A Snag

Johan and I picked the boys up from camp this afternoon (because we were not at the hospital having a baby).  When I found K he quickly let me know that he was a little disappointed because while fishing he only caught a "snag."  He said he thought it must have been a "ginormous" fish because he couldn't even reel it in.  When we got to the car K proceeded to tell Johan about the giant "snag" that he had caught.  Then he turned to me and inquired, "Mama, what is a snag?"  It was at this point that burst out laughing, I realized that K must have been told by his camp counselor that he had "caught a snag."  From this K understood that a "snag" must be a really big fish, because it was so difficult to reel in.  He was disappointed because he never got to see the "snag."

C had more luck today, he caught a croaker.  Apparently it really does audibly croak.  C gives an excellent impression.  He was disappointed because although it was 13 inches long (long enough to keep) the camp was only doing catch and release fishing today.  The croaker is a bottom feeder found throughout the Gulf of Mexico and along the Atlantic coast.  Today the boys were fishing on the bottom off of a pier using shrimp.  This is what the croaker looks like:

Fishing Practice

The boys are participating in "Sea-N-Sail" summer camp during their last week in Biloxi. The camp is hosted by the Maritime Museum and they get to do a variety of activities; sailing, shrimping, swimming, etc.  K went on a real working shrimp boat yesterday, C will go today (he is in the older group).  K thought that it was interesting to learn how they shrimp, he said he had never seen "shrimp that are alive."  Along with the shrimp, the boat pulled in two eels and a flounder, which was very exciting. 

At camp, the boys also get to do some fishing and cast netting.  We did not bring our fishing gear with us to Mississippi so I checked out rods for the boys from the MWR office on Keesler AFB.  These rods are a bit longer than the rods they have at home, so before we sent them off for fishing at camp we decided to do a little fishing practice yesterday evening.  Actually, I skipped the practice session.  I stayed in the condo and did some reading and more hoping that "A" will arrive.  So Johan, my mom, and Hector took the boys down to practice.

The water here is extremely shallow.  You have to wade out quite a distance to cast.  Sometimes at the beach I'll call out to the boys to come back in because they are way too far.  They might be 100 yards away, so far that they can hardly hear me.  They are usually laying down flat, so I can't tell how deep it is.  They hear me calling and stand up to get a better idea of what I am saying, and I realize that the water isn't even past their knees.

Here is K hoping for a nibble.



The headline news when the boys returned was C's fish story.  As he burst through the door he exclaimed, "Mama, I caught one!"  K was quick to add that, "It wasn't very big."  C relived the experience telling me that he was reeling in his line and he didn't feel anything, then he looked down and thought, "Hey, that little fish is following my lure."  Not until he pulled up his line did he realize he had actually caught one.  Johan pointed out that the hook couldn't have been much smaller than this fish's mouth.  That is one ambitious fish!



So today the boys are off at camp again.  C's schedule for the day is shrimping aboard the Sailfish, followed by a presentation from the Hurricane Hunters (who are based here at Keesler), and then fishing and cast netting off of Schooner Pier.  Today K will go; sailing aboard one of the Maritime museum's Schooners, fishing, see the Hurricane Hunter presentation, and finally bowling. 

I am so glad that they are at camp this week.  The boys are as ready as I am for A to arrive.  They are frequently asking, "When is A going to be here?"  Or, "Mama, when do you think A will be here?"  Their absence leaves me with plenty of time to lament the fact that I am still pregnant!  Where are you A?  We had thought that we would be leaving Mississippi with a two-week old baby girl.  Now we will be lucky if she is a couple of days old.  We are supposed to start driving one-week from today...

Johan took this shot of our condo from the beach.  We are on the 13th floor of 14, our patio is the one in the center, just below the top floor.

 

Something in the Water

Last night from our balcony on the 13th floor we watched a gorgeous sunset. Then we noticed the water. It looked strange. In patches it was a different color than we had ever seen. Our first thought was, "Oh no, the oil is here." But then we noticed the birds. There were rain clouds in the area, and we had been experiencing off an on thunderstorms all day. Johan thought for a moment that perhaps there was rain falling just in those patchy areas because the water was rippling. We decided to go down to the water for a better look.

When we got to the water the sun had nearly set, but we could see that it was churning. The boys and Johan walked right in. They announced that the water felt like "slimy popcorn." There were literally millions of these tiny fish swimming everywhere. The boys could just dip their hands into the water and come up with several. Here C holds one to show us what they look like:



These little guys were everywhere. The sunlight was mostly gone, this next picture doesn't do justice to the massive amount of little fish out there. The silvery things towards the top of the picture are the fish, not the brown stuff toward the bottom, those are just leaves and wood. I think we had scattered a lot of the fish by the time we took this picture because their initial concentration was much more dense.



Here is K with a couple more:



It was getting very dark, so it was difficult to see what was in the water. K, who picks up everything anyway and thinks that just about all of it is a treasure to behold was just reaching down into the water and picking things up. In New Orleans I had to tell him not to pick up anymore trash because we didn't know who it had belonged to or where it had been. K ran over to Nana and me and he excitedly, almost breathlessly announced, "I just picked something up, and it was hard and had a long tail." He paused here, perhaps for dramatic effect, then, "I think it was either a ray or a horseshoe crab." We responded with the appropriate, "Wow, that is cool K!" But I don't think either one of us genuinely believed there was ray or horseshoe crab swimming around that he just happened to scoop up in the dark. K then scanned the water again and shouted, "There it is!"


We used the camera and held down the picture button so that the red light that comes on just before the flash would illuminate the water better. We were shocked. There it was. C and Johan came running over to see what all the excitement was about. C wanted Johan to pick it up. Johan wasn't excited about picking it up. None of us knew if it had a barb. K encouraged Johan by pointing out that he had already picked it up and that it hadn't hurt him. Johan obliged, but we all worried about inadvertently hurting it, so we decided to just watch him.

Cake for "A"

This afternoon we made a cake for A. She is due to arrive tomorrow but sadly I have no reason to believe that she is any nearer than last week... Today the boys and I made a birthday cake for her. We had hoped she would want to come to her party...

Here is C writing her name on the cake, with K closely supervising.

Now it is K's turn with the icing, he is adding some stars.

Here is a shot of the boys putting the finishing touches on the cake.

TA DA!

Here both boys are getting ready to enjoy their big slices of cake.

By the way, this cake was FABULOUS. It is Strawberry Meringue. The meringue was spectacular, and the orange juice we added to the cake mix made it so moist. At first bite C exclaimed, "Oh WOW! This is great!" We did use a box cake mix which was a bit of cheating. I am sure we will make this again, especially in the summer when we can get tasty fresh strawberries. If we do I'll try to do it without the box.

Here is the recipe:

Strawberry Meringue Cake

Prep Time: 30 Minutes
Cook Time: 35 Minutes Ready In: 1 Hour 5 Minutes
Servings: 12

Ingredients

1 (18.25 ounce) package yellow cake mix
1 1/3 cups orange juice
4 eggs, separated
1 1/2 teaspoons grated orange peel
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 1/4 cups sugar, divided
2 cups whipping cream
2 pints fresh strawberries, divided

Directions

1.In a mixing bowl, combine cake mix, orange juice, egg yolks and orange peel. Beat on medium speed for 4 minutes. Pour into two greased and floured 9-in. round baking pans; set aside. In a mixing bowl, beat egg whites and cream of tartar on medium until foamy. Gradually beat in 1 cup sugar, a tablespoon at a time, on high until stiff glossy peaks form and sugar is dissolved. Spread the meringue evenly over cake batter. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35 minutes or until meringue is lightly browned. Cool in pans on wire racks (meringue will crack).

2.Beat cream until stiff peaks form. Mash 1/2 cup of strawberries with remaining sugar; fold into whipped cream. Loosen edges of cakes from pans with a knife. Using two large spatulas, carefully remove one cake to a serving platter, meringue side up. Carefully spread with about two-thirds of the cream mixture. Slice the remaining berries; arrange half over cream mixture. Repeat layers. Store in the refrigerator.

Skate Park

We have a skate park in Klamath Falls, but it is way too much skate park for me. I believe that the skate park in Klamath Falls is nationally ranked, the #3 skate park in the nation. It is a concrete masterpiece that absolutely frightens me. So when we are out of town and spot a lesser skate park, the boys are always eager for an opportunity to ride. I am grateful now for everyday that they prefer their scooters to their skate boards.

Here in Mississippi there is a skate park on the Air Force Base. It is small enough for me, and big enough for the boys. The boys spotted the skate park on our first day here, but the military sign posted that warned of a required equipment check, and use by authorized personnel only allowed me to delay our visit. On Friday I had an appointment at the hospital, so Johan took the boys to the skate park and I later met them there.

It didn't take long for the boys to get red faced in the Mississippi heat and humidity. Underneath those helmets are two heads, completely wet with sweat. Notice K's tongue in these pictures. Even as a baby his tongue was out of his mouth just slightly whenever he engaged in any physical activity that required any amount of concentration. C is our dare-devil. He started just going up the ramp ever so slightly, gradually he inched his way up.

Insectarium

We have been through New Orleans in the past, we shipped a car from there to Alaska years ago, but we have never spent any time in the city. On Saturday we (Johan and I, along with my mom and the boys) took the short 1 and 1/2 hour drive west to New Orleans. I was surprised to see that five years after the city was hit by the massive flooding that followed Hurricane Katrina how much of the devastation is still very apparent. As soon as we crossed the bridge that spans Lake Pontchartrain we saw entire neighborhoods that remain in ruins. Miles of what were likely formerly flourishing suburbs were abandoned, huge box stores were merely shells.

Our destination was downtown, The Audubon Society's Insectarium. We were extremely disappointed with the city itself. On Saturday afternoon the traffic inside the city was horrendous. The city felt dirty and generally run down. Johan and I were both quickly reminded of why we really do not like big cities.

The Insectarium is located in a beautiful old building. I believe that it was at some point a U.S. Customs building. The facility itself is grand and the exhibits are stunning. We, especially the boys, enjoyed the museum immensely, but overall I found it over-priced and quite limited. As an "insectarium," they really didn't have a massive collection of insects. There were the great displays, but for the most part the insects weren't much more than you find as part of larger collections in zoos, aquariums, or science centers.

Here is K posed in front of a giant picture of a tarantula.

We are very amused right now, because no matter how many times we correct him, he still pronounces it "TRY-ran-TU-la." Of course Johan and I both pointed to the large bug and asked K, "What is that one?" We just wanted to hear him say it. You wouldn't think that tarantula would be a frequently used word, but at our house right now it really is, especially because the boys have a card game called Top Trumps. The game is played much like the card game "War," but in this game the cards are all different insects with different values assigned to their various traits (mobility, life span, gross out, danger, etc. ). The person who won the last hand gets to choose which trait is to be considered for the next hand. In this game the tarantula is the equivalent of an ace when it comes to life-span, so it is a valuable card and has been the topic of more than a few conversations.

Here is a shot of the Madagascar Hissing Cockroach. Kind of standard fare at places like this. C and K jumped at the opportunity to "pet" one.

There was one major attraction that we have not have the privilege of seeing anywhere else, and both boys took full advantage of it. We learned that entomophagy (insect eating) is practiced all over the world. The Insectarium had a "cooking class." Here visitors were given the opportunity to sample foods prepared with--insects. In many places, bugs are eaten as a good and readily available source of protein, minerals, carbohydrates, fats and vitamins. C and K were absolutely delighted with the idea of eating bugs. C was brave, but withheld praise. While he found them tolerable, C did not appreciate the aftertaste of many of the insects. Remarkably, K, typically the most picky eater, dove right into the chocolate covered crickets. K can spot a tomato buried in just about any dish from a distance of 10 yards. Having spotted said tomato he will request that I remove it from his plate with my fork so as to avoid contaminating his own. Offer him a sample of meal-worm salsa, or cinnamon and sugar coated wax-worms and he won't even flinch. In fact he will go back for seconds with a smile on his face. Remarkable!

Here is a shot of C and K considering their first taste of chocolate covered grasshopper.


This is a delightful smorgasbord that included; "Six-Legged Salsa," "Hoppin' Herb Dip," "Cinnamon-Bug Crunch," and "Southwestern Wax Worms."

K kept on popping the chocolate covered grasshoppers. As we chatted, he kept turning around and grabbing another one.

Crispy Cajun Crickets anyone?

Here the boys are posed in front of a display of chrysalis (is it chrysalises or chrysali???).

These are all in different stages of development, and if we had been there about 5 minutes earlier we would have seen a butterfly emerge. We did get to see the brand new wet wings drying. From the chrysalis we walked through a huge butterfly habitat with quite a few varieties of butterflies.

After the Insectarium we wandered around looking for an authentic Louisianan place for lunch. No luck, we were too hot and hungry to search for long. We ended up on the boardwalk at a sports bar that caters to tourists.

Here are a few shots of the boys on the boardwalk in front of a fountain.