Solar Science Sunday

The KnowitAll family had quite a fun day last Sunday. First we headed over to the Drake Planetarium here in Cincinnati, to attend the Family Science Sunday. We sat through a show in the planetarium, got to play a bit with a few science experiments, and then headed over to the Lego Lab to see who could build the strongest bridge. While it got a little loud and crazy for sensory-sensitive JD, he did have a lot of fun. He made a buddy right away and the two of them gabbed like crazy about the different planets in the planetarium show. When we got to the Lego Lab, JD was really funny. He has performance anxiety, so he walked in and immediately declared very loudly that he was NOT there to compete. He was only going to make a bridge that “looked good.” Of course, as soon as the bridge was done, he did test it out–and then started working on making it better. When he finished he wasn’t competitive at all. Oh no. He only stood up, shouted “Hey everyone! Look at how strong I made this!” then went and grabbed the teacher to make sure she saw his brilliance. No, he’s not competitive at all!

LittleMissSunshine, as always, found delight in everything around her. She especially enjoyed making the pink silly putty, which allowed her to get her hands really messy and goopy. (JD ran screaming for the hills at that concept.)

Later came the really fun part–the solar eclipse. While Cincinnati wasn’t going to see the whole eclipse, we were supposed to see some of it. LittleMissSunshine and I worked together on a special solar filter for my camera. We researched a good high spot to watch the eclipse, then traipsed out to it and got set up. We had a gorgeous view and hung out for about twenty minutes. About the time we thought we might just be *possibly* seeing the eclipse starting, well, that’s when the cloud bank moved in and covered it all up. Sigh. So we packed back up and headed home again. Still, even though we missed the true eclipse, we had a lot of fun getting everything together. JD objected (as always) to leaving the house or putting down his video games, but once the science part kicked in–using a compass to determine location, watching the timing, figuring out how to look at it safely–he was all over it. LittleMissSunshine loved it too, but more because we were all together having fun.

The best part of the day? Stopping to take time together, to be fully present and enjoy the small things no matter how many other things I “should” be doing. Those things can wait–these memories can’t.