Happy New Year 2013!

Had to (or decided to) work all day yesterday when people were available, so today Jazzy and I went to downtown Phoenix to the Arizona Puppet Theater. No pictures allowed there:(. We had never been there before but had heard alot about it. The puppets are all hand made, and the puppeteers are professional actors/actresses. First they talked briefly about the history of Cinderella- a 1000 year old story, then presented the show. The stepsisters names were Sulphur and Carbonite:))

Across the street is a brand new Japanese garden, built in 2011...right in the middle of downtown Phoenix! Japanese Friendship Garden. Jasmine said "I don't even feel like I am in Arizona"!!. Very pretty...except that much of the garden plants/boulders and labor was donated by Home Depot, so there were little Home Depot flags everywhere. There were different sections in the garden representing the mountainous, forest and woodlands of Japan. Kasuga Lantern originating from the Kasuga Shrine in Nara, Japan's ninth century capital. Jazzy making a heart:) Not a good photo in the shade.

Shachi - a mythical fish with the face of a tiger. These are placed on the roofs of important buildings to protect against fire.

Feeding the Koi and ducks.

The garden was co-designed by the sister cities of Himeji, Japan and Phoenix, Az. Next we went to a little cafe in a historical building built in 1920. It was originally someone's house, as are many of the buildings in the artsy/theatrical part of downtown Phoenix. The homes there are really beautiful, all built in the 1920's and 1930's. If you want a 800 square foot house for a cool 900,000.000, that would be the place to go. Lots of other places to go around that area... theaters, art museums, historical preserved homes that are decked out for Christmas. Maybe we'll go again some time!

Noon Year's Eve....

We spent today at the zoo, Noon Year's Eve, with Jenny, Abby and Gadiel. First we went to a really fun magic show.

Next off to the snow!! It was snow trucked in from somewhere else and dumped by several big dump trucks all over the zoo, but we'll take what we can get. Then a guy came by from Channel 12 and interviewed Abby! It was on TV tonight, but we missed it:(

Next off to the Ice Slide.. which no longer has ice on it, but is still fun, then the Merry Go Round!

Ready, set....

Go....

Learning about coat patterns.

Dancin' to the music:)

Camel Rides!

Red Robin for lunch, where we exchanged gifts..

The Tindall's recently returned from a trip to Paris and London. They got Jazzy a chef's hat with the Eiffel Tower on it:)), plus cupcake supplies, a rolling pin, crafty jewelry kit, organic soaps and lotions, and a Lololoopsy Sewing Game that looks really fun. They got me a Pandora bracelet! and some organic soaps and lotions! Really fun day.... the only exceptions being that our poor little doggie has had extreme back pain for 48 hours. She could not lay down and just stood up or paced for 2 days:(( I tried every possible treatment, including heavy duty narcotics with not much response. Prior to us leaving today, I just gave her heavy sedation, and am hoping for the best. She still is not moving much:( Then, when we were at the zoo, Jenny found out that Mark's brother just died in a house fire that occurred two days ago, so they have to leave right away to go to Indiana for the funeral. Other than those two items, it was a long fun day!

Cookie please?

Jasmine knows that she is not allowed to talk to me when I am working, so she made this card and put it in front of me when I was talking on the phone to a patient/client:)) One cookie from the refrigerator please?

Zoppe Family Circus....

The Zoppe Family Circus is in town at the Chandler Center for the Arts. It's a 1940- ish style circus in an outdoor tent. Acrobats, performing animals, high wires, tight rope walkers, clowns, horses and dogs... Not exactly Circ de Soliel, but it was fun. Waiting to go inside the tent.

The tight rope walker from France was amazing,- very multi-talented.

Horses... of course we are right behind the tent pole!

Jasmine with Mr. Zoppe himself, plus the next little Zoppe generation:)

Crafty Jazzy...

Jazz made a pillow on Christmas day from a little kit that was one of her presents:)

Jasmine's chocolate creations....

Jasmine the chocolatier made these chocolates today:) Two in the middle that didn't turn out too well, so we are going to eat those two right now. The dilemma now is what to do with these!! We will give a few to Jaime tomorrow. It's out last skating lesson before she goes to Belize for her wedding:)

Christmas Day 2012

Santa brought Jasmine all of her cooking stuff: candy making kit with molds, cupcake maker and American Girl doll from Grandma and Grandpa, a talking microscope with 12 slides of insects, art set, lots of other stuff. We spent the day making candy with the new candy kit. Since I am not a happy homemaker, we had to go to the grocery store first. I thought it might be closed, but it was open and packed with people! We still have to finish decorating the candy, wrap it in the foil wrappers, and put stickers on it. Jasmine opening presents:

The candy- not finished yet. Not bad for her first try.