Ode to Aunt B

Everybody loves Aunt B!

But nobody gets quite as worked up as Johan. This little clip was taken last weekend when Aunt B and Grandpa Charlie stopped by. Watch the mirror on the top right...

The kindergarten tree

We have been planning to plant a kindergarten tree for Mathias. We've been thinking about it for most of the school year but haven't gotten around to it. The idea would be to plant the tree when he goes to kindergarten and watch it grow up along side the boy. By the time high school graduation rolls around they should both be quite a bit taller.  As it happens Mathias received a tiny little strand of a maple tree at school. So we, appropriately, made that the kindergarten tree. It is pretty small and I hope I don't accidentally run over it with the lawn mower.

Mathias comment was: now we don't have to buy maple syrup anymore! But it might be a while before we can tap this one for sap in the springs! 

Almost dinosaurs

Taking a break from cousin Jonah's graduation celebration this weekend, Mathias and I took a road trip to Nebraska. More specifically, pretty much in the middle of nowhere (which is ironic because most of Nebraska is in the middle of nowhere) we went to Ashfall fossil bed. 

It seems 12 million years ago Nebraska was a tropical rain forest. There were camels and rhinos. A really, really large volcano 1,000 miles away erupted and dropped six feet of ash on top of the region now called, fittingly, Ashfall. Many animals died very quickly and were discovered, mostly intact, in the 1970s. And the dig was on! 

I enjoyed touring the excavation sites. Mathias came for the hands-on experience. They have a spot where kids get do dig for, not quite real, fossil remains. Together we dug out a prehistoric horse and a rhino. Mathias was disappointed we didn't get to take the bones home to show Johan. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashfall_Fossil_Beds

Enjoying the spring weather

We may actually have turned the corner and spring is here to stay.
Finally, the boys can pull their bikes out of the garage and put the driveway to good use. Mathias is especially enjoying  his big-boy bike that arrived for his birthday but sat idle for a long time while the snow just kept coming down.