Bin Boy Brooks

Just thought I would tell you about Teddy's new hobby/habit... might make you giggle.  Each day he likes to go into the trash (v. american - I know) room at the end of the corridor and dig around for newspapers!!!  He says he can't believe how many people bin their unread papers, so he goes and gets them for himself.  Does it sound better if I tell you he only looks in the recycling...

Monsters in action

A lady who bought my eggs kindly sent me a link to her flickr where there are some really lovely photos she has taken of them... check it out http://www.flickr.com/photos/22051346@N00/sets/72157623642356145/   They are maybe four or five lines down, having a jolly in little boats.

B B Q!

First BBQ of the year!  Moomin will take any opportunity to have a BBQ, Sunday was a lovely hot day so we invited Dan over for a BB and some sun bathing down on the patio.  The big grills are gas though which kinda felt like cheating to me and you don't get the same charcoaled taste, still it was a good barby!

No need to get jealous, it's cold and a bit rainy today

Festival - part II

Saturday gone was the Sakura Matsuri; the Japanese Street Festival which is part of the cherry blossom festivities.  There were about six blocks closed off downtown with loads of stalls selling Japanese food & drink, fashion, arts and crafts.  There were also stages showing music, dance and marshall arts etc. 

Not sure what these dudes were called but they were mint

 Kendo demonstration - Teddy thought this was hilarious, 

the noises the made were pretty funny

Pleased with my new necklace

And of course we had food...

Later we meet up with Dan and went down to China Town for a meal.  Its the first time I have been to a Chinese restaurant as I have never liked it when people have chinese takeaway (its all greasy).  But this was really good we had dumplings and wontons then Schezuan beef, peking duck and something with prawns and bean curd - it was all yummy and I will defo have chinese again!

National Cherry Blossom Festival

The festival is a two week long celebration every year marking the beginning of spring.  The cherry blossom trees which were a gift from Japan in 1912 are all around the tidal basin and along the Washington Channel.  It is a really beautiful time to visit DC as many of the major sites are around this area so you get to see them when it's all PINK! Yesterday we walked right around the Tidal Basin here are some of the pictures we took.

Featured

I am feeling super excited and very proud at the moment...... I had a message on my etsy shop to say someone had featured one of my items on their blog.  This girl is from Australia - this super cyber space world always amazes me.... someone on the otherside of the world loves my little miss eggbot!  Thats cool.

Star of the show - Miss Eggbot

Check out The Strangest Dreams blog http://thestrangestdreamsblog.blogspot.com/ where she is featured among other freaky little easter items.  I feel like I need to brush up on my photographs, the others look a lot better and I need good photos to attract people to my shop.  I am working on some ideas at the moment for the shop so will hopefully have something new to list soon.

The Hood

If we go out anywhere locally we always head south and go to either 'Cleveland Park' or 'Woodley Park' which are two neighbourhoods just a short walk away, heading toward the centre of DC.  They are both really cool areas with a lot of restaurants and bars.  I would say if we had a 'local' it would be Nanny O'Brien's which is an Irish bar in Cleveland Park.  Its not really very Irish apart from a bit of paraphenalia and I think an Irish music night on a Monday, which I have avoided! but its a decent little local pub. 

At the weekend we decided to walk north for a change...checked out one of the book shops we had been meaning to go to called Politics and Prose it was pretty good, really big and they often have authors in doing Q&As or readings - there was one going on while we were in there which sounded pretty good.  They also have book clubs and there is one at the moment for modern Japanese literature so I am thinking about giving it a go.



A bit further up the road is the American City Dinner & Cinema Cafe which we visited for lunch.  I loved it, it was really old school I have never been in one like this before its kind of like being in a super shiny aluminium trailer.  It was decked out with little booths and neon signs and had 50/60s classics playing.  I was very excited!

I tried my very first root beer, I really enjoyed it but can understand why others might not.  It tasted like dentyne chewing gum to me (which I really like) a bit medicinal, a bit cinnamony.  Teddy hated it - I guess its a marmite type of thing you are probably gonna love it or hate it.  Russell had a ChilliDog, you can hardly see the dog for all the chilli!

This place has a little extension type thing where there are a few more tables and chairs and they have a big pull down screen and they play a classic movie every night at 8.  So will defo be heading back there soon to catch a movie and have some more root beer!