OLIVER HARDY

After our episode with the raccoons last week, our Ollie really scared the heck out of mama last night. She went downstairs to check on our provisions for our upcoming camping trip and it was dark in the garage as she opened the door and lo and behold who pops out of nowhere? Ollie, who is about the size of a raccoon. Mama's heart skipped a beat right then and there!

THE CAT DID IT

Don't really know quite what happened but we figured Mimi must have pissed ole' Stanley off some way. We didn't hear any crying or hissing though. Only thing we knew is that Mimi came downstairs with bandages on her face.

FISH FRY

Since becoming a stay at home mom, mama loves to try out new recipes. Her favorite shows are on the food network. The first is Paula's Party (Paula Deen) and Down Home With The Neeley's (Pat and Gina). Yesterday was the first time mama has ever fried any fish and roasted corn and boy howdy was it ever so good!!! Although mama's family is of Japanese ancestry, Mimi's Obachan (grandma) was a very picky eater and did not care to much for fish and so Obachan rarely cooked any. Obachan usually bought the fist already cooked. She always said that she could not stand the fishy smell.

SEA FAIR PARADE PICTURES

These are the pictures from last night's Sea Fair Parade. Unfortunately mama did not have the camera with her when she went walking down the sidewalk looking for our group. There were people there with a whole living room, kitchen and bedroom set up right on the sidewalk waiting for the parade to start. I kid you not. There was carpeting, sofa, love seat, coffee table, refrigerator, stove, kitchen table and chairs, bunkbed for the kids. It was definitelya sight to see.

SEAFAIR PARADE

This evening marked the beginning of Seattle's yearly Seafair Parade. Mimi had no idea that we were going there because mama wanted to make sure she would take a nap this afternoon.

We met with Sara and her mom Daphne at the Seattle Culture Center this evening before heading over to the parade site.

Mimi and Sara had a blast together along a several of their other friends. Unfortunately Ling Ling was not able to come. They had to take her grandma to the ER and fortunately it was nothing serious.

There were sooooo many groups participating in the parade. Mama became a little sentimental because of the Navy band. Mimi's other grandpa passed away one year ago and was a retired Naval soldier that fought many operations in the Asian Continent.

The highlight was the Chinese dancers and Chinese dragon and lion dance. Seattle is a made up of many diverse ethnic groups and each one was represented in the parade. The only ethnic group that we saw little of were the Japanese. This year there weren't any of the dancers however we saw the taiko drummers playing their hearts out way on the top of the pirate ship at the end of the parade. Not quite sure what to make of that. The pirates seem to be part of the theme of the parade.

Mimi and Sara were the hit of the parade. It seems that almost a great majority of the parade participants went out of their way to give them a high 5. They also received stickers and buttons to boot!

On the way home mama would ask Mimi if she if "fainting" which Mimi's word for getting tired. Mimi who has a funny sense of humor would fake a "zzzzzzzz" then start laughing but then a couple of minutes later she really did fall asleep in the car. Mimi is getting to big and heavy for mama to carry her upstairs to bed. When mama reached the stairs to go up and get ready for bed, she found Mimi already asleep on the stairs.

COMMUNITY GET TOGETHER

We are very fortunate to live in a very friendly, family oriented neighborhood. Derek started the ball rolling a couple of years back and made the empty lot into a very nice playground for the kids to play in. Last year before we moved up here we found out from the neighbors that they had a community bake sale and garage sale. With their proceeds a new playset was purchased. Earlier this year the men all got together and pulled out some of the stumps in the park and rented a wood chipper. Mama provided the breakfast for everyone.

This morning the men and a couple of the women got together to do more work in the park laying down the beauty bark and gravel for another new playset to be put in a couple of weeks from today. Mama did exactly the same thing as last year and made breakfast for everyone. The problem was she did not make enough food!!! Doggone it!!! There were soooooo many people that showed up from the adjoining neighborhood (different home owner association). We all could just not believe it. We probably had about 100-150 moms and dads there.

Mama thinks that she may have started something with the moms of the hood. When the other moms saw the breakfast food that mama had brought, they went back home to raid their pantries and bring food over to the park too. With the other moms helping out, we all had a nice BBQ to boot. Hot dogs, hamburgers and other goodies to eat and drink.

The weather cooperated with us also. It is overcast and cool. Just right for doing yard work.

Now at 1:00 p.m. mama is trying to get Mimi to take a nap. Normally she does not nap nowadays but today is special. It is the beginning of the Sea Fair festivities up here in Seattle and tonight is the Torchlight Parade in downtown Seattle. We are going to the parade with several of our friends. The festivities will end next Saturday with the hydroplane races but we will have to miss that one due to the fact that we will be up in Mount Rainier camping with our friend Tom and Eloise and their family.

SOUTH CENTER MALL

Today was the grand opening for the newly remodeled South Center Mall. King 5 news stated that it is the largest mall in our state of Washington. I think that next week Mimi and I will go check it out. It has a brand new AMC theater too and a lot of cool sounding places to eat. Must try out the Bahama Breeze, Rainforest, Blue C Sushi and Racha Thai Asian Kitchen just to name a few of the places.

Then of course there is the famous Nordstroms, Macy's, The Children's Place and a whole lot more! YIPPEEEE!!!!