21.2.17

"Light The Sky" by Grace VanderWaal - video and lyrics


Stars, they got nothing on us
I don't think you understand
Let's go out and do
Something we'd never do
Cause I feel like I can do
Anything when

My head is spinning
And my feet are off the ground
When I can't stop dancing
Like no one's around
And yeah, I think we were born to shine
Cause' the stars are dull when their
Compared to you and I
And if people dont like it
Then they can close their eyes
'Cause we're not the same
And we don't have to try
We're brighter than fireflies
We're gonna light the sky
Oh, oh, oh
Light the sky
You and me
Me and you
We will shine through
You and me
Me and you
We will shine
'Cause my head is spinning
And my feet off the ground
And I can't stop dancing
Like no one's around
And yeah, I think we were born to shine
'Cause stars are dull when their
Compared to you and I
And if people don't like it
Then they can close their eyes
'Cause we're not the same
And we don't have to try
'Cause we're brighter than fireflies
We're gonna light the sky
Oh, oh, oh
Light the sky


14.2.17

How to say ‘I love you’ in 50 languages

They say that the language of love is universal and understood by all.
But some may argue that that isn’t quite the case.
For instance there will be many who have no idea that Te iubesc and Jag alskar dig mean ‘I love you’, in Romanian and Swedish respectively.
To make sure that everyone around the world is clearly understood on Valentine’s Day a new infographic by flowercard.co.uk spells out how to say ‘I love you’ in 50 different languages.
So if you want to say the three magic words to someone in a foreign country on the 14th – or indeed any other day – it’s got you covered.
Read on to discover how to spread the love around the globe. 







Caillou gets ready for Valentine's Day - Video



11.2.17

St. Valentine's Day - Wirehanger Heart

Венец за Св. Валентин
The making of these colorful hearts took nothing more than wirehangers (the kind you get from the drycleaner’s), colored paper napkins (as we didn’t have tissue paper), some beads and yarn.
2
Open the wire hanger and straighten it up a bit with your hands, then bend it into a heart shape.
3
As we didn’t have any felt or suitable fabric scraps, we used paper napkins and were quite pleased with the results :)
4
When we had threaded the whole heart through and twisted it closed with a pair of pliers, we made some yarn ‘spiderweb’ to give it a more accomplished look.
5

«Captain Fantastic» - Film Review & Official Trailer

A story of love and extremes, the pleasurably freewheeling “Captain Fantastic” centers on a family that has found its bliss in splendid, unplugged isolation. Somewhere in deepest Oregon, amid the tall pines and soaring mountains, young and old hunt and holler and drop lines from Noam Chomsky. The clan’s father isn’t a superhero, but because he’s played by Viggo Mortensen he’s the next best thing. Mr. Mortensen, whose intensity has the sting of possession, has a way of making you believe his characters can do whatever they set their minds to: fly, leap over buildings, save the world.
Mostly, though, Ben Cash takes care of his children. For years, he and his ailing dream of a wife, Leslie (Trin Miller), have been living with their six kids, who range in age from 7 to 18, on a compound where they have thrived beautifully without electricity, a sewer line or trend alerts about the Kardashians. By day, Ben teaches and trains the children, racing them through the woods like Olympians or Special Forces soldiers. At night, the family plays music together and reads by firelight — leafing through books one page at a time — before bedding down in the communal tepee.

Perhaps it all sounds fairly ridiculous, like a story about a little survivalist house in the woods or the start of a joke about puritanical parenting (no gluten, no grease) that has Gwyneth Paltrow as its punch line. But lifestyle doesn’t begin describe the Cash family’s alternative reality, and despite all the self-aware joking this isn’t a goof. From the moment the movie opens on a deer hunt — in a scene that suggests “Apocalypse Now” by way of “Lord of the Flies” — the writer-director Matt Ross makes it clear he has something weightier in store than mindful napping and snacks.
It begins with a sweep of green, a flash of silver and a smear of red. Discreetly staged and shot, rightly serious and intimate, the hunt turns out to be a rite of passage for the family’s eldest son, the teenager Bo (George MacKay). It’s all very solemn, but also over quickly, and Mr. Ross has soon shifted focus to the stream of younger children straggling out of the woods. Faces and bodies smeared in mud, they are a mesmerizing, surreal spectacle — one of the smallest, a Dennis Hopper-esque runt, wears what looks like a skinned bobcat for a hat. Soon, everyone is laughing while washing off the dirt and blood, a cleansing that gives the movie something of a sustained metaphor.
At first, the outside world looms in “Captain Fantastic” through its stark absence, even though the compound is well-equipped and stocked with necessities from that world, including sharp knives, heavy books and bales of mismatched clothes. Ben and Leslie have opted to live in seclusion as a matter of principle, having embraced protest as an ideal. At its loftiest, their profound seclusion suggests that they’re spiritual and philosophical heirs to an isolationist like Henry Thoreau; at worst, it suggests fanaticism, cultishness, selfishness. Touchingly, the children sometimes seem closer to the castaways of the Swiss Family Robinson, whose self-reliance was involuntary.
American movies about families tend to come in two flavors: the upbeat (the mainstream default) and the catastrophic (the indie brand). “Captain Fantastic” tries hard to find a third way. The story kicks in when a death forces most of the family off the compound and on the road, where they have silly and sober encounters with strangers and relatives on the way to a collective epiphany. (Kathryn Hahn, Steve Zahn, Frank Langella and Ann Dowd fill out the familial ranks.) Along the way, Ben keeps on keeping on about the evils of capitalism while his children discover themselves and other people, including in a sweet, trailer-park stay where Bo learns how to kiss a girl.
If “Captain Fantastic” doesn’t cram all of human experience into that box we like to call the dysfunctional family — a category that suggests that all anyone needs to get through Thanksgiving is therapy talk and a group hug — it’s partly because its characters have politics, not simply feelings. The Cash children stumble, but they’re supremely capable and self-aware. What makes them unusual isn’t their knife skills; it’s that they talk seriously about ideas. The same holds true of Ben, whose worldview falters only because Mr. Ross seems anxious to soften the extremes he’d sharpened. There’s something moving about his search for balance, something a little pleading too.
Perhaps it’s no surprise that Mr. Ross ends up nudging “Captain Fantastic” into more generic terrain. He never sells out his characters, but after all the radical power-to-the people talk he finally comes down on the side of compromise and the soft landing. It’s left to Mr. Mortensen, who can make menace feel like vulnerability — and turn vulnerability into a confession — to keep the movie from slipping into sentimentality. He’s the most obvious reason to see it, although Mr. Ross’s insistence on taking your intelligence for granted is itself a great turn on. His characters don’t need smartphones to do their thinking for them; he assumes the same holds true of his audience.

2.2.17

"Beautiful Thing" - by Grace VanderWaal - video and lyrics


You think that you know my heart
And you probably do
So I'm always with you
I could stay with you for hours
In an empty room
Never get bored
Never have nothing to do

You're my other half
You're what makes me me
What makes me smile
When I fall down and can't get back, get back, get back up
On my feet

Without you here I am boring
Something inside you is triggering
It makes me myself
Makes me funny, you're a beautiful thing

We're a beautiful thing together
Even when the weather is low
You're a beautiful thing
We're a beautiful thing together
Even when the weather is low
We find the rainbow
Up in the sky
You'd say don't you cry, it's all gonna be alright

If we ever gone through a fight oh that would be bad
'Cause you know all of my secrets
But I know all of yours

We make hours turn into seconds together
The weight of the world feel like a feather
'Cause we're holding it right in our hands

You're my other half
You're what makes me me
What makes me smile
When I fall down and can't get back up, get back, get back up
On my feet

Without you here I am boring
Something inside you is triggering
It makes me myself
Makes me funny

You're a beautiful thing
We're a beautiful thing together
Even when the weather is low
You're a beautiful thing
We're a beautiful thing together
Even when the weather is low

You and me
Together, we'll forget what we have been told
We'll live in our own dream world
You and me, forever
We'll forget what we have been told
We will take on the whole world

Without you here I am boring
Something inside you is triggering
It makes me myself, it makes me funny
You're a beautiful thing.
We're a beautiful thing together
Even when the weather is low

And that's a beautiful thing




1.2.17

Listen and read about animals...



Click on the picture and you can read and listen lots of stories about animals and nature each month.


Click on the "More Issues" button to access past issues.

Come on, kids: explore and learn amazing facts about the nature around you!