More Amazing Art

Each year Logan Library makes a Storybook Quilt with artwork submitted by children. Megan's pictures have been chosen for the quilt for the past 4 years. Here is the quilt for 2009, with her picture of Jaypaw from the Warriors series on the bottom middle section.

In Megan's art class, she did a landscape of the Delicate Arch
using pastels (our printer couldn't scan the entire drawing):


...and another charcoal drawing:

She checked out some books from the library
and practiced drawing portraits on her own:

...as well as playing around with colored pencil drawings:

Coming soon: a watercolor of a dachshund...

Hill Aerospace Museum

The morning after Megan's showcase event, we stopped at the Hill Aerospace Museum on our drive back to Logan. We had not visited since Ian was Dallin's age, so it had been a few years. There is an outdoor display area of numerous planes as well as an indoor display area. Obviously, the largest planes are located outside. This was a huge cargo plane piloted by Utah's own Jake Garn (his name is painted by the windshield).

Megan was almost as tall as the wheels!

Inside there was a room filled with pilot uniforms and flying gear throughout history (sorry, no photos of those), and there were two hangars filled with smaller planes, jets, and helicopters.

Erin especially liked the planes that were painted with shark faces.

Dallin liked the fact that he had long stretches of pavement on which to run.
He shrieked loudly whenever we tried to move him to a new place.

Visitors can sit in an ejector seat too.

We thought these regulations were most entertaining (click on the photo to enlarge it and read them yourselves), starting with #1 "Don't take the machine into the air unless you are satisfied it will fly." #10 "Do not trust altitude instruments" was also a little disconcerting. However, planes had only been around for 16 years in 1919.

We ended the field trip with a stop at Wendy's to redeem some
frosty coupons the children got from trick-or-treating last month.

Hi-Tech High Showcase

This semester Megan has been taking two online classes through Hi-Tech High and has been learning a lot of new skills with digital photography and website design. She had the opportunity to present some of her work along with several other students at a showcase held in Provo at Novell. Her instructor chose some of her photos and asked her to talk about them in front of the group. She was a little nervous, but she did a fantastic job (she did say she'd rather play the piano instead of talk).

Here are some samples of assignments she has done for her
Digital Photography & Graphic Design class.

For this photo, she practiced the masking technique,
where she used a mask to protect the butterfly, then blurred the rest of the photo.

This assignment involved using different filters to add effects to a picture.

Here she designed a collage, using cropping techniques, borders, shadows and textures.

This assignment involved cutting and pasting different photos to make a comic.

The showcase was an enjoyable evening for all.
Dad was even able to drive up to Provo to attend the event.

Homeschool Ice Skating Classes

Logan's Eccles Ice Center offers outreach school programs where they give ice skating instruction to class groups. Megan, Ian, and Erin participated in a 3-day program and had a lot of fun. The lessons weren't exceptional--it appeared that the instructors had a difficult time trying to adapt to the wide age range found among homeschoolers (Erin's age group was pretty much ignored). But it was a chance for the children to gain more ice skating experience, and they particularly enjoyed the free-skating time for the last 20 minutes of each class.

All laced up and ready to go!

Megan skating laps around the arena

Ian with some of his friends

Erin used a walker to help her the first 2 days of classes.

By the third class, she was confident enough to try it without the walker.
This is her proud pose so Dad can see how she learned to balance!

Poor Dallin was stuck doing laps riding in the stroller.

Fall "Foto" Fun

Trying to get a photograph of 4 children all looking at the camera with half-way decent smiles can be an exercise in frustration. Mission not accomplished for this particular pose.

Candid shots sometimes turn out the best.

Ian is happiest in a tree.

Dallin gave us some great smiles while playing with sticks.

Photo of parents, trying to demonstrate to children how to hold still,
smile, and look at the photographer:

Ambling Along on an Agreeable Autumn Afternoon

Today's blog title is brought to you by the letter "A"
(in honor of the 40th Anniversary of Sesame Street!)

Dallin is now 14 months old and finally big enough to
face forward in his car seat!
He likes the view.

On Friday we decided to take a late afternoon
walk along the Bonneville Shoreline Trail.
The weather was beautiful and warm.


Dad joined us!
And Yuki was thrilled to be included too.

Erin was soooo happy to be with Dad again.
She wanted us to take a picture of just the two of them.

A view of USU Campus with the sun almost ready to set
behind the Wellsvilles

Peek-a-boo Blue Eyes!

Some bright red berries (emphasizing our lack of botanical knowledge)

One easy way to get children to pose for a photo:
allow them to climb on rocks!

The return hike included some stunning orange clouds at sunset. Dad was trying to think of a poetic metaphor when Megan said, "it looks like grilled cheese." Guess it was dinner time. Erin was too tired to walk all the way back, but Megan was feeling energetic and carried her sister piggyback for a time. We were also treated to some deer on the trail, and Yuki's nearly-hopeless nose actually scared up a pheasant.