Corner View: Statues

This week's Corner View theme is "statues and fountains", so I would like to present the statue of Albert and Alberta, the University of Florida mascots. I would guess that this is the most popular statue in Gainesville. About a week ago, when graduation was going on, people were lined up, waiting to have a turn to be photographed with these happy looking gators.







To see the other Corner View participants, visit the sidebar on the blog Spain Daily. Since Jane from Spain Daily is still traveling the world this week, our guest host is Joyce from A Perfect Beginning.

Corner View : Animals

Florida's most celebrated animal resident at the moment, has got to be the Mystery Monkey of Tampa Bay. No one knows where the monkey came from, but it has been loose in the Tampa Bay area for over a year. It has learned very well how to live in an urban environment. Some people claim they have even seen it looking both ways before crossing the street.

There is a Mystery Monkey of Tampa Bay Facebook page, of which I am one of the almost 77,000 fans:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mystery-Monkey-of-Tampa-Bay/344602443463

Newspapers and Television News shows around the world have carried this story:

telegraph.co.uk

According to the map on this website, we were not very far from the Northern areas where the monkey has been sighted, when we were on our last camping trip:

tampabay.com special report

The late night comedians have been having fun with this monkey business, too.

Jimmy Kimmel- Unstoppable Monkey:





Stephen Colbert talks about the "Monkey on the Lam"


He's even inspired a song:



Go monkey! Go!

Corner View : Earth Day

This is the way I'm recycling newspapers for Earth day, I'm using it as weed barrier in my garden.



By overlapping multiple layers of newspaper, the sunlight can't penetrate, so the weeds don't grow. By covering the newspaper with composted cow manure, it looks like well weeded, dark, rich soil.



The entire process takes about 10 minutes per 20 foot row, but it looks like you just spent long hours weeding, plus it's biodegradable and feeds the garden.



For the garden paths, I'm laying out the newspaper and then covering it with cypress mulch.



Now that I've worked up a sweat, I think this will be the perfect Earth Day treat.





This is how Blaze is cooling down:





The Florida Museum of Natural History's Earth Day Celebration is this coming Saturday, April 24, 2010.

Museum Earth Day

While Jane is away this week, Corner View is being hosted by Joyce of A Perfect Beginning. Every Wednesday, Corner View brings together participants from all over, to share what life is like in their corner of the world.

Corner View First Anniversary: The Great Outdoors

Corner View is now a year old. For this anniversary, Jane of Spain Daily, the host of Corner View, has asked us to revisit a favorite theme from the past year. In keeping with Children and Nature Awareness Month and our recent activities, I have chosen "The Great Outdoors" as my theme for this week. The Great Outdoors originally appeared as a theme on May 12, 2009. At that time, I showed you pictures of Poe Springs; today I would like to show you Hillsborough River State Park.



While my husband stayed home and worked on the "quals" for his PHD (three days of uninterrupted, stressful typing), Blaze and I had Spring Break from school and went camping. We had never been to Hillsborough River State Park before and really chose it because it was one of the few Florida campgrounds that wasn't completely booked for Spring Break week.

I'm sure that our campground neighbors got some amusement out of watching me try to remember how to put up the tent all by myself, but after about a half hour of fumbling, I got it. It had been several months since our last camping trip.




The park is really beautiful, but I wouldn't choose it as a Spring Break destination again. Most of the campsites have very little space dividing one site from the next, so there is no feeling of privacy. It also becomes very noisy at night (right about the time I would be trying to get Blaze to go to sleep). There is a massive swimming pool near the campground, that would have been nice to play in after setting up the tent in 85 degree weather, but it won't open until the end of May. There were also more mosquitoes than I have ever seen before (and that's saying something). Our first day in camp, Blaze and I started out on a short hiking trail and he ran off ahead of me, so I couldn't see him. Just as I was calling to him to come back, he started screaming and ran back to me, covered in mosquitoes. I have a lot of bites, but they didn't think I was nearly as tasty as he was.

This may look like he's trying to re-enact the birth experience, but what he was really doing, was sticking his head out just long enough to tell me that he liked it in the tent and was never coming out again.



We weren't exactly "roughing it". With the air mattress, table, and chairs, it was very comfy and home-like in the tent.



The next day, we went into town and purchased bug repellent spray, a glow-in-the-dark bug repellent bracelet, and mosquito netting to wear over a hat. With all of that on, Blaze was ready to face the outdoors again. Without those things, I don't think I would have been able to pry Blaze from the tent for the remainder of the trip.

You have to look carefully to see them, but one evening there were 5 vultures in the tree branches above our tent.



Despite the mosquitoes trying to kill us and the vultures waiting to clean up what was left, we actually were able to take some nice walks in the woods and wetlands.

















Tammy, this last picture is for you. This wasn't one of those baby alligators I usually photograph. Just the part sticking out of the water was longer than I am tall.

Corner View: Spring

There are signs of Spring everywhere! The dogwood trees are in bloom, as are the redbuds. A couple weeks ago I took this picture of the blackberry brambles in bloom near the garden.



Yesterday, I stopped by the same brambles to show you that tiny fruits are forming.



We have just started putting plants in the ground, for our Spring garden.



A sure sign that it's early in the planting season, is my little assistant's cheerful willingness to help garden. I'm taking advantage of this helpfulness for as long as it lasts, because I know that it will melt away as soon as the temperatures rise.







Gotta love those stubborn perennials! Even though the garden was tilled, the chives from last year are already back and doing well.




Corner View is hosted by Jane from Spain Daily, every Wednesday, so that bloggers all over the world can share a little bit about what their corner of the World is like.

Corner View: Typical Architecture

This week, I'm bringing you a small sampling of the architecture of the University of Florida Campus.









I thought this was a good representation of what the current economy has done to the construction industry around here. This building was started, but then abandoned before it was ever finished. This eye-sore now sits on a corner right across the street from the University.



A couple blocks away, a developer was going to build a luxury condo complex which would include shops and restaurants. They tore down two city blocks worth of businesses, including a church, and then went broke. The church is rebuilding and is looking close to completion, but the rest of the land still sits empty.




To see typical architecture around the world, be sure to visit Spain Daily, the host of Corner View, along with the sites listed on the Spain Daily side bar.

Leprechaun Hat Cookies

This week's Corner View theme is "Miniature Worlds". I figured little hats for St. Patrick's Day Leprechauns counted as things from a miniature world.


Leprechaun Hats

1 9-ounce package of plain chocolate cookies ( I used Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafers)

1 bag of large marshmallows

1 12-ounce bag of dark chocolate chips

green tinted buttercream frosting

Wilton's gold colored "Sparkle Gel" (cake decorating gel)




Melt the chocolate chips in a double boiler or in a glass bowl in the microwave. If microwaving, heat for 2 minutes on high, then stir, and return to the microwave for another minute and stir again.

Spread two dozen cookies out on a sheet of waxed paper.

Use a toothpick to hold each marshmallow as it is dipped into the melted chocolate, and spoon additional chocolate over each marshmallow to be sure it is completely covered. Let any excess chocolate drip from the marshmallow before placing it in the middle of a cookie. The spoon can then be used to help remove the toothpick and smooth out the chocolate to cover the hole left by the toothpick.





Let the "hats" sit until the chocolate has hardened. then use green frosting to make the hat bands and the gold Sparkle Gel to make a buckle on the hat band.

Enjoy!




As a variation on this cookie, I also made some little top hats with goggles made out of Smarties candies ( feeding my son's continuing fascination with airship pirates).




I am looking forward to seeing all the other ways this theme has been interpreted. To find other "miniature world", please visit Spain Daily and all of the blogs listed on the sidebar there, on Weds., March 9, 2010.

Corner View: Coffee Companion

This is my coffee companion:



I think this picture says it all.


Please visit our wonderful host, Jane, on Spain Daily to find links to all of the other Corner View participants.

We interrupt our regularly scheduled Wednesday post, to bring you this special archeological adventure

I didn't get out to take any pictures for this week's Corner View, so I'm having a guest blogger today. This is the video my husband made of his trip to White Oak Plantation, a former rice plantation that was once owned by Zephaniah Kingsley. The plantation is now a wild animal sanctuary with several giraffes.

Corner View: Wisdom from an Elder

For the past three nights, we have been reading The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate as our bedtime story.

I usually read books to myself first, before sharing them with Blaze, but this time I didn't. If I had read it first, I probably would have waited a couple more years before introducing it to him. Tonight's reading included descriptions of violence both on and off the battlefield and it was all I could do to hold back the tears while reading aloud. It is an engaging book, though, and Blaze has asked me to continue reading it in the morning, which is his ultimate compliment to literature.

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate is the story of a young girl ( 11 years and 3/4) in 1899, who bonds with her Grandfather over their love of studying the natural world around them. Calpurnia becomes interested in natural selection, by watching the grasshoppers in her yard, but when she decides she would like to read Mr. Darwin's book on the subject, she is told by the public librarian that they would never keep such a book on their library shelves, that it would have to be ordered from another library, and then only with a note from her mother giving her permission to read such a thing.

Calpurnia had never had a relationship with her grandfather before that time. She had always been a little afraid of him and didn't believe that he even knew her name, even though they live in the same house. As she observes more of the world around her and starts to ask questions about it, she discovers her Grandfather has many of the answers she seeks. She discovers that he owns a copy of On the Origin of Species, but since it is such heavy reading for such a young girl with no scientific background, the grandfather explains the concepts in term that she can understand.

This is not just a story about a girl learning about Darwin, though. This is a story about a family living in Texas at the turn of the last century, when women and minorities had few rights and grandfathers could still tell stories about the brutality of the Civil War.

Corner View: Repurposed

This week's Corner View topic is to show something in our home that has been repurposed (changed from it's original use, to serve a new purpose. Since I've been using it quite a bit this week, I will share with you my way of organizing sewing and crafting supplies.



This was a two sided tool box, of the sort meant to hold nails, screws, nuts, and bolts. Although, I do now have two different size brass screws stored in the box, mostly the box holds other sight;y more "girly" things.

One side is mostly sewing supplies:



While the other side is full of odds and ends for doll and jewelry making:




The reason I was using the things in the box this week, was that I was working on my first big leather project. I have made little things out of leather in the past, like boots and coats for the bendy dolls or helping Blaze make his moccasins, but this was the first thing I have made for me. I bought two pieces of deer hide at the Medieval Faire and spent the past few days turning it into a messenger bag.

I completed it Monday:



A chain across the back of the bag for hanging useful things:



The left corner of the front flap:



Inside pockets: