Learning about Canada: Artic Tern

This morning we were learning about some of the different animals of Canada using this book.

We learned about seals, walruses, a variety of birds, reindeer and so much more. 

I said to the lad "pick an animal and we'll learn more about it".

He picked the Artic Tern.

The Artic tern is a fascinating bird, did you know it flies an annual trip of 40,000 km, from it's Artic Breeding grounds to wintering grounds in the Antarctic.

The Artic Tern is a medium sized bird. Newborns are gray or brown. Adults are gray to white in color during the breeding season. Their beak and legs are red, and a black patch covers the head and forehead. During the non-breeding season, the legs and beak are black and the black patch of color on the head shrinks.


Artic Terns are a long-lived bird, living into their decades and don't start to breed until 3 or 4 years old.

Artic Terns can moult so quickly that they can be flightless.  When they moult they tend to sit on blocks of ice near the water's edge.

The downy young come in two colours, grey and brown, and colours can be mixed in a single hatching.

They normally eat fish and crustaceans, but will also eat insects.   They also will steal food from other birds by flying at them and startling them into dropping their catch.  

Anyways, that's a lesson in the Artic Tern.    Ready for my boy to learn tomorrow.  :)

Recipe: Tuna Melts

I grew up on tuna melts.... it was a quick and easy meal that us girls could make and mom wouldn't be wondering what we were up to.  :)

The recipe I grew up with used relish and boiled eggs, salt and pepper in it along with miracle whip and I used to love, but as I matured though I've developed a resistance to relish so have needed to find a way to replicate the taste without side effects.

This had led to be playing around with what I like in my tuna melts.

My current rendition:

Ingredients:

1 regular can of tuna, drained...  for melts I like flaked tuna.
mayonnaise
PC lemon-herb seasoning
2 pickled eggs 

2 slices of bread 
2 slices of cheese

Directions: 

Chop up the pickled eggs.
Then mix the rest of the first four ingredients in well.  Add mayo and seasoning to taste.  I tend to like a drier mix, others like wet.

Put on two slices of bread. 
Cover with cheese slice (one for each slice of bread eh?)

Put in oven to heat through (350 if I recall until bread is browning basically), then under the broiler until cheese is all melty... or if you are like me until slightly burnt (if using the black diamond style cheese slices).

Works equally well in regular oven or a toaster oven.

C is for O Canada, a blogging through the alphabet post

Welcome to week "C" of blogging through the alphabet.  I am so happy you are joining us today.

Today I am going to talk to you about our national anthem "O Canada".   The C being the C from Canada or if you wish Chant National as it was originally known.  :)

Did you know that O Canada was originally called “Chant national”?   Our anthem was written by Sir Adolphe-Basile Routhier, in Quebec City, with musical composter Calixa Lavallee.   Originally written in French, it was first performed on June 24, 1880.

It was sung widely in French but the English versions varied widely for quite a few years, partly due to the translation from French into English, until the version written in 1908 by Robert Stanley Weir became popular.  It is very similar to the verses we use today.

"O Canada" was approved as our national anthem on March 15, 1967, but the current version wasn't officially approved until June 27, 1980 under the National Anthem Act.