*Joey and William will be guests here on the blog as they document our Nature Challenge journey for 2016.

Opening Ceremony by Joey and William

On August 13th Auntie Leslie, Uncle Dustin, and Alex came down from Austin to go to the Opening Ceremony at the South Texas Botanical Gardens with us.

We started by visiting with Ms. Pringle from the UT Marine Science Center.  She showed us how to observe different types of sand.  We used tiny microscopes to help us see the details.

J:  I did Mustang Island.  The tan sand had little grains.  Its shape was circular like dots and it had shells in it.

W:  I got to see a few different sands.  My favorite sand was the black sand.  It was black because it is volcano dust.  It was from Hawaii.  Mommy said, “Good job!  How did you identify that by yourself?”  Ms. Pringle asked me if I knew why it was black and I said, “Yes, because it was from near a volcano.”  I was right.

J:  I also got to see sand from Dunstaffnage near Oban, Scotland.  It was made of medium dots and it was gray and reddish.  It was very colorful and pretty.

Next we went to say hi to Ms. Sara Jose and sign our team in.  Our team is just called The Satery Family because our team consists of our family…Mommy, Daddy, Joey, William, Andrew and Katie.  Ms. Sara gave us a crossword puzzle to complete.

After signing in, we went to visit the Texas A & M Forest Service.  They had leaf plates for us to rub our crayon over and make a leaf rubbing.  Then after we rubbed it, we had to identify it.  They also had a sign that showed how you can tell a tree’s age by counting its rings.  That was very neat.

J:  First I did a sycamore rubbing.  Then I did a leaf from an Elm Tree.  It was very fun.  I love doing crayon rubbings.

W:  Alex and I did our rubbings together.  We both used the same color and we used the same leaf.  I don’t remember what my leaf was but I’m going to check with Alex to see if he remembers.

J:  Katie and Andrew made their own crayon rubbings using the leaf plates, too.

Once we were all done rubbing leaves, we moved over to visit with the Wildlife in Focus representative.  She had some nature photo books for us to look at and then we got to dress up as a nature photographer and use her camera.

J:  The books had a lot of animals in them and beautiful photographs of plants.  I also liked dressing up as a nature photographer.

W:  So did I!

J:  I liked using her camera.

W:  So did I!

J:  I took pictures of my family which wasn’t really a nature photograph…

W:  We’re made by God, so we really are kind of nature.  I took pictures of the family, too.

J:  It was good practice so we can take pictures on our excursions this fall.

After taking photos, we visited quickly with the Corpus Christi Science and History Museum and we got the materials to make star catchers.  Katie was starting to get restless so we took those home to make.  We also stopped by the table for the Botanical Gardens.

After that we went to renew our membership at the Gardens and do a little exploring.  We visited the Reptile Room and got to hold a snake.  It was a rat snake.  We went to visit the birds and see the butterflies.

J:  I had lots of fun at the Botanical Gardens and I also realized that the opening ceremony was a lot of nature places under one big roof.  So I got to go from Wildlife in Focus to the Science and History Museum by only walking a few feet!

W:  I had fun, too.  My favorite part was when I observed the sand.

J:  It was fun coming home and finishing our work, too.  We spent an evening coloring our Wildlife in Focus pictures (I colored my bird so it would look like a Woodpecker) and making star catchers.  Now I’m going to have to look for the constellations next time we go camping.

W:  Me too! W:  Oh!  I almost forgot!  Andrew and I were in the newspaper!  Andrew got excited when he went to HEB and someone recognized him there.  We’re famous!

 

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