Birthday celebration

     Panda had a birthday recently. We had a family dinner with my sister and her family. Panda chose to eat at a Japanese restaurant - where the food is prepared in front of you with a great deal of showmanship. First, a match was lit on the grill and a huge flame leaped into the air. Poodaloo hit the ground under the table and was not sure she wanted to come out again.

Our chef preparing fried rice (we are sitting out of sight on the right).

The three girls sit beside the pond.

Beautiful goldfish swim in the pond.

This fountain led to quite a conversation between the boys who were also eating at the restaurant.

     The birthday party for friends happened on the 10th. The party was at the YMCA swimming pool (for the second year in a row). I've spent the last year germinating the idea of birthday parties without presents. My little seed has borne fruit. We are calling it a 5 Spot Party with emphasis on lots of time for swimming. Guest bring $5.00 instead of a present. Panda will donate half to the local humane society and she can keep the rest to spend as she likes. My fingers are crossed for success. (Post script: It was a success! Most of her friends included handmade cards with the 5 Spot. Reading the cards gave the feel of opening gifts. The moms were thrilled with such an easy gift.)

(No party photos ~ too busy managing the party. Sorry . . . . )

     Panda & I finished a really good book. It's called Cornelia and the Audacious Escapades of the Somerset Sisters by Lesley M. M. Blume. Spoiler Alert: There is sadness at the end of the story. Panda & I went through a mountain of tissues as we finished the book. (Okay, it was me who went through 3/4 of the mountain of tissues.)

     We discovered electronic library loans and have gone crazy over them. There is one drawback to e-book loans: the library only allows five at a time and you cannot return a book early when you have finished reading it. This likely would not be a problem if I was not such a dunce about electronic things. I 'checked out' two e-books that are not actually Kindle books. They count as part of the five books but I can't download them. One is an MP3 file and the other has some bizarre file name that means nothing to me. Now we wait 14 days for the loan to expire. Sigh . . . .

     Another fantastic thing about the modern* library: requesting books via the internet. An email tells you when the book is at the library (you can borrow from any library in the valley). You zip in, use automated checkout, and in next to no time there are new books for you to read.

* I used the book mobile when I was in grade school & high school but had not used a library since until recently. Unlike today, there was no library in Troy when I was a kid.