Yesterday, we celebrated human flight, but today we’re taking one small step into space! On this day in 1977, NASA launched the unmanned spacecraft Voyager 2. It was the first space probe to explore the outer planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, where it also discovered and photographed many previously unknown moons, rings and other features of the planets. A record player carried on board contained greetings in dozens of languages, samples of music and sounds of nature.

Take a minute for a little space exploration with your family today and go check out some of the cool shots from the Voyager 2 in NASA’s photo gallery.

Did you know that today is Orville Wright’s birthday? We suggest celebrating the birthday of one of the Wright Brothers by throwing an airplane party! Ehow.com has some fun suggestions for a party that will make sure your little pilot feels like he or she’s flying:

Invitations

Take a look at a plane ticket and model the birthday invitations accordingly. Include the “passenger’s” name, flight destination (party location), estimated time of arrival (date and time of party), and a message: “Thank you for flying with Birthday Airlines.” You can even include a note for the passengers to bring their tickets with them, and you can then collect them at the door as they “board” (arrive at the party).

Decorations

Enlist the help of your little airplane enthusiast to build some simple model airplanes for the party. Hang them from the ceiling with strings, and surround them with white helium balloons as clouds. You can even hide messages in the balloons and have the kids pop them open later to get their “fortunes.” Label one area of the room “Baggage Claim,” and have the kids deposit their coats or presents by the sign. Label another area “Departure Gate,” and have the goodie bags sitting there for when the kids leave.

Activities

Airplane contests can be fun, and you can judge based on appearance, performance or originality. Have the kids make and decorate their own model airplanes out of simple kits, or teach kids how to fold paper airplanes and let them experiment. You can have the birthday child be the judge of the contest.

The children can make their own pilot badges with pieces of soft foam, markers to write “Airplane Pilot,” feathers, and other art supplies. You or another adult can attach pin backings to the finished badges.

Today, we would like to celebrate an outstanding right-fielder and the first Hispanic player inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame, Roberto Clemente. Check out this neat biography we found of “The Great One” at the Smithsonian Education website:

As a boy in Puerto Rico, Clemente displayed both a love and an aptitude for the game of baseball. The Brooklyn Dodgers signed him in 1953, and placed him on a farm team in Montreal. A year later, he was drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates, where he remained for the rest of his career. Clemente’s baseball achievements were numerous. He won twelve Gold Glove awards, given annually to the best league defensive player at each position, and he made fourteen All-Star appearances.

As a batter, he hit above .300 for thirteen seasons, and he topped the National League’s batting list four times. In 1960 and 1971, he led the Pirates to world championships, and in 1966, with 29 home runs, a batting average of .314, and 119 RBIs to his credit, he claimed his league’s Most Valuable Player award. A baseball veteran once called him “a one-man team.”

During his eighteenth major-league season in 1972, Clemente was still at the top of his form. In his last game that year, he became the eleventh major league player to accumulate 3,000 career hits. However, tragedy struck that New Year’s Eve. Long dedicated to supporting Latin America, he died in a plane crash while on his way to Managua, Nicaragua, to help in relief operations following a severe earthquake.

In Puerto Rico, which had been the beneficiary of so much of his generosity, Clemente’s death was deeply mourned. At his funeral, the Puerto Rican governor, Rafael Hernandez Colon, declared, “Our people have lost one of their great glories.” Not long afterward, baseball paid its own tribute to Clemente by waiving the post-career five-year waiting period to induct Clemente into its Hall of Fame.

Today is Davy Crocket’s birthday, and in the spirit of the intrepid explorer, we suggest you head out into the great outdoors for an adventure of your very own. Check out these nature walk tips we found on www.brighthub.com that are sure to entertain your family wherever you decide to go exploring!

What to Bring

When you go on a nature hunt with children, be prepared! Here are some things that are important to bring along:

a first aid kit

a cell phone

a plastic sandwich bag (collection bag) that stays closed easily – one for each child

crayons and paper for rubbings

a magnifying glass

books on local leaves, insects, birds, or other objects in nature

Nature Scavenger Hunts

Put together a scavenger hunt for your child to do as you walk. Included in the hunt can be descriptions like “something soft,” “something pink,” or “something bigger than a house.” Alternatively, you can encourage a younger child to find as many objects as possible in different colors.

Saving Your Finds

On the walk, encourage children to collect any non-living bits of nature that interest them, such as stones, pebbles, or fallen leaves. You may wish to make the rule that they can only take along objects that will fit in their collection bags, or that they must check with you to make sure that the objects they are taking along are safe. When you get home, suggest that they save their finds by placing them on one piece of contact paper and covering them with another.

You can read more nature walk tips here.

Today we would like to wish a very happy birthday to funnyman Steve Carell. This actor is celebrating his 48th birthday today.

Steve got his start in show business in 1999 as a Daily Show correspondent. He had parts in the comedies Bruce Almighty (2003) and Anchorman (2004), but his big break came in 2005 when he was cast as the loveable – but often oblivious – office manager Michael Scott on the Emmy-winning TV series The Office.

Steve has been equally successful on the big screen. He has starred in hit films such as Over the Hedge, Little Miss Sunshine, Evan Almighty, Dan in real Life, and Get Smart.

You can catch Steve in the films Dinner for Schmucks and Despicable Me in theatres now.

Have a great day, Steve!

Today, actress Debra Messing celebrates her 42^nd birthday! Debra is best known for her role as Grace on the popular TV show Will & Grace, which lasted eight seasons and earned her an Emmy Award for Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy TV series.

Starpulse.com has more information about this talented performer’s ascent to fame. Take a look to learn more:

Early roles such as Dana Abandando on television’s NYPD Blue garnered much attention for the stunning starlet, and it wasn’t long before Messing made her feature debut with A Walk in the Clouds (1995).

Jumping back to the small screen for the short-lived Ned and Stacey the following year, she next turned up in the feature Prey (1997) and a subsequent television series based on the film.

Launching her career into overdrive in 1998 with her role as Grace Elizabeth Adler in television’s Will & Grace brought Messing critical and public praise, and her role as the interior designer living with a gay lawyer charmed audiences with its snappy writing and talented cast.

The massive success of Will & Grace helped Messing gain a foothold in a film career. She tested the waters gingerly at first, taking small but key roles in films as diverse as the thriller The Mothman Prophecies and the Woody Allen comedy Hollywood Ending.

She played Ben Stiller’s newlywed wife in the hit comedy Along Came Polly in 2004. Although audiences ignored her romantic comedy The Wedding Date, Messing scored her most prestigious post-Will & Grace work yet landing a major role in Curtis Hanson’s Lucky You in 2006, the same year as she lent her vocal talents to the animated film Open Season.

Look for Debra in the Emmy-nominated TV miniseries, The Starter Wife, and in a new ABC comedy series, Wright vs. Wrong for the 2010-2011 season.

Today we would like to wish a very happy 27th birthday to actress Mila Kunis!

Mila is best known for playing Jackie on the popular TV series, That ’70s Show. In her audition, fourteen-year-old Mila lied about her age and landed the role (even though she was required to be 18 to play it!). Mila was given the part anyways—a part that would soon send her on her way to stardom!

After That ’70s Show, Mila branched out from TV to film, appearing in various moderately successful movies such as Get Over It, American Psycho II, and Tony and Tina’s Wedding.

Mila would score another hit in 2008 when she appeared as Rachael in the comedy, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. The film did very well in theaters and earned Mila a Kids’ Choice Award nomination!

Currently, Mila is the voice of Meg on the animated TV series, Family Guy. Look for Mila in the thriller Black Swan, scheduled to be released this winter.

Have a good one, Mila!

What do Marilyn Monroe, Nicole Kidman, Barack Obama, Jimi Hendrix and Robert Deniro have in common? They’re all left-handed!

August 13th has been named Official Left-Handers’ Day—so all you lefties out there, go out and celebrate!

Here are some interesting facts about being left-handed that we found on the site Lefthandersday.com that we would like to share with you. Take a look:

Most left-handers draw figures facing to the right.

There is a high tendency in twins for one to be left-handed.

Left-handers adjust more readily to seeing underwater.

Left-handers excel particularly in tennis, baseball, swimming and fencing

Left-handers usually reach puberty 4 to 5 months after right-handers

4 of the 5 original designers of the Macintosh computer were left-handed

1 in 4 Apollo astronauts were left-handed – 250% more than the normal level.

Today we would like to wish a very happy 35th birthday to Casey Affleck! Both Casey and his older brother Ben have found success in their ventures into the acting world.

We found a biography on Biography.com that details Casey’s journey from Falmouth, Massachusetts to Hollywood!

Take a look:

After graduating from Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, Casey headed to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting. He landed a role in Gus Van Sant’s To Die For before returning to the East Coast to study politics, physics and astronomy at the George Washington University and Columbia University. He returned to Los Angeles for a supporting role in 1997′s Good Will Hunting, the Oscar-winning screenplay that was famously written by his brother and childhood friend Matt Damon.

While Ben Affleck became an overnight A-list celebrity, Casey took a different course, concentrating primarily on character roles in independent films, such as Desert Blue and 200 Cigarettes. These small projects led to his Hollywood breakthrough as one of the members of George Clooney’s Ocean’s Eleven and its sequels. In his own time, Affleck assumed more grown-up roles, including 2005′s Lonesome Jim and 2006′s The Last Kiss.

In 2007, Affleck turned in two acclaimed performances, as the murderous Robert Ford in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and as an introspective private investigator in his brother’s hit directorial debut Gone, Baby, Gone. He received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Ford.

Casey Affleck has been coupled with actress Summer Phoenix since 2000. They have a son, Indiana August Affleck.

Did you know that today, August 11th, is Play in the Sand Day? If you can’t make it down to the beach to build a sandcastle, though, don’t worry! We found instructions on how to make some beautiful sand mosaics with your little one on the site FamilyFun.Go.com. So go ahead and celebrate Play in the Sand Day anyway!

How to make sand art:

Materials
Scissors
Black construction paper
Shoebox lid
White glue
Sand
Assorted seashells

Instructions:

Cut a sheet of construction paper so that it fits inside the box lid — this will be the portable canvas.

To make a picture, draw with the tip of the glue bottle, then sprinkle on loose sand.

Once the sand is dry, shake off the excess by gently tapping the side of the lid.

For added detail, glue on shells, pebbles, sea glass or any other beach-y finds.