The Colour Run is Coming to Ottawa

On August 25^th, the Color Run is coming to Ottawa. The Color Run, also known as the ‘Happiest 5k on the Planet’, is a weird and wild paint race that celebrates healthiness, happiness and individuality. From it’s debut in January 2012, it has focused on fitness and fun rather than who wins. In fact, there’s no winner at all. Or hundreds of winners. Depending on how you look at it. With only two rules, the concept of the Color Run is easy to follow:

1. Wear white at the starting line
2. Finish plastered in colour

I know it sounds a bit daunting – a 5K run – but don’t worry. This run is for everyone – kids and families – at all levels of fitness. Remember, there are no winners. The whole point of the run is FUN!

So get your whites on and head down to the Canadian Tire Centre on August 25^th. It's $50 for individuals to register and $45/person for teams of 4. Kids under 5 are free.  The fun starts at 9 am.

Stay tuned for more about the Color Run. We’re sending Andrea Lie and her daughter down to the event so we’ll have a first hand account of the color mayhem. 

"Go - Bon Voyage" to the Ottawa Public Library this summer (part 2)

By  Xiao Feng Xing - Youth Collections Librarian at the Ottawa Public Library  Here's part 2 of this year’s Summer Reading Club. The “Go – Bon Voyage” travel theme encourages children to go on their reading journey to places near and far and explore anywhere or anything.

Cocca-Leffler, Maryann: A Vacation for Pooch, Henry Holt, 2013

Violet felt very sad. She can’t bring her dog with her on her vacation to Florida. Her dog has to stay behind on vacation at her grandfather’s farm. Before she leaves on her vacation, she packed two bags: one for her dog and the other for herself. But Violet accidentally takes her dog’s bag. Will Violet and her dog both be okay for their vacations? This book describes the emotions that come with separation from a loved one.  You could pair this with a book from the Toot & Puddle series by Holly Hobbie.

Smith, Mike: The Hundred Decker Bus, Macmillan, 2013

You might have taken a ride on a double-decker bus in Ottawa. Can you imagine what would happen when you take a ride on a hundred-decker bus? The giant fold-out bus at the end of this book will give you a big surprise too!

Koolen Maayken: The Kidnapping of Mona Lisa,  Clavis, 2012

Fans of Where’s Waldo will enjoy this super searchable book that has a great mystery detective plot. Five thieves have stolen Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous painting the Mona Lisa. Join officer Rat and officer Wolf who chase the thieves through the most beautiful cities in the Europe: Paris, Berlin, Rome, London, Barcelona, and Amsterdam. You’ll see lots of famous buildings and landmarks as you solve the mystery in this wordless giant book.

Gravett, Emily: Meerkat Mail, Macmillan, 2006 

Sunny is a meerkat, a squirrel-size member of the mongoose family, who lives in the desert in Africa. Of course it’s very dry and very hot in the desert. Sunny’s family motto is “Stay safe, stay together." However, Sunny wishes he could live somewhere else. So he packs his suitcase and goes on a trip to visit his mongoose relatives - from Monday to Saturday - to search for the perfect home. He sends postcard to his parents every day during his trip. The text and illustrations on the postcards are full of humour and delight.  In the end, Sunny realizes that his own family is the best, and that there’s no place like home.Children will love how most of the story is told through flip-the-flap postcards featuring stamps and postmarks.

Falconer, Ian: Olivia goes to Venice, Atheneum Books, 2010

In this book, Ian Falconer tells the story of a little pig, Olivia, and her family, and their travels to Venice. They enjoy gelato (ice-cream), taking a gondola ride, and looking for the perfect souvenir to remember Venice. Olivia takes a stone from the Bell Tower as her perfect souvenir, causing the monument to tumble down!

Familiar drawings of Olivia and family as well as photos of the real Venice are digitally combined to create a fresh illustration experience. Pair this one with Froggy goes to Hawaii to see how your favourite characters spend their vacations.

Come into one of the Ottawa Public Library’s 33 branches and bookmobiles to sign up for the TD Summer Reading Club all summer long. Pick up your “passport” and activity book as well as delightful stickers. You can also enter your sticker codes at www.tdsummerreadingclub.ca  to reveal rewards.

Train Rides at the Science and Tech Museum

By Kamerine This summer at the Science and Tech museum you can ride on an actual train. It's a steam locomotive pulling two vintage rail cars on an out and back trip, run by volunteers from the Bytown Railway Society. It costs $2 and was totally worth it: the kids loved it!

The trains run between 11am and 3:45pm on Wednesdays and Sundays until September 2nd.

You buy your tickets just inside the museum and present them at the train station which is outside. We bought our tickets when we got to the museum around 10am, checked out some of the museum before heading to the station. We arrived at the station a few minutes before the first ride at 11am, but had to wait for the second trip because it was so busy.

The ten-minute trip was narrated and we were told all sorts of interesting things about the train and the rail cars. Unfortunately the trip was over in no time and we had to leave the train. I think the kids could have gone again and again.

The kids have loved trains forever and couldn't have been happier than when they were finally sitting on one. Definitely one of the highlights of the summer.

For information about the train rides and other fun things going on this summer at the Science and Tech museum visit their website: http://www.sciencetech.technomuses.ca/english/whatson/2013-summer.cfm.

Let us know if you decide to go!

Kamerine is mom to 3-year-old Little J and 2-year-old  Little K.  She documents her life with two toddlers, a husband and a cat at The Life of K.

Farmers, Warriors, Builders: The Hidden Life of Ants - A Giveaway (Closed)

Farmers, Warriors, Builders: The Secret Life of Ants is a new exhibit at the Museum of Nature. We sent Andrea and her kids to scout out the digs and they loved it. You can read about their adventures here. The collection is on loan from the Smithsonian and features 39 incredible, large-format images from Mark W. Moffett, who the National Geographic Society describes as “the Indiana Jones of entomology.” The exhibit is jam-packed with all kinds of interesting information about how ants work, hunt, live and communicate.

Now for the giveaway part

We have a family pass for one lucky family (2 adults and 2 kids) to visit the Museum of Nature and The Hidden Life of Ants.  The pass includes admission to the Hidden Life of Ants exhibit and all the regular exhibits but some special exhibits and movies may have additional fees. In order to qualify you must answer tell us one fun fact about ants (or even just why you love ants!).  Leave your answer in the comments below and we'll pick a winner at random on August 5th. Good luck!

Farmers, Warriors, Builders: The Hidden Life of Ants

By Andrea In the summer months we aim to keep them out of our homes. At picnics we do everything to avoid them. On the front patio stones the kids catch and examine them. We consider them a pest but is there more than meets the eye? Yes!

If you've ever watched ants at work you discover their behaviour, anatomy and purpose is more complex than we generally understand. This spark of interest is satisfied at the Canadian Museum of Nature's new visiting exhibition, Farmers, Warriors, Builders: The Hidden Life of Ants on loan from the Smithsonian.

When the opportunity to preview and blog about a new feature at the CMN presented itself, I gladly accepted. Our membership allows us to foster our children's education and this exhibit is a compliment to junior elementary science curriculum where insects are studied.

When you enter the gallery you notice the large, colourful photos of magnified ants. Through the eyes of a child, this is what macro photography was meant for: seeing bugs up close and in detail. Mark W. Moffet, an award-winning photographer for National Geographic, lends 39 large-sized photos of ants which capture their behaviour, their roles in their ant-heap and their habitat.

In addition to the images there are two aquarium-like encasements at a child's eye-level allowing them to observe ant colonies at work. My children were especially interested in the honeypot ants but also intrigued by having poisonous ants carry seeds to feed their young beneath their fingertips. An effective visual was the casting of an ant colony's underground habitat. When you consider that we only see the small hill of dirt and a hole, it opens their eyes to a whole new underground world!

The exhibition opened July 26th and runs until January 5, 2014. It can be found to the left of the stairs behind the main desk at the front entrance. The cost of admission and/or membership includes access to this exhibit as well as several fun activities held throughout the summer. The following activities are for visitors of all ages and run until September 2nd.

IT'S A TRAP! INSECT TRAP MAKING WORKSHOP

• Daily at 10AM, 11AM, 2PM and 3PM

ANT SCAVENGER HUNT

• 
Daily

ANT CRAFT

• Saturdays and Sundays, 9:30AM – noon

PICNIC TIME

• 
Daily 11AM - 2PM

ARTIST IN THE GALLERY

• Irena Lyubchenko, August 19 - 23, 1PM - 4PM
• Dinorah Catzalco, August 26 - 30, 1PM - 4PM

I found this exhibit to be accessible, appealing and informative to my three children of different ages. Enjoy your visit!

Andrea is a happily married stay-at-home mother of three amazing children who loves her friends, family, art, music and takes too many photographs. She blogs here.