The Real Kiwi

You know, if you don't know what a Kiwi is. It's a bird from New Zealnd who can't fly. I think I've posted it before when. It demonstrates how this Kiwi desperately attempts to fly despite all the obstacles. His desire is very strong.

Under the user's "info" there are links for more information, and for answering people's questions about the Kiwi that people have been asking the animator. This clip is actually a fave of mine since it was posted 2 years ago. The clip was posted by the original animator.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdUUx5FdySs

Aha! A Catalog For The Kiwi Pacific Records!

Ouch! I should have checked this site earlier. I went straight to Kiwi Pacific Records and saw that there is a catalog of their old records.

Kiwi Pacific Record Catalog
http://www.kiwipacific.com/index.php?cPath=27

The Sounds Of New Zealand

The history of New Zealand includes a record company called Kiwi Records. Kiwi Records was established in 1957. Kiwi Records' purpose was as the first paragraph tells us to "provide support to the "Maori language, physical education and folk-dancing school text". The link Also, additional reading include the record company's historical background of the Maori & Pacific discs, folk songs and ballads, children's choirs & records, tweets and twains.

As you go on reading the about the background, you'll read that besides producing songs and music there was another unique music style. In the 1960's when the hi-fi was new, people were doing experiments by recording anything. Like the sound of birds and the stream trains. There was even a record package from a company called Musicolour Products. The package was called "The sounds of Antarctica" (1965). This package came with colour books. There is also an interesting history about the sales of the sounds. You could even hear the bird calls at the Radio New Zealand National.

On the right hand side navigation area, go to "Related galleries" and click on the "New Zealand Music Month" to related images. This site is an excellent place to learn about the history of New Zealand which includes those crazy decades of the 60's and the 70's. There is really plenty to learn about the musical background such as the Beatles visit to New Zealand. I enjoyed the reading about the music but wish there were a lot more pictures of their vintage records covers. It would have been nice to see them visually not just reading about them.

Kiwi Records
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/photo/kiwi-records

The New Zealand History Media Library has many other great topics at the media page. I may be wrong but you probably could learn almost anything about the historical background of New Zealand here. At least to me, there is much to learn about NZ, I hardly know anything about this country except (from what I've been told) that the people in NZ are very friendly. ;-)

The New Zealand History Media Library
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/library/media

Papers & Crafty Crows

The Crafty Crow blog is basically about children's craft and books. There are all kinds of entertaining posts. There are many posts about books as well crafts, paper toys, history, music, experiments and just about anything that you can share with children. Among all these categories there are four categories that aim at four specific age groups. 12+, 18 months to 2 years old, 3-5 years old and 6 to 12 years old. There are way too many categories for me to list here. This is a good place though, to find out about children books. The posts contain the link of the featured subjects. I find these other sites equally interesting. At one point I indirectly went to nice blog called Custom Paper Toys. Check it out. I've seen a few of these paper toys somewhere else, but I'm not sure if it was the same artist. Anyhow, these creations are truly amazing, creative and imaginative. Looking at the image above you can see the talent coming through. The link to his site is the second url below.





http://belladia.typepad.com/crafty_crow

Custom Paper Toys
http://www.custompapertoys.com

Blog - Groovy Vegetarian

As a vegetarian I enjoyed this stuff. This isn't a PETA sort of things. It's fun and there are all kind of posts, like funny vegetarian shirts, vegan vanilla cupcakes, Coasters Made From Recycled PC Motherboards and Why Isn’t There A Dog Whisperer For Cats?

Believe it or not, but the woman above, Mimi Kirk, is 71 years old vegetarian who became a vegetarian 30 years ago and eats raw food! That post is from August 30th, 2009. Many years ago I met this elderly lady. I was curious about her age. She told me to guess it and I said maybe early 60's. She said no, that she was 75 or 80 (I can't remember her exact age, but she sure didn't look anywhere close to her real age). I was in shock! She was in a fantastic shape just like the woman above, Mimi Kirk. Truly amazing. In that post, there is also a small video clip in which you can see how old she looked. It was hard for me to believe she was much older than she looked.

So as you can see there are some interesting posts displayed on Groovy Vegetarian.

Groovy Vegetarian - Compassion Lifestyle Blog (with eco fun mixed in)
http://www.groovyvegetarian.com