Philippa Fisher and the Dream-Maker's Daughter

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Philippa Fisher and the Dream-Maker's Daughter

By Liz Kessler

Love this book! I read and reviewed Canned earlier this year and this book reminded me of Canned. The characters are fun in this book...although it's a little tricky to believe Philippa has such a great relationship with her parents. I was enjoying the book until it really got exciting and then I was so anxious to read just to find out what was going to happen. It was totally unexpected because I have read The Tail of Emily Windsnap by the same author and that book was anti-climatic for me, not in a bad way, I just expected more. Anyway, I definitely recommend this book. I have to warn you, it is the second book in a series that you can read without reading the first one but there is a first one in case you want to read that one first (although, I haven't read it so I can't speak for it).

Krystie, I think you and/or Sophia might like this one! :)

You can read my review at The Picnic Basket.

Racine Zoo

As part of our desperate efforts to get in fun stuff before having to go back to school, we went to Racine Zoo with Kathy and Maddy last week. I hadn't been since high school and Chad didn't even know Racine had a zoo so it was like a whole new zoo to us...and Jordan had never been either (obviously).

It is a small zoo but it is way nicer than I remember so they have been taking care of it nicely. One of the things we really thought was cool is that they had lots of things to do to interact with the animals. We just so happened to walk right up to the giraffe as they were starting the Giraffe Encounter where you actually get to feed a giraffe! I was all about it, lately I think that I am much more likely to fork over the $5 to do something that's cool just so I don't regret it later. And guess what, I so don't regret that I did this. It was pretty cool to be that close to a real life giraffe. I put my hand out to touch the giraffe's whiskers after he took my cracker. How cool is that? This was the coolest part of the zoo for me! (So cool that I moved it right to the beginning of this post, so the pictures are kind of out of order.)

I love seeing Maddy and Jordan play together. They have a lot of fun with each other and they are just so cute with each other. These are pelicans!

Chad with mountain goats! You kind of have to look closely at the picture but they are lounging up on the top of the rocks.

Meerkats! It was fun to watch them digging!

I thought these guys were pretty cute.

There were peacocks wandering around all over the zoo. We didn't get to see any show its feathers, but they are still beautiful just sitting in the grass. Oh, and if you are one of those kids who we saw chasing the peacocks, stop. And if you are one of the parents of the kids who were chasing the peacocks, please tell you kids to stop. Seriously.

How cute are these penguins! I love that they were all lined up waiting for fishies. I love penguins.

I think Maddy was doing something funny with her face or plugging her nose or something but it had Jordan in complete hysterics. He was cracking up. It was so cute to hear his little laugh. I love it.

I so love this picture! I feel like we don't take that many "group" pictures or pictures of us with the kids and with each other and this one is just a great picture. I'm so printing it out. It's me, Maddy, Kathy, and Jordan.

Chad took Maddy and Jordan on this train around the zoo while Kathy and I sat on a perfect bench in the shade for a few minutes. Ah.

They even had a playground area with two different climbing places. It was small but these kiddos were having fun!

That was our Racine Zoo experience! It was a great one! I think it was the perfect size and so relaxed and nice. Check it out!

Jumping Pancake Airplanes!

After Thomas, we went to stay overnight in Rockford. Saturday afternoon we took Jordan to play at Monkey Joe's, which he loves. There are tons of jumpy inflatable slides and obstacle courses.

Bubba and Jordy

On Sunday morning we went to the Poplar Grove Airport for a pancek breakfast that was the allstar of pancake breakfasts. We got to see real airplanes up close and Jordan got to get his face painted and to do even more jumpy jumps!

Meow!

Tattoo Giveaway!

Hey, guess what??? I got another package today from Knopf, my friendly-generous publishing company. They sent me The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo tattoos!!! I am super excited. I'll be contacting everyone who entered for the giveaway for the book The Girl Who Played With Fire so I can send them their cool tattoo! Anyone else who is interested in an oh-so-cool dragon tattoo, post a comment and tell me if you have a tattoo, or two, or twenty-seven, and tell me about it OR if you don't have a tattoo, tell me what kind of tattoo you would want and where you would get it if you were to ever get one. The first ten commenters get a tattoo!!! Cool, huh?

I have to tell you that I don't have a tattoo. I've thought about it. I got my belly button pierced in college but that's about as crazy as I get when it comes to such bodily fun. I had to take my belly button ring out when I got pregnant with Jordan so I don't even have that any more.

If I could get a tattoo I would definitely want a colorful one...not a black one, which Chad always points out are really green...but I pretend they are black. I think I would want something swirly, like the cool drawings/doodles my sister does with lots of fun colors. I think I would want it on my foot or my ankle, but then I could never wear sandals or capris at work because I would feel self-conscious about my tattoo and I've heard that it hurts if you get it where there is basically just bone there SOOOO that's why I don't actually have a tattoo. But I do like remove-able tattoos!

First Blog Giveaway Results!

Just now I entered the numbers for the giveaway and did a random number generator from random.org. I wanted to put the information here on this post...but I really couldn't figure it out. BUT, here are pictures of my computer when the screen came up!!!

If you look closely you can see the number...

6!!!!!

Congratulations to...drumroll...Stephanie from Call It A Clan! I will be sending Stephanie her very own copy of The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson!!! (And then, hopefully, she'll let me borrow it!)

Thank you to everyone who entered to win and to the publisher for sending me a copy of the book for the giveaway!