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Wonderland Tea Party
07.17.09 | Permalink | | Comments Off on Wonderland Tea Party
We’ve been heading over to Lynndale Park on Wednesdays for the Wonderstage performances that begin at 12:00.   At the Wonderstage (fancy for amphitheater) there is a free kid-friendly performance each Wednesday throughout the summer. So far, the events have been interesting and varied. First, there were Valentine’s Performing Pigs, and today there was a totally trippy tea party. Each time we go, I see some of Hilltop’s finest representing, along with Gigi’s friends. I’m telling you, the Wonderstage is a happening place!
Gigi’s review of July 15 – Zambini Brothers presents Wonderland Tea Party. Theatre mayhem with music, comedy & more!
What I liked was the tea party stuff. It was funny when the Mad Hatter said that the queen was the ‘Royal Hiney’. That was the funny part. I think he was trying to be silly. Maybe when she is going potty he calls her a Royal Hiney. Maybe he does. The Mad Hatter was so sweaty. I wonder why he was so sweaty. I thought the play was very scary. I didn’t like it. I thought that the queen was very mean and spooky ooky! And she was a CHEATER!  She cheated at cards! She did it by always saying, “I won! I won!” She could make us stand up even if we didn’t want to .  She sang a song about tea parties – a very special date.
Regardless of what anybody says, the kids were engaged and appeared to love it, as evidenced in the picture above!
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Bellingham Weekend
Our family made a sojourn to Bellingham this week. We left in the afternoon and spent one, whole blissful evening with the lovely family of Michelle, Jeff, Sage and Luna. The kids had a blast for the entire 24 hours. It is always so nice when the kids get along while the adults can relax with very few interventions!
Jeff and Michelle have done a lovely job of fencing in their entire yard. Jude was able to run loose with the big kids without having mom and dad on his heels. He enjoyed the freedom, and we saw how valuable our future yard will be to him.
Martha LOVES to go to Jeff and Michelle for many of the same reasons that Jude does: fenced yard, freedom and great toys. Jeff and Michelle have generously kept this USA ball on hand for years exclusively for Martha. Whenever we arrive with Martha in tow, out comes the ball and Martha rolls with joy, gnawing on ‘her’ beloved soccer ball!
Jude spent some time on the piano while Gigi climbed the Dogwood Tree.
We all got some good visiting time in.
The kids played in the pool on the second day. Jeff and Michelle are such cool parents that they don’t fill the pool with regular hose water – oh no! They run the hose inside, hook it to the sink and use the warm tap water. The kids had a nice warm pooltime experience on a not-so-hot day.
We said goodbye, so grateful for our escape to the town we once called home and for some wonderful and hospitable friends.
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Butterfly Release
07.15.09 | Permalink | | Comments Off on Butterfly Release
Today we released the butterflies. We put a butterfly on a flower then we put them outside the cage and then they flew off. Do you think they will fly off if you have butterflies?  These butterflies made a metamorphosis. That means that they turned from a caterpillar to a butterfly. That’s the way they work. Today, we let them free. They are gonna live for a week or a month. I’m sad for them to die because they were my butterflies. They were very cute and I want to do it again sometime.
The caterpillar that was very very small small is growing. It’s almost as big and fat as my thumb now. I think it is going to make a metamorphosis soon.
This is the end of my butterfly experiment! I hope you learned something!
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Yummm!!! (Again)
07.12.09 | Permalink | | Comments Off on Yummm!!! (Again)I am a firm believer that when you are invited to someone’s house for dinner you need to bring something. When you ask your hosts, they always say not to bother. Everything is always taken care of. But, in my experience, if you show up with something sweet they aren’t going to turn it away. And for us, it is a lot safer to make a batch of something and give most of it away rather than eat it all ourselves, so a good excuse to try a yummy new recipe!  So, that is my excuse for making another recipe off of Conversations With a Cupcake, the place before where I found my 4th of July Cupcake inspiration!
This time I made the recipe called Tiger Butter Bars. I wouldn’t change a thing in this recipe (near the bottom of the blog). Delicious!
The recipie directs you to spread the batter onto a cookie sheet. It took me a leap of faith to do this because the batter does not look copious enough to fill an entire cookie sheet! However, they puff up quite nicely in baking and really do need the whole sheet. And I use the Costco sized cookie sheets!
The only thing you should be aware of is that the bars are really sweet. And if I am mentioning it, you know they really must have been really REALLY SWEET! But still, so good!
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I Swear, This Wasn’t My Idea
I overheard Bradley say these exact words before I stumbled on this scene:
Yes, that’s Jude wearing his sister’s dance/gymnastics outfit complete, of course, with earmuffs. As the story was told to me, he was perusing a box of Gigi’s clothes when he came across this gem. He held it up and hollered screamed at his father and beat his chest which Bradley took as a sign that he wanted to wear it. Let the record show that this is Jude’s first self chosen outfit. And look how happy he is!
