The holiday season has passed and now I'm into the first new season of the year: science fair season.

I did have a wonderful Christmas and a warm, lovely New Year. I got my last present in the mail yesterday - a stuffed, two-headed calf from our dear friends in Boise. My kids were delighted.

Now, however, my kitchen is a temporary lab - testing the effect of varied glycerin levels on the longevity of bubbles. I think that after at least a dozen of these projects I am finally getting better at the selection and procrastination part of the project.

My daughter's entrepreneurial spirit popped up when she was mixing her varied solutions and trying one out with her homemade, ineffectual, wire wand.

"We should market this stuff!" she exclaimed. I hated to burst her bubble but I explained that she was a little behind the curve on that idea.

Right now we are currently having a "delay in the lab" due to the lack of a normal bubble wand. Ironically, despite the perhaps gallon of homemade bubble solution on my kitchen counter, I'm going to have to go buy some bubbles for the wand. Figures.

I love bubbles - the perfect introduction to the ephemeral nature of beauty. I remember my 2 year old son drinking a couple of big chugs before he registered that they didn't taste good and his wide eyes when he burped a bubble. They had an ill effect on him over then next day.