A Birthday Party & A Balky Bobbin!

After birthday cupcakes, ice cream, gifts and the traditional singing of "Happy Birthday," the focus shifted from the birthday girls (Laura & me) to my 48 year-old, faded-lime-green portable Singer sewing machine. It's bobbin, a few days ago, became stuck. EVERYONE (Rod, Dave, Bryan, Justin, Kara, Laura) except me, provided input. And, lo and behold, Laura, after much lint removal from numerous puffs of the small compact air duster, located the culprit thread that hung up my bobbin. Who needs a $50/hour repair person when I've got a family like mine! Now how's that for a unique birthday party story?

Have Fun With Your Photos

Yup, this is me. Go to befunky.com to upload a photo and have some creative fun. (Notice that I got rid of all my wrinkles quickly without Photoshopping or using anti-wrinkle cream!)

Roscoe Takes His Job Seriously

NEW SIGN (new gate)


OLD SIGN (old gate)

My Kupe'e (Coo-pay-ay)

This is the orchid kupe'e (bracelet) I made yesterday at the Hawaiian Cultural Festival downtown Seattle. (The orchids are real not fake!) I even learned a few hula moves, and also to keep your bare feet together (you don't want a Toyota truck to go between your legs), to keep your knees bent, to stand tall and to smile.

Garlic Ice Cream, Yum!

Yes, I'm eating garlic ice cream. Since twice (July 2008 & 2009) I had to cancel my trip to the Gilroy Garlic Festival in Gilroy CA, I decided to try garlic ice cream at the Chehalis WA Garlic Festival yesterday. It was quite good with just a hint of garlic, although I didn't manage to talk Dave into tasting some. The festival area had lots of garlic for sale and many food booth garlic selections available, but the garlic smell was not as overwhelming as I thought it might be. Try garlic ice cream when you get a chance and see what you think.

Herbs!

The number of dried things in jars - herbs, fruit, tea etc. was amazing to me - in the New An Dong Chinese Herb & Grocery in Seattle's ChinaTown/International District. One of my goals is to learn to use the buses in downtown Seattle so that we can show guests around without worrying about finding parking. This past Tuesday, my friend Carol and I took the bus to Seattle to learn about its International District. Not only did we see the fascinating herb store in the picture above, we had lunch at the Cambodian Noodle House, stopped by the huge factory where fortune cookies and noodles are made, visited the Wing Luke Museum, toured a very narrow-aisled fish shop, and learned some history of the area from our guide. And, most importantly, we managed to get on the correct bus to come home!