molly

Molly: Scientist of the week

| patmcg

Molly showed a cool magic trick — oops, I mean science experiment — to her class for “Scientist of the Week” today.  Molly got to choose her own experiment.  She didn’t like any of the experiments from the standard class books because they “don’t have useful conclusion”.  She found an experiment she liked roughly relating to air pressure in a random kid’s science book that I had.

As you can see in the picture, she turns a cup of water upside down, and a playing card miraculously holds the water in the cup.

The class was pretty impressed and had lots of questions.  “es this work with orange juice?”,  “Does it work with sparkling water?”,  “Do you have to use a card, or can I use my iPad?”, “Does it work on a lower value card?”  To test the last question, we tried the experiment on a second card of lower value (2 of spades) to make sure it still worked.  What do you know, it worked!? 😉

You got a love those curious third grade minds!  And way to go Molly for a great presentation.

Christmas 2018

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We got to Houston for a couple of days this Christmas.  My mom and I coordinated everyone between Austin and Houston, but we came up one stocking short, so we improvised and used a gift bag for Noni’s “stocking”.  Molly wanted to make sure Santa Claus was clear on this, so she wrote him a super sweet note:

Dear, Santa.

The gift bag is for Noni.  We only had three stockings.

Btw: the cookies are stale, you do not have to eat them!

Have a merry Christmas.

From, Molly

 

Some pics from Christmas Eve dinner, which we got on the table hot and delicious  despite being coordinated across me, None, and Noni’s helper, Patience.

 

We also saw an amazing and slightly scary performance of A Christmas Carol at the Alley Theater.

 

 

Chocolate Reindeer Comes to Life

| patmcg

Molly was pretty excited about her Chocolate Reindeer idea and wanted to try it out before we go to Houston for Christmas.  I warned her it may not come out quite like she imaged and to be ready for a mess.  She acknowledged the rick, and then we went all in on making it happen!  Despite my hesitations, I really wanted to make Molly’s holiday invention work too.

Molly and I had a fun time figuring out how to bring  her vision to reality.  It was an interesting challenge and took a fair amount of planning and research!  In the end, it came out a too goopy to, uh, eat, much less bring to Houston.  But it was a fun experiment, and Molly happily ate up her practice Chocolate Reindeer.

I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

Chocolate Reindeer Blueprint

| patmcg

Molly became inspired to create a new holiday treat called a Chocolate Reindeer, inspired by a Chocolate Mousse.   Her vision is three layers of chocolatey goodness, one layer for each “official” Christmas color: red, green, and white.

Molly’s initial idea was for each layer to be melted, colored chocolate.  After some discussion and brainstorming , we decided to use a combination layers with heavier ingredient on the bottom and lighter on the top.

  1. Bottom layer: red-colored white chocolate
  2. Middle layer:  green-colored melted marshmallows
  3. Top layer: natural white-colored whipped cream

Here’s the blueprint.

choc-reindeer-blueprint.jpeg

 

 

Fidget Spinner

| patmcg

Molly has been enjoying her new fidget spinner, which was a birthday party favor.  For some reason, she decided to lay down on the carpet and spin the spinner on her forehead.  I couldn’t resist but get some photos of the adorable expression on her face.

Out for a Ride

| patmcg

Molly and I had the morning together while Claire finished up a sleepover at a friend’s house.  I asked Molly what she wanted to do, and we ended up combining the top two things on her wishlist: going for a bike ride and going over the Pfluger Pedestrian Bridge in downtown Austin.

In a hilarious turn of events not well captured in photographs, Molly ended up riding her bike right past an active film set on the bridge.  The crew yelled, “We’ve got a biker!  Heads up!”  Molly was not the only such biker, but she was the funniest by far.

Here is our route for Molly’s ride.

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Molly is really motivated to ride her bike but is so far frustrated with the process and thinks the training wheels aren’t working right.

Also, isn’t she adorable on that bike?