birthday boy

we had a little birthday party for cosmo at PDO (parent's day out, his pre-school) yesterday. later, at bath time...

cosmo: i was quiet at PDO today.

carl: oh yeah, why's that?

cosmo: because i was so famous.

november

tom waits has a song about it.
many significant, life changing events have occurred for me, in the month of november. one year, my apartment caught on fire, and i had to move out. oh, and four years ago, in november, i had a baby! this november, i'm writing 50,000 words in thirty days. i have my doubts that the collection of letters, arranged into words, placed together haphazardly into sentences, over the next few weeks, is going to resemble anything close to what anyone would call a novel, but at least i'll have something to work with. i'll have 50k words that i didn't have before. and, i must say, i love nanowrimo. it's just the kick in the pants i needed to get this crazy story onto the page. i am writing every day, over 2000 words, and i am not editing. i am not reading what i have written. ahhh. it is so freeing.

cosmo had fun trick-or-treating, but seems to enjoy, even more, playing with the candy. he likes to sort it, arrange it, catapult it with a yard stick, move it from one container to another, build with boxes of dots and milk duds, toss laffy-taffy into a cut-out flap in a card board box, count hershey's kisses, and make letters out of skinny tootsie rolls. he never eats any without permission, and when he is allowed to have a piece or two, he just can't. decide. which. one. he wants. so, we showed him how to do "eeny meeny miney mo," "bubble gum, bubble gum, in a dish," and "engine engine number nine," so that the decision making is left to chance. he loves this process, and will line up six (or nine, or thirty-seven) pieces of halloween candy, and then, through a long, arduous process of elimination, pick the one piece he will have. he alternates between the three rhymes, and says, "the one that wins, i will eat." he is always thrilled with the winner, even if a milkyway gets eliminated in the first round, and the piece left standing is one, solitary dot. i love the way he says, "MY mother says to pick the VERY best one, and YOU are not IT!"

speaking of tootsie rolls, cosmo looked better in my borrowed costume than i did, but he couldn't walk in it-- just roll. i loved the costume though, for its ease. no make up, no wig, no special clothes, just put it on, and you have an instant, and rather impressive, costume. "cheers!" to whomever crafted it, and "thanks!" to my good neighbors for letting me wear it. cosmo's ghostly cheesecloth kept drifting off his hoodie, but he didn't seem to care, one way or another. the costume was incidental to him. he still can't get over the fact that one day a year, you go out at night, knock on people's doors, they open them, and hand you candy. how can this be? he doesn't run around excitedly, but rather wanders from house to house, sort of stunned, and amazed. he says his obligatory "thank-you," but no smiles. carl called his own, last-minute costume "the haunted shepherd," he was wearing a sheep-herder's hat, from kyrgyzstan.

back at home, we were greeted by these jack-o-lanterns that cosmo and i made out of plastic water bottles. i hope to do a tutorial on those, in another post.

we checked out an awesome book from the library called "applesauce season." it's all about making applesauce, which is something carl especially loves to do. so this time, we got cosmo involved in it from start to finish, including picking out the apples at the farmer's market, and running the cooked apples through the food mill. he really got into it, in part, i suspect, because it is one of his favorite foods.

cosmo has been surprising us, on a regular basis, with his reading skills. i catch myself saying, "you can read that? so, you're a reader? you read now? okay then..." and, i have been saying this for months and months. i guess i have to face the fact that he's learning to read! very exciting. i have even seen him in his room, quietly turning the pages, and reading simple books, all the way through. gasp! he seems to get a lot of satisfaction from it, and tries to read words everywhere we go. he also made a huge leap last week, in his grasp of addition and subtraction. it started with one of the pbs kids games he plays online, but he needed help. i grabbed 5 pens, and showed him how to figure out the answer to a simple addition problem, using the pens, and counting. he was absolutely giddy when he got it. witnessing his little brain grow and expand is one of the greatest pleasures of my life.

(that's 813 words, FYI)

last gasp

a honey bee gathers the last of the nectar from the asters

i guess i titled one of my gardening blog posts "last gasp" last year. sorry, but that's what it feels like around here. last burst of gardening energy, before winter sets in, and a mish-mash of a blog post, to cover a lot of ground before i dive into national novel writing month, tonight at midnight.


the last cosmo of the season and the view from our window, one week ago.

let's start with the garden:
the rye cover crop is now a lovely green blanket over what was once the sprawling cherry tomato bed. we are still plucking perfect tomatillos off the vine, and i have made two batches of salsa verde (for canning) and countless batches of quick fresh green salsa. and still, there's more.



i've been enjoying the herbs we still have flourishing in the garden, and was astonished at the bounty i brought in last week, as i was preparing dinner for some friends. not all of our fall carrots have matured, but some have, and they are lovely. we are cherishing the last of the beets. the candy-striped ones are called chioggia.



we harvested another armload of leeks and made the memorable leek and goat cheese galette. since another blogger has already documented this process beautifully, i won't repeat it here. this time, i chose to make 4 individual galettes, instead of one big one. it looks so lovely on the plate, surrounded by a wreath of fresh water-cress. since it was just for carl and i (cosmo rarely eats what we eat for dinner), we got two full meals out of it. i think this might be my favorite dish right now. at least my favorite of dishes that come out of our kitchen. and i swear it tastes better with leeks, thyme and parsley from our own garden.



in other garden news, my friend stephanie, garden-educator-extraordinaire, taught me how to create our newest garden bed. first i spread out some cardboard, then a layer of our compost, a thicker layer of leaf-mold from last year's autumn leaves, then a layer of straw. it took me a couple of hours to complete, and it's huge! cosmo had a lot of fun "helping" me. in the spring, we'll dig some holes for transplants, add a little compost or soil to each hole, and that's it. the following year, it should all be broken down, and soil-like, and can just be dug and worked like our other garden beds. i am so thrilled.



we still have lettuce, arugula, and a tiny bit of spinach, which i hope will over-winter with some straw on top. apparently the carrots can stay in the ground too, with a layer of mulch, and they'll come back in the spring.



on to gleaning, and other topics:
we ended up making pear fruit leather, and a pear/cranberry chutney for canning, with the rest of our gleaned pears. one of our neighbors has a particularly nice crab apple tree, with large fruit, that tastes good right off the tree. she told us to help ourselves, and we did.



nothing like starting the morning trimming little tiny apples. but aren't they beautiful?



then carl made this glowing jelly while i was busy shopping at the free swap out at bloomingfoods (they used the truckload-sale-tent to house a glorious exchange of useful stuff, all free of charge! crazy, huh?). there was a littlecrab apple juice left over--tart, and nectar-like. we sipped it from tiny crystal goblets.



take a gander at that incredible tromboncino squash! it was a gift from our neighbor jack, whose son is a farmer. they say you can use it just like butternut, but i found it to be more stringy and watery than a butternut, and lacking in that brilliant orange color. the soup-in-progress (shown below) features a true butternut, and a garden herb bundle.



i managed to get the basement into a somewhat presentable and inhabitable space--in time for our housewarming party, and in time for the crafting frenzy, which has already begun. since some potential recipients of my creations may read this blog, i cannot reveal all the particulars of the crafted goodies that are being churned out of this space, but after the holidays, i'll try to do a re-cap.




we took a short drive to the hoosier national forest last weekend, to climb the fire tower for the ultimate autumnal view. i failed to bring the camera to the top of the tower, but my wimpy little lens wouldn't have even come close to capturing that spectacular vista-- so, it's probably better left to the imagination. cosmo enjoyed the short nature walk, and the lady bug explosion that happens here every fall.





cosmo was down for a few days with some virus, other than the flu. it was quite mild, and luckily, he's over it in time for halloween. hope yours is fun.

as winter approaches...

the garlic is in the ground. maybe too early? i don't know. it rained for days. the garlic arrived,

the sun came out, i planted the garlic. couldn't help it.

also dragged the cold frame over from our old yard and plopped it over some beets and leeks that are still in the ground. i had wanted to put in some kale and broccoli starts, but i guess i waited too late because i can't find them anywhere. one of my permaculture friends said it would be worth a try to stick some seeds in the ground right now. apparently, brassicas love to germinate in this kind of weather, and while they probably won't grow much over the winter, i might get some baby kale leaves, and we may have early broccoli in the spring. it was tough finding even seeds at the local nurseries. i finally found some bulk seeds at the farm-and-feed co-op, and went a little nuts. i planted cabbage, broccoli, kale and arugula seeds in the cold frame. so far, the kale, broccoli and arugula have germinated. we had our first frost last night. i got the windows on the cold frame just in time. i'm excited to see how the cold frame works when it actually sits in the sun all winter!

we are still harvesting tomatillas, hot chilies and cilantro (made some yummy salsa verde last night, for our housewarming party). we still have parsley, basil, sage, beets, carrots and LEEKS! most of the leeks are reserved for our most favorite leek and goat cheese galette, but we did harvest a few, and made a simple dish involving a lovely, mustard vinaigrette.



the neighborhood is bursting with brilliant fall color, i'm drying and sorting seeds, and dreaming, already, of next year's garden.

blog action day: climate change*

i'll be frank: i think it's a lost cause. fighting climate change. too late. we've known about the greenhouse effect since i was a little kid--AT LEAST! the situation was dire THEN. drastic action had to be taken immediately to even hope to begin to reverse the trends. instead, it has only gotten worse. and will clearly continue to do so. a new study shows that much of the arctic ice cap will be melted in summer months-- within TEN YEARS, and that the arctic will be an open sea in the next 20-30 years!



so...? that is just the way it is. we are humans, we belong to this earth, we are creatures of this planet, and this is what we do. this is what we have done. if, as creatures of this planet, we take elements of the earth, and manipulate and use them in such a way that they make the earth unlivable for most of the beings that currently in habit it-- if we humans take actions that lead to the destruction of the environment, such that humans can no longer live on earth, so be it. the earth will go on without us, and the adapted ecosystem that evolves will be something else. something we don't get to know about.

it seems arrogant to me, to believe that it is all about us. or, all about our perspective. or, that we think we can control global climate change, or that we think the worst thing in the world would be the extinction of human beings. if we make our planet uninhabitable, then we cease to exist. and i hate to admit it, but i am kind-of okay with that. well, what choice do i have? this is reality. it is simply too late to stop global warming.

i am not at all happy about any of this. i accept it, but it is, nonetheless, still heartbreaking. i dread the loss of the polar bear, the flooding of cities, and i know that the people in the lowest economic classes will suffer first, and suffer the most. it is not fair, it is not just, but it is what we have done, and it seems absurd to think that sticking a piece of newspaper in a recycling bin is going to change this global truth.

but... i still recycle everything that can be recycled, re-use packaging of various sorts, shop almost exclusively at thrift stores and yard sales for clothes and other household items. i buy and glean local food when i can, and preserve much of it for the winter months, in order to eat locally all year. i garden organically, and i compost. i ride my bike for in-town transportation--often (not always), and i bring my own bags to the grocery store.



i figure, as long as humans are still living on this earth, might as well enjoy what we still have.






*i bet i'll never be asked to write about climate change again).

autumnal clichés

there's nothing like living in houston texas, for nearly a decade, to make one appreciate the splendor of the 4 seasons. when we were living in houston, carl's friend michael (of mike & patty's fame) once sent him an email in october that facetiously suggested he must be enjoying all the wonders of fall: bulky sweaters, apple picking, the rosy-cheeks of the school children...
it's still hot and sticky down there, well into october, but now that we live in the mid-west, we actually do get to experience these seasonal markers. for instance, on sunday, we went apple picking.



the trees were low, and easy for little ones to reach, but since the coveted jonathan variety was almost gone, we still got to do a little bit of searching, to find those precious few that remained. then we filled our bag with golden delicious, and red delicious, and topped it all off with a caramel apple from the quaint little country store.



we used most of the bag for applesauce, which we canned last night. cosmo went through so much of that last winter, i think we'll need to do another batch.



it is so simple: just cut apples in quarters, stick 'em in the biggest pot you can find, with a little bit of water. cook until soft enough to mash with a potato masher (stirring to prevent scorching), then run them through your handy-dandy food mill, to remove the skins and seeds. after that, you just ladle the sauce into the sterilized jars, add a little lemon juice on top (to prevent discoloration), seal the jars, and put into the boiling-water canning bath for 20 minutes. that's it. pure, homemade, nothin-but-apples-applesauce. yum.



we have also been gleaning the fallen pears from a lovely neighborhood tree. one night, we made a crisp, from the pears, plus some black raspberries we had from earlier in the season. it was heavenly. we'll probably try some pear chutney, or perhaps pear butter? any other pear ideas out there?

beets!

i tried to grow beets last year. they germinated, grew about 2 inches tall, and that was it. they just sat there, all summer. didn't die, but didn't grow either. i've determined it was a combination of bad soil, and too much shade.



this year, i gave it another shot. i planted two different varieties in my fall garden, in our new place, between rows of leaf lettuce. boy, did they take off! i credit plenty of sun, and that miraculous river bottom soil in our new garden beds. we pulled out our first one a couple of weeks ago.



cosmo got to do the honors. would ya take a look at the size of that thing! i baked that one, sliced it, and just ate the whole thing with a little butter and salt. there is nothing like a beet pulled fresh outta the ground. i used to not care too much for beets, 'til i had one that had just been pulled from a friend's garden, in oregon. it is a completely different experience, and i believe the reason is that the sugars begin to break down, and convert to starches, as soon as the beet is removed from the ground. so, the fresher, the sweeter. baking and roasting do a good job of concentrating the remaining sugars, and making most vegetables taste better, even if they are not fresh from the garden.



for the next batch we harvested, we made this unbelievably delicious soup from (possibly) my favorite cook book:

Beet Soup with Three Legumes
from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, by Deborah Madison

1/2 cup red kidney beans, soaked 4 hours, or overnight (i have also used white
beans, they cook more quickly, and don't need to soak as long)
4 medium beets, peeled and diced
1/2 cup brown or green lentils
1 cup cooked chickpeas (canned are fine, drained)
2 cups chopped beet greens, or chard
salt and freshly milled pepper
1 bunch scallions, including half of the greens, chopped
two cups coarsely chopped spinach (or more beet greens, if ya got 'em)
1 small bunch parsley, finely chopped

the garnish (in my opinion, this can be doubled)

3 tablespoons butter, preferably clarified (ghee)
1 onion, cut into 1/2 inch squares (or chopped in a food processor, if you are in a hurry)
1/4 teaspoon tumeric
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 cup chopped mint
1/2 cup plain yogurt, or sour cream

Drain the beans, cover them with 5 cups water, and boil hard for 10 minutes. Lower the heat and simmer, partially covered, until soft, about 1 1/4 hours. set aside.

Put the beets, lentils and 7 cups water in a soup pot. Bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer, partially covered, for 25 minutes. Add the kidney (or white) beans with 2 cups of their liquid, the chickpeas, beet greens and 2 teaspoons salt; simmer until the greens are tender, about 5 minutes. Add the scallions, spinach and parsley; cook until the spinach is wilted and bright green. Taste for salt and turn off heat.

For the garnish, melt the butter in a small skillet over low heat. Add the onion, tumeric, cayenne, and mint; cook until the onion is soft, about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Ladle the soup into bowls. Add a spoonful of garnish and yogurt to each serving.

Madison notes:...Unlike most soups, the aromatics are added at the end, breaking the clean surface with a net of golden speckles.

to achieve the effect described above, make sure you ladle plenty of broth into each bowl.

i hope at least one of you will try this soup, and let me know what you think. i love it because it is so thoroughly packed with nutritious foods, and yet it tastes like some rare, gourmet delicacy, and the colors are fantastic. the mint really takes you by surprise, and works with all the other flavors. don't think you can skip the mint. the recipe makes a lot, but luckily, tastes better the next day. however, if you leave it on the stove too long, to re-heat it, you may lose some of the dazzling color-- but, none of the flavor.

ahhh, beets.

now with gardening!

i've come to the conclusion that i simply don't post often enough to maintain 2 blogs. thus, i'm going to stop posting on my garden blog (rake shovel hoe), and will include any gardening content here, on whistling leaf blower. i'll leave the garden blog up, as an archive, for anyone who wants to reminisce.

please address your objections, sighs of relief, and/or questions and comments to the complaints department, at whistlingleafblower.blogspot.com

a place for everything (and everyone)

i may have mentioned that cosmo likes to put things where they belong. i wouldn't say he is obsessive about it (yet) but he seems to find great satisfaction in knowing where an item lives, and returning it to its home. i like that too. every time i move into a new place (which i have done a LOT of in my 40+ years) i have a renewed fantasy of finally having a place for everything. i know i could manage all the stuff i drag around, if i could just get it organized. and, i must say, over the years, and moves, i have made great strides. my art supplies, for instance, are compartmentalized. i have a bin labeled "glue and glue guns" one called "small paints and ink" a bin dedicated to "tape," i have a drawer with only small boxes, to be decorated, or otherwise crafted into something wonderful. so, it is not all fantasy.



recently, i have found an activity for cosmo and i that puts these "everything in its place" skills to use. we have been going to mother hubbard's cupboard one afternoon each week, to help stock the pantry shelves. MHC's food pantry is a wonderful place. the premise is to offer food to people in need, in a grocery store-like environment, where everyone is treated with dignity and respect. the criteria for shopping there is simple: you can shop if you don't have enough money to eat, and it operates mostly on an honor system. they serve an average of 1,878 people per week.



they also offer workshops on nutrition, gardening, and food preservation, and host an in-store lending library and resource shelf. many customers are also volunteers, and the result is an inclusive, close-knit, supportive community.



i wasn't sure, at first, if cosmo would enjoy it or not. i should have guessed that he would quickly get into the groove of taking items out of boxes, and placing them neatly on the shelves, in perfect rows, with the labels facing out. sometimes he likes to create elaborate systems of handing things up to me (if the shelf is too high) which may not be as "helpful," but it is cooperative, and engaging for both of us. he also likes to sort the recycling, and help tidy up before the shoppers arrive.



i thought he might get distracted by the food, and only want to taste things. this is often what happens when he "helps" me cook. but he understood early on, that we are just organizing the food, for other people, and he's fine with that. i also worried his interest would wane after a half hour or so, but he really likes being there, never wants to leave early, and cries if we can't make it to our shift. i am not sure if he gets the concept of "helping people," i think he just likes the idea of working, and of being needed, in a setting that is not his home. the staff are so welcoming, we both felt like part of the family right away.

it has been great for me too. i'm forming new friendships, and i had the chance to share my passion for local food preservation, by co-teaching their canning and jamming workshops last week. we've also passed on some of our excess produce from the garden, as part of the plant a row for the hungry program. i am grateful to live in such a vibrant community, and to have the opportunity to contribute.

mash

Homemade Baby Food Making Workshop
Presented by cake



Saturday, September 12, 2009 @1:00
at Barefoot Herbs
$8.00 per adult
615 W. Kirkwood Ave. Bloomington
Phone: 812.339.5090

New parents often don’t believe they have the time or energy to make food for their baby. But homemade baby food is easier than you think. It costs less than store-bought, and is certainly more nutritious. We will discuss the benefits of making your own baby food, demonstrate techniques for preparing, preserving and storing your homemade baby food, share simple recipes and more.

Lap Babies Welcome! Must register and prepay in advance.

spirited away

i was weeding a flower bed last week, when i came across a monarch caterpillar. not a huge surprise, since the zinnia bed my landlord planted before he left, has been attracting many species of butterfly, including monarchs. but from what i understand, monarchs only lay their eggs on milkweed, and milkweed is the exclusive source of nutrition for the monarch caterpillar. we have no milkweed in our yard.



so, i put the caterpillar in our old aquarium (minus the water, of course) and went down to our neighborhood stand of milkweed to pick some. i ran into ria, the one who stewards the community garden beds that run along brayn creek. she told me about the milkweed stand, and said she thought many of the caterpillars that hatched there this year didn't make it due, perhaps, to wasps. so, i felt it was important to do what i could to help my caterpillar make it to butterflyhood.



the little striped thing went to town on that milkweed. for two days, all it did was munch, sleep and poop. then carl and cosmo and i headed down the street for fresh milkweed, after dinner, on the third day. we left the caterpillar in the aquarium, inside the screened in porch.

when we returned, about an hour later, he had vanished. seriously. into thin air. i was baffled. first off, there was no reason for him to wander, and he hadn't been interested in exploring anything but leaves the whole time he had been in there. it wasn't like he was constantly searching for a way out. there were a couple of holes in the lid that were big enough for him to fit through, but it was difficult to imagine it happening. even if he did escape, how far could he get, in such a short time? i searched all around the immediate vicinity. not a clue. nothin'. nada.
my emotional response to the caterpillar's disappearance surprised me. i was devastated. cosmo seemed slightly bummed, but he clearly was not as invested in this little project as i was. carl was as confused as i was, and comforted me at first, but then, ya know... there is a kid to bathe, read to and get into bed...life goes on.

but i could not let go. and i had to fight back tears for the rest of the evening. that night, i dreamed the caterpillar returned, and i swear, i left some leaves out on the table, just in case.
but the next morning, he was still gone, and i had to face the facts, even if it didn't make any sense.

there is a larger life lesson here, i think, for other things that are currently bringing me down. someday soon, i'm afraid i am going to wake up in the morning, realize that this beautiful opportunity for meaningful transformation of our broken health care system has been hijacked by the heartless, misinformed, right-wing fringe. i won't understand it. there won't be a rational explanation for it, i will be devastated, and...i will have to except it.

farm tour

saturday was the farm tour, at the farm where we get our milk and eggs.



it was a gorgeous, cool, overcast day. they had a hay ride, and chicken coops made of old school buses. the chickens were running around everywhere under-foot, clucking a high-volume, eerie sounding, collective "coo."



cosmo found it all very amusing, and dove right in to collect eggs.





we watched the cows being driven from the field for milking.
cosmo seemed genuinely awestruck by the mechanical milking process .



he got within kicking distance of a goat that was being hand-milked, and another one approached him to say hello.




nani has taught him how to do the texas longhorns "hook 'em horns,"



but these indiana cows didn't get it.



couldn't resist photographing this spider web.



the hay bales, covered in white plastic, looked like giant caterpillars.

wondering

while humming mickey-mouse-club-song (ol' school), eating chickpeas, and playing with a fading balloon, cosmo drops the following questions on me:

i wanna know who i am.

i mean, how did i be this person?

how does everybody turn into people?

how do they be theyselves?

how do they grow?

all i could manage in response was to tell him that they were excellent questions.

score!

if it weren't for julie, over at craftknife, i would have never known that our public library was selling all of their cassettes and VHS tapes from the children's department. we support this out-dated media at our house. we have three audio cassette players: one in the car, one on our main stereo, and one in cosmo's room. if we want to copy music from vinyl, which carl has a LOT of, we use cassettes. we have quite a bit of children's music on cassette, so we can play it in the car. we also have a vhs player, and have some of our most beloved movies and shows on VHS tapes.



so, i was excited, and a bit panicked when i heard about the sale, especially since it was already in progress when i saw julie's facebook notice about it. i jumped in the car and headed downtown. carl met me after he dropped cosmo off at PDO. i wanted to make sure i snagged some VHS tapes that we regularly check out for cosmo, which are not available on dvd. titles like mighty machines, and pre-school power. i also grabbed all the magic schoolbus tapes i could find. these educational gems are favorites of cosmo's, and who can resist lily tomlin as ms.frizzle! once i secured these priceless videos, i moved into the books-on-tape section, which had already been picked over by julie, and the other early birds. still though, i found some unexpected treasures.

the reason for a flower is a gorgeous book, with compelling images like these:



and goes a bit deeper than many books for young children, in explaining the ins and outs of pollination.



this one about the four seasons actually made me cry with its description of a young girl experiencing the wonderful subtleties of each seasonal shift.



cosmo's favorite is called mama don't allow. i remember reading this lively swamp tale to a two-year-old, back when i was a nanny, but hadn't seen it since. it makes great use of the audio format, since music figures strongly in the story.

like julie's kids, a big part of the appeal for cosmo is the apparatus of the tape player. he's old enough now to operate it completely on his own, and he can even follow along, and turn the pages of the book at the right time. but he also likes to just listen to the stories, while he does other things quietly in his room.



we also took home some great music (thanks to carl's sharp eye) and some longer books-on-tape that we can save for a road trip, when cosmo's a bit older. at least one of our tapes was too damaged to listen to, which was a disappointment, but considering i got out of there with a huge box of goodies for $20, i am not complaining.



now, if only we can get julie to alert us about those store-wide 50% off sales at the goodwill. BEFORE they happen.

county fair!

cosmo and i went to the fair with justin, just before our big road trip.



i enjoy the animals, and the 4H crafts.



but cosmo is all about the rides. we went on the giant ferris wheel first. it was scarier than expected. the little buckets that you sit in were open on top. cosmo wasn't phased by it, but the
adults were.



great view of the midway.



baby's first cotton candy!



the tilt-a-whirl rocked our world!



mirror house and fun house--only fun if you are under 5 years old.