Brrr! Winter is the coldest season of the year. Water freezes to become ice, snow, sleet, or icicles, creating a sparkling wonderland. Many plants and animals become dormant or hibernate. People bundle up in hats, mittens, and boots. It's a time for enjoying outdoor activities like ice skating, sledding, and building snowmen or indoor activities like drinking hot chocolate, curling up with a book by a toasty fire, or going to see a good movie like "Happy Feet," an uplifting story about a tap-dancing penguin named Mumble. Give winter boredom the boot and learn about penguins.
Penguins range in size from the fairy penguin which only gets about 9 inches tall to the emperor penguin which can reach lengths of up to 3-4 feet. Although penguins are birds, they do not fly, at least not in the air. Penguins spend most of their time underwater looking for dinner (fish, squid, krill, and crustaceans). All penguins live below the equator, from the Galapagos Islands to Antarctica. That's why you'll never see a penguin and a polar bear together-except on the Coca Cola:%$reg; commercials.