Year of Pig, Birthday of Dragon

So we spent Chinese New year in our own traditional way- eating Chinese food and watching Chinese-themed movies: Kiss of the Dragon, and Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. Ok, so that's a lot of dragon for the Year of the Pig (or boar- that sounds far more dignified, doesn't it?), but pig movies are few and far between, and somehow, Babe the talking pig just didn't seem Chinese enough to cut the hot mustard...

The house was all decorated in red and gold, and the bulletin board (known in the summer months as the back door) was covered in a display of various Chinese trivia. The kids (and almost anyone else that came by) got traditional red envelopes or lai see, filled with shiny gold (chocolate) coins. For dessert, we had Glico Pockys, and tried some pretty strange sugared winter melon. The Pockys rock- we've been eating them in my family since I was a kid, but the winter melon was, well...just downright weird. We wished there'd been a smaller package.


We also got this thingy of Chinese candy from our corner store- the girl who does the ordering was nice enough to stash it for us (I love living in a small town!). It closes up into a cylinder and is decorated to look like a firecracker (see the 'fuse' on the lid?), which are used during the New Year's celebrations to scare away evil spirits.















Two days later, as we were making playdough, we realized it was Mardi Gras, or Pancake Tuesday, and I decided to try making chocolate-chocolate chip pancakes for lunch. Here's a picture of Liam making playdough spaghetti while eating chocolate pancakes. That's the life!








The following weekend we had Liam's birthday party. He decided to have it at McDonald's so he and his friends could play on the tubes. Grandpa Mike and Grandma Kim drove down, and we all had dirt cake and ice cream cones, and the kids played to their hearts' content. Liam even got to see his old buddy Xena, who he hadn't seen in years...
When all the wrapping paper had settled, he got a portable DVD player (bought with $ from Gramma Candel), an ipod shuffle (from us), a couple of new outfits from Mike & Kim, a book from Grandma & Grandpa Jones, and various toys and art supplies from his friends. What a lucky (and spoiled!) kid.







After the party, Liam feasted on the last crumbs of his dirt cake, checked out some of his snazzy new stuff...and fell asleep on the couch. What a cutie...

Ben's been busy creating his mySpace page and spiffing it up, and I've been working on digging up new songs for our SCA bardics (song circles).

And as I write this, we're gearing up for the Iditarod, which starts this weekend, as well as St. Patrick's Day and Ostara, the spring equinox (which we celebrate instead of Easter). It's been verrrrrrrry cold again the last week or so, but we're hoping for warmer weather around the bend. We're so ready for spring!

Well, off get some real work done and get our Triops tank ready to hatch...

Blessings,
Those Crazy Stevenses