Party Animal

Hi Kids,
     I bet you didn't recognize me in my Mardi Gras mask! Do you know what Mardi Gras is? Mardi Gras is French for Fat Tuesday. For hundreds of years, people celebrated Fat Tuesday by eating and partying before they began the somber period of Lent, 40 days before Easter.
     But they don't just party on that day. They start the parties 12 days after Christmas. That whole time until Lent is called Carnival or just Mardi Gras.
     The favorite dessert during those months is King Cake and it's served at almost every party. It looks like this -- 

     It's like a giant, oval, cinnamon roll with a yummy filling inside and icing and sugar sprinkles on top. When Miss Elaine and I went to Mardi Gras in Shreveport, Louisiana this year, we ate lots of King Cake. 
     Parties are planned by groups of friends called krewes. Many of them plan special balls -- parties with food and dancing. They have a king and queen and royal court and everybody dresses up and wears masks. 
     My picture above shows me in a Mardi Gras mask. We got to go to a museum and saw a whole bunch of fancy masks. This is me at the museum -- 

    
     Several of the krewes have parades with lots of big floats. All the krewes build floats to be in the parades. They even have a pet parade put on by the Krewe of Barkus and Meoux (meow). 
     Miss Elaine and I got to ride on a float in the Krewe of Highland parade. This is me getting ready for the parade -- 

    
      Here are some of my favorite floats --

     
People line the street waving their arms and yelling, "Throw me something, mister!"

    The most popular things to throw are strings of beads but other things get thrown, too. From some floats people threw plastic cups, snack cakes, packages of ramen noodles, oranges, avocados, stuffed animals and even hot dogs wrapped in foil. 

     This boy caught a lot of things. It was fun throwing things to the crowd. Some people even remembered to yell, "Thank you." I had fun at Mardi Gras. Most of the Mardi Gras celebrations are in the South in places that the French people settled. Do you think we should have a Mardi Gras parade? I do!
     Love,
     Fuzzy

Bon Jour, Quebec

 Hi Kids,
It's cold out -- so I wanted to tell you about a place that makes the best of the cold and snow. These are pictures my cousin Vanilla sent me from her trip to Quebec, Canada. You know Canada is our country's neighbor to the north. It gets so cold and snowy there that people leave their Christmas decorations up until Valentine's Day because it helps them feel cheerful. And they have a big celebration this time of year -- Carnival. That's Vanilla and Bonhomme. Bonhomme means snowman in French. Many people in Quebec speak French. Bonhomme is the official greeter at Carnival.

Another cool thing they do -- and I do mean COOL - is build an ice village. All the buildings are made of ice blocks and all the furniture and decorations inside are made of ice. Below is a picture of the village. They even have a little church. That's Vanilla in the church. The benches are made of ice, so they put deer skins on them to keep people -- and little bears-- from freezing their bottoms! You can spend the night there -- on beds made out of ice. But they do put mattresses on the beds and plenty of blankets!

 Back in the city, they build an ice palace for Bonhomme. He doesn't really live there but they use it for concerts and other special events during Carnival

 There are lots of fun things to do, too. They made big, snow hills for skiing and for sliding down. You wouldn't expect to see a river raft come sliding down the hill -- but it is lots of fun

They also have games and races -- like this sleigh race.

 And they have snow sculpture contests. Vanilla liked these dinosaurs.

Some people take snow baths. That didn't seem like much fun to Vanilla!

At the end of Carnival, they have a big night parade. Bonhomme waves good-bye for another year. I'd like to go to Canada for this celebration. Wouldn't you?

Love,

Fuzzy

The Really Grand Canyon

Hi Kids,

     The Grand Canyon isn't the biggest or longest canyon in the world but it is the biggest one in the United States. And it is considered the most beautiful canyon anywhere. It is 277 miles long -- just a bit longer than the distance from the top to the bottom of Oklahoma.

     It was created by the Colorado River -- and erosion -- over 3 to 6 million years. If you could see through the hole in the rock in the picture below, you could see the river -- looking like a tiny thread -- about a mile down. If you look very closely, you can see people on top of that big rock.

     There are many different kinds of animals that live in the canyon. Park rangers offer talks about many of them. Here I have just enjoyed a talk about ravens. (This is a puppet in the picture, but you get the idea.) They are very large, black birds and are very smart. They can even unzip ziplock bags to get at food!
     

   
     This is me sitting on a statue of Brighty. You might want to read the book about him -- it's called Brighty of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry. He was a wild burro who lived here long ago.

        I hope you enjoyed seeing my pictures. Have you been to the Grand Canyon? It's in Arizona. It was a two-and-a-half day drive from Edmond. Can you find Arizona on a map? Look at the top of the map of the state -- the Grand Canyon is sort of in the middle near the top. Do you know what direction is at the top of the map? There are lots of things to learn about travel. I want to share my adventures with you -- and I hope you get to do some traveling, too.

Your new friend,
Fuzzy

Zip-a-Dee-Do-It

It's been an age since I've blogged. I have excuses but none of them are really great. So what has driven me to try and remember how to do this? A brother who doesn't Facebook or Dropbox -- and I want to show off to.

I've long thought that a zip line would be fun but my knees would take a look at the stairs involved and convince my head that it was a bad idea. So when I found out that the zip line at Palo Duro Canyon (near Amarillo) didn't involve stairs, just a couple of bridges, I was in.

Here's what I didn't know -- the bridges were swingers with just cables to hang on to. I'll tell you right now, that was the scariest part of the whole adventure. The bridge to the take-off spot was 180 feet long. I had to just look at the platform ahead and tell myself "I'm almost there. I'm almost there" as I swayed across a chasm. I'm hoping the two videos work -- one is from the start of my zip, the other from the landing. Thanks, Jon Jarosh and Laura Watilo Blake for documenting my zip!

The zip line was about a quarter of a mile long and lasted less than a minute. The picture below is the second bridge which was 300 feet long and it was just as scary as the first. Would I do it again? You bet. But I'm looking for a zip line with an elevator.

Fuzzy Visits Nebraska

Hi Kids,
Let me introduce myself. My name is Fuzzy and I am a Traveling Teddy -- part of the geography education program of the Society of American Travel Writers. My bear mom, Miss Elaine, writes stories for magazines and newspapers about places people might want to visit.

She brought me on a trip to Nebraska and we met your teacher, Mr England. He told us you might be interested in our adventures. If you want to be a traveler, too, you can. You can start right in your own hometown. I'm going to show you some of the things we saw when we visited Ogallala. I bet you've seen a lot of these things.

The first place we stopped was Boot Hill. That's where we met Mr. England. He told us about the cowboys who drove cattle up from Texas to Ogallala. And he told us about a lot of the people who were buried in this old cemetery. I really liked this cowboy sculpture but Miss Elaine was too short to put me up in the saddle so I had to sit on the cowboy's boot!

Our next stop was at the Petrified Wood and Art Gallery downtown. There were many beautiful paintings and sculptures there but I liked the rocks and wood best. The owners, Mr. Howard and Mr. Harvey Kenfield spent many hours shaping these rocks into spheres (a fancy word for "ball") and polishing them. Aren't they pretty?

Next we visited the Mansion on the Hill. This house is over 100 years old! It has been decorated inside so that it looks like it would have looked a hundred years ago. This is the children's bedroom.

If you had lived back then, you wouldn't have television or Nintendo or cell phones. But children back then had books, just like you do. I love to read. I hope you enjoy it, too

After lunch, we took a hike up Windlass Hill to see where pioneers going west on the Oregon Trail traveled. Miss Elaine carried me up the steep hill. She needed someone to carry her, too! Her legs were really tired by the time we got to the top!

Our guide explained how thousands of wagons traveled on this trail. No, not the little walking path we were on, but the area around it. Where the wagon wheels traveled, they packed down the dirt and kicked up a lot of dust. A particular kind of brown grass grows well in this kind of soil. If you look at the colors of the grass, you can see where those wagons passed over 150 years ago. Travel was hard and slow. It probably took them a day to get from where your school is now to Windlass Hill. We traveled that distance by car in about half an hour.

Look at the picture below and see if you can tell which way the wagons went.

If you enjoyed reading about my adventure, please let me know. I would love to write you about other places I travel. You can also look at some of my earlier adventures when I was writing to a 3rd grade class here in Oklahoma. I would like to be your friend this year.

Love,
Fuzzy

Fuzzy Goes to Atlanta

Hi Kids,
     This is me with Miss Elaine and her grandson Calvin in Atlanta, Georgia, the capital of the state. Calvin was going to college in Atlanta and Miss Elaine wanted to visit him -- and she took me along. We did lots of fun things.
     The first thing we did was take a Segway tour. I had to ride in the pouch on the front of the Segway.
Segways have two wheels and a motor. Before we could go, we had to take lessons. This is Calvin with our teacher Laura.

          The trickiest part is getting on and off! We had to wear helmets. Thank goodness no one fell down!  After our two-hour ride, we were hungry. You're not going to believe what we ate! This is called a Sublime Burger at a restaurant named Cypress Street Grill. It is a big burger topped with Cheddar cheese, caramelized onions and applewood-smoked bacon and, instead of a bun, it is served between two doughnuts! We shared it. The hardest thing was getting into our mouths!

     One of the most interesting places to go in Atlanta is the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum. Jimmy Carter was President of the United States from 1977 to 1981. Some of your parents were babies back then -- or maybe not even born yet.  Before he went into politics, President Carter was in the Navy and helped develop the nuclear submarine program. Calvin and I are in front of a replica of the inside of a nuclear submarine in the museum.

     President Carter has always worked hard to solve big problems through peaceful means. Because of his efforts to make peace between Egypt and Israel he was given the Noble Peace Prize -- one of the most important awards in the world.

     In the museum is a copy of the Oval Office in the U.S. Capitol as it looked when President Carter was president. We couldn't go into it but they had a big picture you could use for taking photos.  I pretended I was president.

     Another cool place we visited was the Fox Theater. It was built in the 1920s and opened as a movie theater in 1929. In those days, going to the movies was a big deal and theaters were often so beautifully decorated that they were known as movie palaces. Today the theater is used more for live shows and concerts but you can take tours, too. Have you ever seen a movie theater this fancy?  I hadn't!

     Here's one place that everyone who goes to Atlanta should visit -- the Georgia Aquarium. It's really big and has some really big fish! That's a whale shark in the picture below. You can actually swim in the tank with them -- they don't eat people. They aren't whales, which are mammals, but are the world's largest fish.

     My favorite animals were the beluga whales -- this one seemed to be putting on a show for us.

     I have enjoyed writing to you this year. I hope you enjoyed my stories and my pictures. Have a great summer -- I hope you get to do some traveling.

Your friend,
Fuzzy

Bear in the Bluebonnets

Hi Kids,
This is me on my trip to the Texas Hill Country. These are bluebonnets -- the Texas state flower. They're wild and bloom all over this time of year. They are very pretty and everybody loves to see the fields of beautiful blue flowers.

Miss Elaine and I stayed at a nice place on Lake Buchanan (Buck-anan). It is very rustic -- you can see the local limestone used around the pool. It was too cool for swimming but we didn't have time anyway. Can you find me in the picture? Look for my white tee shirt!

There are lots of things to do here. One night we took a wagon ride to a big dark field where there is an observatory with two giant telescopes. We could see the stars and planets up close! We also got to hear a talk about snakes and lizards. This is a crevice spiny lizard which lives in this part of Texas. When you turn him on his back, he kind of goes to sleep. If you turn him back over, you have to make sure you are holding him or he will run away very quickly! He has a pretty blue tummy -- it matches Miss Elaine's purse.

One day we took a cruise up the Texas Colorado River which runs into Lake Buchanan. Captain Shawn let me sit in the pilot house to get our picture taken.

This waterfall was my favorite spot on the river. We also saw a bald eagle, some pelicans, some great blue herons and a wild pig.

Another day we visited the Fort Croghan Museum. Two of the buildings were over 150 years old! There were people there dressed in clothes like they wore in the early days of the fort. This man was dressed like a trapper. In olden times, he would have trapped beaver, coyotes, deer and bobcats and sold the furs to make money.

Another day we went to Longhorn Caverns. This is one of only three river-formed show caves (open to the public) in the United States. One of the others is Alabaster Caverns in Oklahoma. Have you been there? I haven't been there yet but I would like to go. We had to go down a lot of steps to get to the cave entrance.

Most of the cave walls are very smooth but this is a section that has calcite crystals. You can see several of them sparkling. Crystals a solid minerals which are usually clear and have very regular sides and edges. In another room we saw crystals much larger than these.

In this picture you can see the crystals much better. See how different they look from the rock around them.

Here you can see smooth walls. The lines were originally layers of sediment -- dirt that settled to the bottom of an ancient ocean and became squashed so hard and long that it turned into rock.

I think the cave was my favorite place. Most caves have stalactites and stalagmites caused by dripping water. This river-formed cave only had a couple of tiny ones. But it was cool to see how water carved this cave into smooth shapes. I hope you get to visit it someday.
Love,
Fuzzy