Sunday Randomness #68 Weather Science Data and straws

This is a favorite link about the weather data for Salt Lake City:    https://forecast.weather.gov/product.php?site=CAR&issuedby=SLC&product=CF6&format=CI&version=1&glossary=0

It's searchable for the last few years-just click on the versions numbers at the top to see the information for a previous month in a past year.  If you go back through the years, it's easy to calculate that we are still in drought mode.  We have not been catching up that much to the levels we really need to sustain our great Utah outdoors, no less all the water consumption we use on both residential and business levels.  Reduce, reuse, recycle.  Water deep and water less often.   Even in the summer months, I try to water just once a week with a deep soaking during the cooler hours.

We've been taking our own containers for leftovers to restaurants for a number of years now and we all use reusable water bottles.   I just got our rain straws from the Kickstarter we supported last year.  If you're interested in a fully washable straw here's the link to their new website: https://rainhydration.com/    We'll have to do a review of the straws on a different Sunday Randomness.

Book Group Post 4 : Feb. spotlighted McMullan and Ahlberg and Mar. covered some j500's

We read Hooray for Bread by Allan Ahlberg and talked about other books by the Ahlbergs and the McMullans in February.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_and_Allan_Ahlberg

https://www.katemcmullan.com/

http://jamesmcmullan.com/BIO3.HTML


March started something new with a diversion into the j 500's.  We shared the following titles: (again, let me know if I missed some that we talked about)

• Star Stuff: Carl Sagan and the Mysteries of the Cosmos by Sisson
• Earth! My First 4.54 Billion Years by McAnulty
• The Glow In the Dark Book of Space by Harris
• Bedtime Math by Overdeck
• Island A Story of the Galapagos by Chin
• Max Goes to Mars by Bennett
• Water Can Be by Salas
• Magic School Bus books by Cole
• Wonderful Winter: All Kinds of Winter Facts and Fun by Goldstone
• Our Family Tree by Peters

Author #134: Springtime anytime books by April Pulley Sayre

Author April Pulley Sayre has written over several dozen books to date.  Read more about her other books at: http://www.aprilsayre.com/category/my-books/

Just to touch quickly on a couple of books pictured below: Let's Go Nuts!  features beautiful photographs of all kinds of seeds that we eat from coconuts to lentils and Stars Beneath Your Bed tells the the story behind where dust is found, its possible composition, and how it affects the way we see sunsets and sunrises.  There's a short two page informative section in the back that tells a lot more about dust.  

Sunday Randomness #975: A Brief History of the Man who explains some of the Universe

This looks promising for a look into the life of a man (Stephen Hawking) who has changed some of the views we have on science and the universe.  While I may not agree with everything he has shared, I do appreciate many of  his contributions, not least of which is his perseverance.

Cookie project

While they didn't have to do the science fair this year, Eva still had to do a project for class if she wanted to try for an "A" in the science section for her class. Eva chose a cooking project since we had all the supplies. (The shortening and margarine were from pie making during the holidays.) (The apple butter was bought for a recipe and we've been slowly consuming it on sandwiches and toast. We prefer the traditional spreads like raspberry and strawberry jam so the apple butter has lasted for some time.)Ingredients: brown sugar, white sugar, flour, salt, egg, baking soda, vanilla, fat & chocolate chips
(recipe courtesy of Small-Batch Baking by Debbie Maugans Nakos)

Fats used: Butter (B), Margarine (M), Apple Butter (AB), Shortening (S) and Oil (O)

We didn't sign up to do taste testing [that required a separate form (government bureaucracy-even at the elementary level)]. I'm sure there's many legal and logical reasons behind the extra form but we chose to just go by appearance for this test.

The oil cookies looked the prettiest but smelled and tasted the worst. The apple butter came out soft and chewy but really sweet and the apple tones were....unusual. The margarine actually tasted the best in this particular recipe but normally we use a combination of butter for taste and shortening for texture and softness.

Since the tri-fold boards were only a dollar, we went ahead and bought one from the school. The final score came in around a B+ to A- so that was pretty good. If Eva had to do it again she'd add taste and overall appeal-not just appearance.

Milk in Pretty Colors

Swirled Milk Experiment also known as Marbled Milk. I obtain access to many books in my job and I bring a fair number home. Unfortunately, I have to return the books eventually and too often we never try anything from the books where we could do projects from them for talent building. Examples are cookbooks, crochet books, craft and hobby books, sewing books, hiking books, etc…. But finally we actually did one of the experiments from a cool little book called Lotions, Potions, and Slime Mudpies and More! By Nancy Blakey.

Pour milk (preferably 2%) into saucer, add 5-7 drops food coloring (use full amount or more-doesn't work as well with just a few drops of coloring), then add 1 drop of liquid detergent and watch what happens!