Butterflies

Our butterfly finally came out. It's a girl!! Here we are letting it go. 

Now we have another one and it's in it's chrysalis. I'm not sure that it's alive because of the colour of the chrysalis. I wonder if it died. I've learned never to be sure and to wait for a long time and see. So... we wait...

Oil Discovery

 I took Austyn to another museum. It was not far from the other one. There was a tour guide for this one. I found that although it was really cool to see more things live and working, the information that the guide had to give us at this museum was vague. We were able to get much more detailed information at the other museum.

 This is a real gum bed. "Real" as in not put here by humans but naturally occurring and left alone to be viewed. 

A wagon with a tank on it was always nearby to ship the oil to the train.

This is the old way of drilling for oil.

 This is the storage tank. We could walk up and look in. They also separate the water from the crude oil here.

 This was a favourite place for Austyn. Again... we may need to try and make a model or the jerker line and how it works with our K'nex.

One nice thing about a small-town museum is that Austyn was able to get close up and personal with a very old typewriter and now knows why Shift is on our keyboard and why it's named what it is. I think mechanical things are his thing! He loves to figure out how things work.

Oil Museum of Canada

I took Austyn to visit The Oil Museum of Canada. Zoe didn't come. It was nice! It gave him peace and quiet to learn what he wanted to learn and take his time on things that interested him. This is a model of the jerker line. It was broken and he fixed it as well as he could, without being able to tighten the one belt.

 He played and observed this model for a long time. 

 Although the real deal is just outside the doors of this museum the models are still cool to see. Here is another one of the first oil well.

 This was a tent that a traveler from the area would have stayed in while traveling abroad. The pictures you see on the inside of the tent are of a movie that is projected onto the sides of the tent and it tells a story that is all around us while we sit down to learn what happened in the past. 

 Although unrelated to oil, there were many old items in the museum. One that Austyn found interesting was this camera. We may need to research old cameras now.

 He also enjoyed the metals and coins.

 Here is another model. We were thinking that this may be a model that we could try and duplicate at home with our Educational K'nex kits. 

 Here is a real jerker line. It is working and there is still oil being collected on this site and the surrounding area. 

 This is one of the outdoor displays. There are many more, including a blacksmith shop.

 We purchased a toy that kids would have played with long ago.

 After viewing all of the displays at the museum we took a drive around the area and listened to the details of many of the original sites. There were displays set up with metal men.

The well that you see in the background is the site of the first Oil Gusher in North America.

We had a great time and learned so much about oil here in Ontario. This is so much more interesting after living in Alberta.

Book Sharing Monday - The Mushroom Hunt

This book is a great story about a family searching for mushrooms in the woods and goes into some detail about mushrooms. 

It's a great way to introduce mushrooms and create more interest in the subject. My kids didn't look at mushrooms the same again. It is my understanding that this book is part of a series called Read and Wonder. After going to their catalog HERE I'm surprised to recognize a couple of the books that we have enjoyed.

Pictures Of Our Garden

 We use a similar method to Square Foot Gardening. These plants are in raised boxes in our back yard and laid out by square foot. This is a red sunflower.

 This is the flower of the Hungarian Pepper.

 Peas!

 Cucumber!

 Dill! I didn't get to make dill pickles this year, but oh well. Life gets busy and the garden worked out okay, regardless.

 These are seed pods for radishes. I'm trying to make a sustainable garden, which means I can gather seeds for the next year so that I don't need to purchase them.

 Spinach!

 Cherry Tomatoes!

Mint! I use this for mint tea... yummy!!