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[-=CROMAN=-]

I am scheduling another star paty with St. Charles Discovery Center on Jan 13th with a bad weather date of Jan 20th. This will be an indoor / outdoor event.

We will be utilizing the conference room to view a wireless live video feed from one of the scopes outside. This will be a family event with themed activities for the kids and a workshop for the adults. This event will tentatively go from 7pm until 9pm for the kids and 9pm - ?? for the harcore people.

If any CA can make either of the dates that would be cool.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Rich....

You are hardcore sir.

[Paulie pchris00]

I can't imagine I'll have any conflicting astronomy dates in January. I'd like to be there. Let's see how the weather turns out those weeks.

[erikruud]

I should be able to be there.

I had a couple thoughts:

We should make sure any announcements stress that the address is on Campton Hills Drive and not Campton Hills Road. It makes a difference on GoogleMaps.

Also stress that the event has an indoor portion.

I read the other day that the Home Depot digital levels don't work below freezing. I don't know if it's true or not yet.

[RobbW]

Am I to assume this means there will only be one scope set up with a video camera on it? We won't be setting up multiple scopes for guests to look through? Just wondering.

What video camera is going to be used? This isn't going to be the mysterious MallinCam in action, is it?

[-=CROMAN=-]

Robb... Multiple scopes will be in action. I just meant that we would have at least one scope with a video feed. I'll be setting up a wireless LAN there so we can have multiple cameras! I'm looking at a new goto scope and cam setup now. I have a couple of months to get my setup together.

If the mysterious Mallincam person wants to join in on the fun that would be very cool. I was also thinking about streaming the feeds to our website as well with some javascript.

[patrickm]

Winter sounds like an ideal time for Night Sky Network!

Unfortunately, it looks like we already have Steppenwolf tix that evening. :-( If that's the case, then I'd say chances are good for it to be the only clear, fifty degree day in January.

[-=CROMAN=-]

Eric.. The park district is going to run a big promo for this event and the subject directions has been brought up. =) I have the same digital level as you do. If they really freeze up we will have to summon the powers of Bill and access his neurons remotely.

Patrick... if the first day gets weathered out there is always the next weekend. ( you cant escape )

[patrickm]

Unless something else is going on, or I am sick, I am almost always up for astronomy!

[erikruud]

My son and I are headed out to a Cub Scout overnight in a local forest preserve tonight.

I am bringing the scopes and doing a little astronomy night for the Cub Scouts.

Wish me luck!

[-=CROMAN=-]

looks like you got a good night tonight... good skies

[erikruud]

The sky was pretty good last night. We were at Johnson's Mound Forest Preserve near Elburn and it is a slightly darker site than Hickory Knolls, but there are more trees so you have to wait for things to get higher in the sky.

I showed them the Big Dipper and how to find Polaris. Every one there, including the adults, pretty much pointed at Jupiter when I asked if they new where the north star was.

We spent some time on Jupiter. One boy wanted to zoom in so he could "see the lava".

We looked at Andromeda, which impressed the adults more than the kids.

We missed Mercury and Venus due to the trees.

I was hoping to show them the Pleiades, but by the time the rose above the trees, a haze had rolled in and they faded from view. Jupiter had a halo of sorts for a while.

Then I lost my audience to the siren call of a campfire and marshmallows.

[erikruud]

Oh and before Joe jumps on me for not having pictures, I have this one.



You can see the new shroud that I made yesterday morning. I used some black electrical tape to hold it on. I plan on adding some velcro strips to hold it on.

It is made from a rubber sheet that I got at American Science and Surplus. I cut it to size and added cut outs to fit around some of the hardware. It actually runs under the focuser mount and there is a hole to let the light through. It really cut out the fogging of the secondary from people breathing.

[erikruud]

One more picture.

[-=CROMAN=-]

how did the digital level work out?

[erikruud]

The digital level is great. It even works as an adjustable counterweight.

[-=CROMAN=-]

The party is still on for friday. We have this setup to utilize the indoor facility and the attached deck for the scopes. If you are interested in joining me, robb and Erik please do so.

elenin.paranomalo.us/2011/12/hickory-knolls-star-party-january-13-2012/

[erikruud]

In spite of the solid cloud cover, Thanks Joe, we had a great time last night.

There were activities for the kids, presentation by Robb, and good food including cookies baked by Robb.

Here was Robb's scope setup indoors.


And his target for the evening was the Dixie Nebula.


We made sure we had our safety lights.


Robb's Cookies were awesome.


We even has a mascot for the evening. Petey the AstroBunny!


Robb gave a presentation on the winter constelations.

[erikruud]

Robb did a great job of improvising a presentation on light pollution as well.


We had lots of people come out and lots of questions were asked and I think most of them were answered.

My favorite question of the night came from one of my Cub scouts. He asked Robb, "Can you buy the the Hubble Space Telescope?".

[-=CROMAN=-]

[erikruud]

Nice job on the video.

[-=CROMAN=-]

Clear skies tonight! I'm out with the celestron firstscope minidob.... Such is life.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Very cool and the vid displays very well on the feel of the night.

Next time...clear skies.

Robb's cookies are indeed good.

[RobbW]

I had a great time Friday night, and it seemed as though everyone in attendance was enjoying themselves, as well. For the next event, Joe will be banned from making ANY asto purchases within two weeks of the scheduled date!

Rich, thanks so much for pulling all this together. It was a great success despite Mother Nature's best efforts to thwart us. Good job on the video. Although, next time, I will demand hair and makeup technicians and there will be no filming from my right side!

Eric, thanks to you, as well, for coming out and being part of the team. I heard from several people that you did an excellent job of explaining our different setups and how the work. Also, tell your daughter she was a great ambassador to the night skies.

I'll post up what few pics I took of the evening. All of mine were from the very beginning of the festivities as I quickly got wrapped up talking with many different people about various astro topics throughout the night. Next time I'll try to be like Joe and enlist a camera assistant to do all my photography for me!

[-=CROMAN=-]

Rumor has it......... Astrofest is cancelled this year. Get ready for the first st.charles weekend camp out this summer. We have 130 acres dedicated to our summer event. Gonna be a good summer. Hopefully "certain" people will be out there representing!

[erikruud]

I know from a past facebook status that our favorite suburbaphobic was in Homer Glen a couple months ago so maybe we can get him out by us.

Maybe Robb can leave a trail of cookies.

[atomant]

I look forward to summer camping and starwatching this year!
Can never have too many C.A. observing sites.

[erikruud]

Hey Rich, where is this 130 acres you speak of?

[-=CROMAN=-]

There are two field. 130 access in total. We still need to check out that biden field they were taking about

[erikruud]

At Campton Hills Park?