Sunday, April 4, 2010

Easter 2010

Easter 2010! We arrived at my sister's house around 10:00 in the morning. Cassandra had been waiting for the Easter egg hunt, and in a couple minutes she was running around the back yard finding Easter eggs. These were the plastic pop-open kinds, so there weren't any jellybeans rolling around in the dirt. There were the regular plain ones and some cool animal shaped ones I hadn't seen before. The eggs had the traditional candy, some stickers, coins for the piggy bank, and a few little toys (I think - the toys may have been from something else).

After the Eggs had all been found we sat in the living room for a bit and were entertained by the ever changing tale of Belle, the horse, the snail, the bunny and Charlie Brown. I didn't quite follow the narrative, but Charlie Brown did get to sit in the Dora the Explorer chair. More family and friends arrived and at around noon we had a tasty lunch of grilled chicken, potatoes, green beans and salad - as usual, very good. This was followed by a very good fruit tart for dessert along with coffee.

Showed Cassandra how to hear the ocean in a couple big seashells we found last week at Carpinteria Beach. She thought it was interesting and kept listening to them, sometimes in stereo. She also found a penny and a shiny jingle bell in a planter, and had a great time hiding them under shells and having people find them again - usually under the same shells each time.

We left around 3:00 or so - tomorrow is the first day back from Spring Break and still need to get some last bits together.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Easter on the Farm 2010

Today we went to the Moorpark Farms "Easter on the Farm 2010" festival with family and friends. It's a two day event and not as elaborate as their Fall Festival, but it's still fun. There were a variety of farm animals including pygmy goats, rabbits, horses, ducks, etc. For some reason they weren't selling carrots this time, but you could buy animal food pellet for a quarter. One thing that was new (or at least I never saw it before) was a wooden walkway high in the air between the different goat pens on the farm.

Most of the rides and exhibits were for little kids (we had two with us). They had a pony ride, a straw pyramid, wooden trains and trucks that the kids could play on, and a grassy area with some kid-sized tunnels. The kids ran around and all and all they had a good time.

Around 11:30 we left for lunch. We decided to go to the Roundtable Pizza in Moorpark as it was close by, probably kid friendly and in the past we've had pretty good luck with their pizza. Not the best of plans. Ordered the pizzas and then got some salad at the salad bar. As I was eating, found a big clump of stuff in the potato salad. First thought it was hair, but it appeared to be a clump of thin nylon threads that had gotten burnt around the edges. Quite gross. Gave it to the clerk, but got no real response. Owners came in a bit later (I'm pretty sure they were the owners) and never said anything. They also got our order wrong and the "grab a stuffed animal" machine was weighted or loose (as per Jim - I've seen him use those machines, and if he says it's rigged, it's rigged!). We won't be going back there again.

Went on our way after that and made a quick stop at the Moorpark Farms in Somis (they have a produce stand) to pick up some fruit and vegetables.