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Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Mysteries of the Nile & Our Day


We had a wonderful day today. We started off by going to see the IMAX film of Mysteries of the Nile since we have just started studying the Nile in SOTW. It was an amazing film - Alexandra wants to go and see it again. It is about a small group who were the first ever to travel the Nile (through the Blue Nile) from source to the Mediterranean Sea. They went through Ethiopia, Sudan, and finally through Egypt. The scenery & story were amazing. We particularly enjoyed the Nile Crocodiles and the hippos. (Above is a picture of Alexandra with her "scary" croc!)

Next, we went to the medical museum. It was almost empty! We played for awhile in Nanoworld, and then went to a Nanotechnology class. We were the only 2 in it! It was a lot of fun and my favorite thing was the memory wire. You could twist it any way you wanted to, and when it was dropped in heated water, it went back to its orignial shape immediately!

Then, we saw a cow's eye dissection. Alexandra didn't seem to get grossed out at all. My favorite part was seeing the retina - it was so colorful and beautiful!

At home, we did some school work and then Alexandra went swimming and played like she was on the Nile. She even had her own kayak.

Lastly, we used something new I'd just bought called Moon Sand. We made a model of the Nile River complete with pyramids. We wanted to add some crocodiles, but couldn't figure out how. We ended up just building some pyramids. It's an interesting substance to work with - it feels a lot like sand, but it molds more like wet sand. But, it won't mix with water - it actually floats! I hope we figure out more things to make with this new medium.


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