Summer Break: Week Three

We had a lot of rain in Houston last week! We can't complain too much because it kept the temperatures down. 

Here's a peek at some of during our third week of summer break:

Indoor running because there was too much rain!

 The boys and I went to an ASCII art class at the Looscan Library. This summer program for tweens taught them how to use code to create ASCII art (art with symbol). This program also counted toward my field project for my grad school class. 

Will's ASCII art

We also checked out books, clearly! I had requested this one for me, but Will confiscated it because it's epistolary and he loves that style of narrative. I'll read it when he's done and then hopefully Henry will grab it too! 

All the rain made this one a bit goofy! 

But he did make me a flower out of bendy sticks.  

Finally, on Thursday, we got out of the house (for something besides library visits and art class). We decided that it was the perfect day to visit the zoo because it was very overcast with a decent chance of rain. We grabbed our umbrellas but it didn't rain on us AND we had the zoo pretty much to ourselves.

Our first stop was the Big Bugs exhibit.

The zoo always has fun summer exhibits -- this year, there are giant animatronic insects!

The bombardier beetle sprays water, so Henry tried to fend off the attack with his umbrella.

The animals were so active, maybe because it wasn't too hot.  

The chimpanzees and gorillas were out and moving.

And we got to see the brand-new baby elephant! Tilly was just five days old when we saw her!

Henry's art class work

On Friday, we visited the MFAH. We had to stop and show Will the Cloud Column sculpture outside the Glassell School.

The fountains outside the school were pretty cool too.

We really wanted to see the Big Bambu installation.  

The installation, This Thing Called Life, is made up of over 3000 bamboo poles and towers more than 30 feet in the air. Bamboo is the strongest natural building material. This installation is really impressive!

After walking through the installation on the ground level, we went upstairs and walked across this bridge to walk on the structure.

Summer in Houston may be hot, but our cultural institutions do a phenomenal job bringing exciting and unique installations to our city during these sweltering months.