Wilmington Field Trip

Sierra and I accompanied her fourth-grade class on a field trip to Wilmington, NC today. After gathering at the school at 5:45 am, we took a couple charter busses on a three-hour tour, landing at the USS North Carolina. This was apparently the most decorated battleship in WWII, and was incredible to say the least. We then spent a couple hours at a nearby aquarium before wrapping things up at the beach. We had a great time, and it’s hard to believe that this was our first visit to the beach in the almost three years we’ve lived in NC. We’re looking forward to our longer stay at OBX this summer.

Road Trip 2010

In early February, I joined Sierra, Camden, and Grandpa on a cross-country adventure. I’m still sorting through the photos, but I figured it’s taking me long enough that I should just make these available to the family now. I will follow up later with the story of our trip, and will cull a lot of the Grand Canyon photos that you’ll find in this set. We had a lot of fun, and especially enjoyed spending time with Cordell and Sarah’s family in Santa Clara.

Snow Day

We got a few inches of snow and ice Friday night that kindly waited for my flight to land before falling. The kids spent most of Saturday enjoying the white stuff, knowing this may be their only opportunity to do so this year.

New Lens

Although I really like our camera, an Olympus E-620, I’ve struggled getting good pictures in low-light situations. After wasting a ton of good shots this Christmas, we decided to order a faster lens. The ZD 50mm ƒ2.0 macro prime arrived today and here are some of the first test photos I took with it. I’m impressed and look forward to using it a lot more in the upcoming weeks.

Road Trip 2009: Part III – Camp Linwood MacDonald

After leaving NYC, We enjoyed two action-packed days at Grandpa’s camp. Activities included scaling the climbing wall, taking aim at the archery field, eating meals with the other campers, participating in a science show, navigating the ropes course, and canoeing in the lake while watching Grandpa take the Chompy Challenge (swimming across the lake without getting bitten by the infamously large snapping turtle).

Camden stunned the audience at the science show as one of the youngest attendees by being the first to answer the scientist’s question, “What are the building blocks that make up everything?” “Molecules,” came the prompt, confident reply.

Here is some cell phone video I took on the lake.

By the way, I updated the previous road trip post with pictures from our stop in NYC.