She Blinded Us With Science

Camdyn participated in her school's science fair this year. Her project focused on a question whose answer has eluded mankind for some time: Which diaper holds the most liquid?

To do this, mommy secured diapers of various brands from her friends with toddlers, and with mommy and daddy assisting, Camdyn systematically poured water onto three different brands of diapers and then measured the amount of water that wasn't absorbed by each to determine the best performing diaper. Each one was subjected to 1000ml of water (the competition required metric measurement, but if you're American, this translates to around 4 cups) added over time.

Here she is preparing a diaper for testing:

And here is a pour:

Once the experiment was over, then the display had to be created. She and mommy worked into the early evening on Sunday to suitably capture the project for the fair.

Finally, mommy took Camdyn to school the next day to drop off the project.

We found out today that, in addition to the ribbon Camdyn receives for participating, her project was awarded a ribbon by the judges!

And just in case you're wondering: Huggies was declared the winner, although only a narrow margin separated all three diapers.

For my Father

On Sunday morning's the girls take control of the TV, and if I'm fixing breakfast, I'll use the Internet to listen to Pittsburgh radio station WDVE. WDVE is classic rock with various comedy bits from comedians and their morning show mixed in.

During this time, we invariably have music appreciation sessions which center on my attempts to determine if the girls like the song that's playing and making sure they understand the significance of artists like Metallica, Ozzy, Van Halen, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Red Rider and so on. Growing up, my father would insist on playing "his" music during meals, and I guess that is something I inherited.

This morning, McKenna was explaining why she didn't like the songs, pointing out "the music in mommy's car sounds like princesses, and this music and the music in daddy's car (brief pause) does not."

And at that moment, I was once again reminded that I was my father's son.

P.S. With the girls, the American Bandstand system ("It's got a good beat and I can dance to it. I give it a ten.") still holds true no matter what the song is. So strike up a little Jethro Tull and let the daddy/daughter dancing begin.


P.S.S. Later this morning in the van (mommy's car) as I pulled out of the driveway, McKenna said "See, this is a princess song!" The song was a duet of Faith Hill and Tim McGraw. So now we know!

The Great Snow of '08

On Thursday the schools closed (announced on Wednesday) due to anticipated snow and freezing temperatures. This gave the girls an opportunity to play in the light dusting that occured:

And enjoy some hot chocolate:

On Friday, they were calling for 2-4 inches of snow to fall by Saturday afternoon, so we ventured out Saturday morning to the Children's Museum to work off some energy before becoming snow bound. It didn't hurt that this was a special "train day".

I had hoped to be able to play around with our photo/paint software while snow bound, and did so despite only a little accumulation occuring. Here is Warhol Keeghan:

And a car in a bottle:

Winter Fun

When mommy does laundry, the girls help out by "making it snow". This involves flinging the dirty laundry from the upstairs to the downstairs to be washed. McKenna must have been inspired by the thought of "snow" and figured out how to have a little fun while there was soft clothes to land in at the bottom of the steps.

Here she is to demonstrate Stair Sledding:

She demonstrates a mastery of control while dodging her sister, but perhaps my favorite part is the laugh at the end.

Merry Chistmas

Our Little Drummer Girl

I think she was channeling her inner Tommy Lee with the hat.

And a Pa rum pum pum pum to everyone.

All she wants for Christmas is to lose some teeth

Today, the children's choir sang during the church service. Camdyn enjoys choir and has sung publicly with it several times in the last two years.

Today they sang "Star of Wonder" and "Oh, Come, Little Children" and Camdyn sang inspite of her current affliction:

Seems a tooth is coming loose, and while she is more caught up with the overall holiday spirit, there's still curiousity over when the Tooth Fairy will visit and what the exchange rates will be. There doesn't seem to be any coverage of this particular market in the Wall Street Journal, so her mother and I are also curious on how this will all work out.

Here's video of the tooth's current status:

I personally know that Camdyn's expecting a lot more for Christmas than just to lose a tooth. She may even be hatching a plan to get the Easter bunny to swing by this holiday season too.