Monday, March 2, 2009

Places I miss..

There's Hawaii...








And Califonia...






Katharine's Science Project

Most of the time I'm against helping children with their science projects because it becomes a parent-building-race where it looks like (a lot) of money was spent with an architect, designer and decorator to produce a product that resembles a design ready for the governor to approve. You'd think I've learned this lesson last year when Katharine, 'the Goose' was in 3rd grade - of course I didn't. Anyway...

It started with a concept from the Goose about a two-level freeway where on the bottom level, animals can roam free without fear of being run over. Glass windows on the sidewalk would allow people to see the bottom level and enjoy the animals. A glass roof will allow birds and (flying dinasours such as a terradactyl) to land without any worry on the glass of fast moving cars.

Here is what the prototype looked like..




The Goose's concept is sound, but the prototype looked, well.. crappy as my wife Kelly put it. "We need to redo this because I do not want her to be embarrassed!" So we decided to go to Home Depot and get the supplies needed to make it out of wood. Gray paint for the support columns, white for the freeway levels and PVC pipes can be used for the crawl-in tunnel the animals will use.

Sunday was spent acquiring (not to mention new tools and equipment) for the new model. At one point, I noted to Kelly that it feels like a $300 project - she said its because that's probably how much we spent already! Nice..

As you can see, the Goose is hard at work remeasuring and gluing the new parts together.



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A few more additions such as the upper deck, PVC pipes on both sides, painting and more gluing, the product was beginning to resemble the prototype but in a much cleaner and straighter fashion.

And voila! The completed version is now ready for display.




On to the next project...