He called it an advance apology for late nights and changes to weekend plans.  ðŸ™‚  He knew to get me a mixed bouquet instead of roses or lilies, which are typically what one sees given.  That mixed bouquet is still looking like it was just picked 5 days later in a vase on our kitchen table 🙂
The boys each got one of these coins.  A great gift!  Good job Dad!  We’re so proud of you!

Spawn of the Pond

20. July 2011 · Comments Off on Spawn of the Pond · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Last week I talked about bringing 3 tadpoles into the house as a mini-science lesson for the boys.  Those tadpoles spent the weekend in a glass mixing bowl while all of our visitors were here.  They swam around, eating fish food and leaving plenty of algae-green-colored droppings.  You could see visible changes in their eyes and by the end of the weekend, the telltale legs had sprouted on the two largest ones.

July 13th

July 18th

On Monday I went to the local pet store and picked up a medium-sized “Critter Carrier” and set up some rocks on one end.  This will be an area for the tadpoles to start hanging out once they figure out what to do with their legs 🙂

You can see one of the tadpoles in the center foreground, and there’s one in the center of the pack of the tank.

In other pond news, I got some good pictures of what I assume is the tadpoles’ mother:

This son-of-a-gun is LOUD at night.  My condolences to all our houseguests who have to sleep in Jacob’s bedroom whose window is right next to this pond.

And the fish in the pond seem happy.  Unlike the two sets of koi we had, these folks come crowding over when I stand nearby, they know where their food is coming from, ha ha!

Not-Quite-Boston Baked Beans

19. July 2011 · Comments Off on Not-Quite-Boston Baked Beans · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags:
Boston Baked Beans with a Southern flair….

I’ve been rather scarce, busy with our visitors this past weekend (that’s for another blog post which is forthcoming) and now that the extended family is now all safe and sound back home, I have some time to play catch-up with the household and some of the administrative pieces of my life.  I can also catch up some blog posts on my mind….

While we were visiting my parents in June, they grilled steaks and burgers for us.  They also served up some delicious homemade “Boston Baked Beans”.  My Dad had made them from scratch (he loves to cook!) from a recipe from America’s Test Kitchen’s Cook’s Country magazine.  Since the recipe is copyrighted and you have to pay to see the recipe online (or at least sign up for the 14-day free trial), I’ll point you to the website, but won’t reproduce the recipe here.

Jacob and I are the only bean-eaters in the family, which is unfortunate, because beans are so stinkin’ (pun intended) good for you!  Low fat, high fiber, flavorful…

Dad gave me a printout of the recipe from the magazine (which he could do as a paid subscriber) and I made up a big pot of them the day after I got home from our trip!  Except, I didn’t make them exactly as in the recipe, since I had some ingredients on hand that I thought would make reasonable substitutes….

…starting with the salt pork.  I had a HUGE package of ham hocks in the freezer.  After all, this is the south and ham hocks are WAY easier to acquire than salt pork…Emeril Lagasse has a ham hocks and beans recipe that will seem similar to mine, except I’m keeping the molasses and brown sugar from the Boston baked beans…

…and the Dijon mustard.  If you open our fridge, you’d be greeted with four bottles of mustard: two bottles of French’s yellow mustard, one bottle of Gulden’s brown mustard, and one bottle of Zatarain’s Creole mustard — hands down the best mustard EVER!  I had a hankerin’ for the Creole mustard…

Dad told me that Boston baked beans, by definition, has molasses and salt pork or pork fat, so my substitution of something other than salt pork would make them migrate away from their Bostonian roots.  And then I can share the recipe!

The other point to make here is that this is a “quick cook” beans recipe.  Boil the beans with some baking soda for 20 minutes to soften them.  After some prep cooking of the meat and veggies, you simply bake the beans for about 2 hours — having just-like-cooked-overnight beans in a fraction of the time!

Patricia’s Not-Quite-Boston Baked Beans – inspired by “Quicker Boston Baked Beans” recipe in June/July 2011 Cook’s Country magazine.

1 lb. dried navy beans, picked over and rinsed
1 Tbsp. baking soda
2 large ham hocks, slice as much meat off the bones as possible; keep the bones
1 onion, chopped fine
3 c. water (4 – 4 1/2 c. if you use a Dutch oven)
5 Tbsp. packed dark brown sugar
1/4 c. plus 1 Tbsp. molasses
2 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
4 tsp. Creole mustard
2 tsp. cider vinegar
Salt and pepper

1. Heat oven to 350F.  Make sure oven rack can accommodate your Dutch oven.  Bring 3 quarts water, beans and baking soda to a boil in Dutch oven over high heat.  Reduce heat to medium-high and simmer for 20 minutes.  Drain beans, rinse excess cooking water.

The skins will peel back from the beans, this is a good thing!

2. Return empty pot to medium-high heat.  Cook the chopped ham hock pieces w/ the bones until well-browned, about 10 minutes.  Add onion and cook until soft, about 5 minutes.  Stir in water, beans, sugar, 1/4 c. of molasses, Worcestershire sauce, 1 Tbsp. of the mustard, vinegar and 1/4 tsp of pepper and bring to a boil.  Cover, transfer to oven and cook until the beans are nearly tender, about 1 1/2 hours.

Chopping meat off a ham hock isn’t that easy, but will help things cook down better while in the oven.
Brown the pieces.
Don’t be afraid to let the pieces stick to the bottom some…that’s the good stuff!
Combining everything.
Don’t be afraid to throw in the bones.  The meat and fat there will flavor things up nicely.

3. Remove lid and continue to bake until beans are completely tender, about 30 more minutes.  Stir in the remaining 1 Tbsp. of molasses and remaining 1 tsp. mustard.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.

The same ham hock bone after cooking.  Pick out the bones before serving!

A great main dish!

YUMMMMM!

Howie – Our Photographic Challenge!

16. July 2011 · Comments Off on Howie – Our Photographic Challenge! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
Photo by Fotomom.

While Maryann AKA Fotomom was here visiting last week she took a really sweet picture of Howie in our kitchen.  After she got home this week, she took some time to dress up the picture and wrote a lovely blog post about him and how she made the great picture!

Photographers have been challenged many times with Howie.  Here are a couple of the not-so-great professional family pictures with Howie.

November 2002.

October 2005.

Howie does a good job with sitting still and letting the camera do his thing (hint: just say the magic word, “WALK?” and he’ll look right at you attentively!), if only he showed up better-looking…Maryann got it right by taking advantage of the white-colored setting.

Pandering to the Pond

14. July 2011 · 1 comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , , ,

This week I put away the “kitchen laptop” once and for all.  We got our weather webcam working again with Dave’s old PC laptop that had been sitting in our front office unused since we moved here.

With no kitchen laptop to occupy my time reformatting and partitioning, I’ve taken on a new hopeless project.  Wasn’t sure whether to call it my Waterloo or my Achilles’ heel or what, but it’s effectively taken the place of the kitchen laptop.

I’ve talked about the small pond in front my rental house before.  It’s pretty, and the cascading fountain is really really cool.  Most of the time my involvement with the pond isn’t the greatest.

The hose in the background is connected to our well pump, thus making it easy (and free-of-charge) to refill the pond with non-chlorinated water.

It’s too small.  I’m going to guess the homeowner doesn’t read this blog so I’ll just be honest here and declare that it’s almost inhumane to have tried to keep 4 large koi in that small space.  I’d guess it’s about 55-60 gallons.  Not enough for large goldfish.

I’ve been keeping notes of my “pond issues”.

  • At first there was a lot of splashing out of those cascading trays and when the sprinklers weren’t running in the winter, I had to manually refill the pond almost daily.  I recently rearranged the trays and virtually eliminated this problem.
  • The hose that runs up the center of the fountain often slips and without warning the water isn’t cascading down the trays.  I have to remove one of the trays to access the hose and thread it back up the center of the fountain.  Darned gravity!
  • As I had written about this past spring, I had killed all 4 of the original koi that were with the house when we moved here in December.  So I had replaced those koi with 3 smaller ones.  The day we left on vacation we had thunderstorms and the outdoor electrical circuit that includes the pond pump shorted out.  Within 24 hours, those new koi were dead.
  • The algae!!!  Once the weather started warming up the amounts of algae have been very difficult to control.  The pond is too small for a UV filter, which probably would solve all of our problems, so I’m trying humane methods to control the algae: barley straw packets and manual water changes.
  • There is a frog that lives in or near the pond.  He’s really loud.  My neighbors send me Facebook wall posts, he’s so loud.
  • Or shall I say…”She?”

Meet Mr. Tadpole, one of about a dozen living in the pond now!  Perhaps this picture is difficult to see?  I brought 3 of the tadpoles into the house to show to the boys.

So I now have 3 tadpoles in the kitchen swimming in a Pyrex glass and I’m not sure what to do with them.  I’m considering setting up a small habitat and seeing if we can see the development over the next few weeks…a cool summer science project, right?  After all, I’m the ant-farming, vermicomposting Mom, right?

Also, to replace the koi that died during our vacation, I bought 8 feeder goldfish from our local Wal-mart.  At 38 cents a piece, I’ve officially thrown in the towel on making large investments in this pond.

I tried to get pictures of the new little goldfish trucking around the pond, but the water is so incredibly murky from the algae, it’s been near impossible:

Do you trust me when I say there’s a goldfish in there?

Wish me luck!

Change of Command Time!

12. July 2011 · 5 comments · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
Hey — is this lady really juggling for you?  In my blog post draft this is animated!

Today I’m doing a “reset” of sorts.  As great a time as we had at Disneyworld, on our road trip, and hosting our North Carolina friends showing off the sights of the Florida Panhandle, I realized we were “on the go” for a solid MONTH!

From June 8th through July 10th!  Wow!  And then there’s GeekMom Jenny who’s currently halfway through a 40-day vacation!

So here’s our “reset”: The kids are taking it easy, we’re taking care of a few errands, cleaning up the house some, and we’re getting ready for this weekend’s next set of festivities.

My Dear Husband’s assumption of command is this Friday.  Dave will be taking command of an Air Force weather squadron, and I couldn’t be more proud!  The “change of command” ceremony itself is a pretty elegant affair, and much of our extended family is coming into town this weekend to see the ceremony and celebrate with Dave.

I did a cursory search for some easy-to-digest information to help define Air Force Squadron command to a non-military member.  I didn’t think I’d find it, but I found this recent blog post with exactly what I need!  An Air Force Colonel at Sheppard AFB, TX wrote about how squadron commanders are selected and what kind of job is ahead of the Air Force’s newest squadron commanders.  Wow!  How easy is that?  I’ll just link it for you here:

Sheppard Live: Squadron Command

I’m proud and excited for Dave, but also nervous about what impact squadron command will have on the family.  While part of me is dreading that I’ll never see Dave for the next 2 years, that his new wife will be his squadron, I also remember how it was when Dave first started his 3-year PhD program in North Carolina.  Several fellow Air Force PhD-student families warned me, “Kiss Dave goodbye for the next 3 years.  He’s going to be living at his office!”.

So. Not. True.  Dave did a great job managing his time and even though it was tough work, things didn’t seem as bad as I thought they would be.

We are looking forward to have all the parents in town for the weekend, along with Dave’s brother and our 16-year-old niece.

Road Trip 2011: Traveling Solo With Sons

08. July 2011 · 1 comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,
Easter 2011.

I’ve gotta admit it — my boys travel VERY VERY VERY well. From Jacob and the Amtrak Auto Train to see family at 9 months old, to Timmy and a trip up to North Carolina to find a new house at 4 months old, our boys have learned that long automobile trips are part of the military lifestyle…

I also have to admit that I really enjoy traveling and I like to think that I travel pretty well. But probably not as well as I used to travel, when I’d work a full Air Force day and then hop in the car and drive from Fort Polk, LA to Keesler AFB, MS to spend the weekend with Dave while he was TDY.

(Oops, did I say that out loud?)

Right after Christmas 2006, I took the boys on a 2-week trip to New York and New Hampshire to give Dave some time to prepare for his comprehensive exams while he was at NC State. People thought I was CRAZY, but it turned out to be a really great trip.

January 2006.  Jacob has always been such an angel in the car!

Last month Dave and I parted ways about halfway through our vacation.  I continued northward to Vermont, while Dave caught a flight out of Harrisburg back home since he had to return to work.  Again, folks commented about how brave I am…or how crazy I am to make such trips on my own.

I love driving.  I guess I get it from my Dad.  My sister is the same way — after all, she and her husband drove with their THREE sons from North Carolina to Nevada, taking a “southern route” westbound and a “northern route” (including our house in Nebraska) when they returned eastbound.

In every other way, traveling solo with my sons was great.  I only had one issue: rest stop restrooms.

I’ve put up a blog poll about this before: At what age is your child old enough to go into a public restroom on his/her own?

I believe most of my responses were in the 7- to 8-year-old range.

So here I am, stopping on I-81, the New York State Thruway and I-65 rest areas and was just sending my sons into the restrooms.  But I was GLUED to the exit door waiting for them…my ears were really close to that doorway listening for them making sure they weren’t abducted.

Since I made it back to Florida with both boys in tow, it’s safe to assume that my sons survived the rest area restrooms.  But this leg of the trip certainly got me thinking about how single parents do it — traveling and trusting their babies in roadside restrooms.

Some other tips on how we handled the 50+ hours in the car with two young boys:

  • I will admit, we have the built-in DVD player.  But we put some planning into how much the kids use it.  For starters, we have a “30-minute rule” in our SUV: no movies unless we’re traveling more than 30 minutes.  But on longer road trips, I insist that the boys put some space between their movies, especially of there are particularly scenic parts to the trip (such as driving through downtown Atlanta or crossing the Hudson River on this last trip).
  • I will also admit (boy, I’m doing a lot of “admitting” here, aren’t I?) that my boys have Nintendo DSi’s (pardon the apostrophe, not sure whether it’s used here like this or what….).  On the first day of our road trip, I didn’t give much thought to Jacob having played his DSi for nearly the entire day’s worth of driving!  And that was a long day!  Oops…
  • Don’t rule out good-old fashioned road trip games: The License Plate Game, Auto Bingo, and I Spy are all family favorites!  
  • I’ve heard of other families doing this with success, you could try using the rest area or fuel stops as break points between media: perhaps 2 hours for a DVD, then 2 hours of Nintendo, then 2 hours of “looking out the window”.
  • With young kids, don’t forget to try to work in some activity time to make the hours of sitting less terrible.  Stop for lunch at a Chick-Fil-A with a kids’ play area, or find a rest stop on your route with a playground and pack a picnic lunch.  Dave and I used to frequent the Amtrak Auto Train station in Lorton, VA as a rest area when we’d make our drives from North Carolina to Pennsylvania or New York: there’s a nice playground, and at lunchtime the kids would enjoy seeing the vehicles getting loaded onto the train cars.

Road Trip 2011: Wanderlust Yoga and Music Festival

08. July 2011 · Comments Off on Road Trip 2011: Wanderlust Yoga and Music Festival · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,
This is our just-finished-packing-on-the-first-warm-day-of-our-campout-pooped picture. 

Meet Megan, who was my college roommate for my last two years at PSU.  She has a son about Jacob’s age.  Every couple of years we try to get together to hang out.  We aren’t formal about it or anything, but in recent years we’ve been able to take turns with visits and the last time we spent time together was at Dave’s family reunion in 2008 (I think it was 2008….).

So this time it was the Vollmers’ turn to make a trip up a bit closer to Megan; we discussed getting together for a mother/son campout somewhere between Pennsylvania and New Hampshire.  The Poconos and Catskills came to mind.  Megan found out that her favorite music group, Michael Franti and Spearhead, were headlining the Wanderlust Yoga Festival near Stratton, Vermont at the same time we were planning to get together.  We decided to go!

Michael Franti’s uplifting music is a lot of fun to listen to, his most recent album, The Sound of Sunshine, is so full of fun and happiness.  His band is well known for their Top 20 hit “Say Hey (I Love You)“.

We met up at Bald Mountain Campground near Townshend, Vermont.  The weather was pretty rainy and cool most of our time there, with high temperatures near 60F.  I wrote more about the camping itself earlier this week.

I will be the first to admit that I’m not the biggest yoga enthusiast!  I have gone to classes before, I know the basic moves, and I guess I’m okay at it.  When I saw the other music groups involved there turned out to be a couple of bands that my sister really likes and have heard before and cinched even more that it would be a good time.

Because of the kids (and our lack of enthusiasm for yoga), we didn’t sign up for any yoga classes but there was still plenty to do before the music.  I think it was in part due to the rain, but the concert went later than we thought, and I have to admit my kids were pretty tired by the time it started.  And they were wet.  But when they broke out several dozen beach balls to toss around the crowds during the song “Sound of Sunshine“, the kids suddenly got pretty happy!  Enjoy some pictures from our day!

The festival was held at the Stratton Ski Resort village, these stilt-walkers were roaming the festival.

I thought these pop-up recycling bins were cool.  One of the openings was actually for compost!

A circus performer was teaching the kids to spin plates, use “diabolos“, and juggle beanbags 

An acrobatic act was going on right in front of us while the kids were enjoying their juggling lessons.

Another stilt-walker.  Note the low clouds coming over the mountain — it rained off and on all day.

Michael Franti led a yoga session.  We stood at the back of the tent and listened.

These are the Mayapuris, a Krishna-inspired kirtan band from Alachua, Florida.  Their music was so wonderful!   

I only had my iPhone camera on this trip, so it was working extra hard to capture concert pictures after sunset!  Here’s Michael Franti himself!

Google+: Good Idea or Bad Idea?

07. July 2011 · Comments Off on Google+: Good Idea or Bad Idea? · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,

I use that line with my kids a lot when they’re making questionable decisions.  If one of them is feeding grass clumps to the dog, I’ll ask “Good idea?  Or bad idea?”  Usually that’s enough to make them think before continuing.

I got a (not-quite sanctioned) invitation to join Google+, Google’s new social network, last week from GeekMom Jules.  Several of us GeekMoms have been checking out the assorted Google+ features, from the photo sharing, to the statuses to the “Hangout” area where you can web chat with other Google+ users.  The privacy settings are very likeable (default privacy is “no one can see much”, seemingly the opposite of Facebook’s privacy where the default is often “everyone can see everything unless you manually change that”).

Anyway, in terms of the social network, I think Google+ is on the right track for a smoother-running social network than Facebook.  I’m hoping it doesn’t get overrun by corporate pages and multi-player games the way Facebook has in recent months.

However, I’m sitting here with a clenched jaw waiting for the kinks to get ironed out of the other Google products that are supposed to nicely tie into Google+.

A couple days ago it was published that Google will be rolling their Picasa and Blogger brands into their own names, and with it will come some more tie-ins to Google+.

I’ve been slowly-but-surely uploading and sharing my vacation pictures in the middle of this transition and was faced with some difficulty sharing my Picasa albums with my family.  What I have typically done is upload the photos to Picasaweb with captions, then e-mail the album to myself.  Finally, I forward that album to a pre-set list of friends/family.  This week I attempted to e-mail the album to myself and nothing happened after hitting that “Share” button.

Actually, something did happen: the album posted to my Google+ news stream.  Because my e-mail address was tied into my Google+ account, some assumption was made that Google+ news stream is somehow equivalent to an e-mail inbox.  I managed a workaround by using a non-Google+ enabled e-mail address that I have.

But then when I tried to share the photos with my pre-set friends/family e-mail list, several of them couldn’t see the pictures unless they had their own Google.com login/passwords.  This used to not be the case and it’s very upsetting that my parents (among the main audience for my family’s photos) can’t easily see the pictures anymore.

Similarly, this morning I discovered that several pre-sets in my Blogger (soon to be Google Blogs) account were reset without my knowledge.  I used to have 10 e-mail addresses who’d receive automatic copies of my blog posts when published.  Who knows how long they hadn’t been receiving them.  Chances are they missed most of my vacation posts….

Thanks for letting me vent…I’m hopeful that Google is taking in everyone’s feedback (including this post) and will be sympathetic to those who don’t necessarily want a Google.com login/password to enjoy the Internet.

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