It’s my first fathers day and Emily said she was buying me lunch. So I picked Pho’s to get some lovely Vietnamese noodle soup. We started off with some Jasmine tea, which came in a very pretty pot. Our Jasmine tried it, but she didn’t seem to like it very much. Of course she may have been distracted by the chopsticks. She tried numerous experiments with the chopsticks with only one or two explorations having the purpose of grasping food. Let’s just say I came very close to wearing an eyepatch this week.

Our food arrived and we gave samples of our dishes to Jasmine to try. She ate bean sprouts, rice noodles, and cucumbers. She even took a bite of a jalapeno pepper, even though we warned her they are very hot. We just smiled as Jasmine’s eyes got really big with surprise and she quickly reached for a gulp of water.

We split ginger creme brulee for dessert,  which sounded unusual, but tasted yummy. Jasmine absolutely loved it, she ate heaping spoonfuls as fast as she could.

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We got up at 5:15am today to go watch the annual balloon festival. We were worried because of the low cloud cover and drizzly weather that the balloon launch might be canceled (and that we would have gotten up early for no good reason). We arrived on location at 5:45 and waited… But nothing in the sky. We decided to go for a walk in a nearby park since we were already here. And at 6am we saw our first of many balloons take off into the sky. What a beautiful sight.

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Jasmine had a fun filled playday with her sister Destiny and foster family Ron and Kristi.  We started our time together at the zoo. First up was hand feeding nectar to happily chirping Lorikeets. Then we strolled through the Pacific Shores section viewing seals, otters, and fishies. After lunch, we viewed monkeys, polar bears, elephants and we all sat down to watch the bird show.

As the energy of the adults began to diminish, we exited the zoo and got an energy refresher at the Dairy Queen. Then Emily and I took Jasmine and Destiny to the park while the foster family headed off to prepare for dinner. In the evening we said our goodbyes with promises to get together again in July.

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After a morning of errands and playing in the park we were hungry. I had a craving for some egg drop soup, so off we went for some Chinese food. Jasmine put on her hesitant face saying “I want real food.” We said this is real food. She look unconvinced. When the pot of tea and teacups arrived she looked even more concerned about what the heck was going on. Then I said “Are you ready for the tea party?” and then Jasmine’s face lighted up. After her first taste of hot tea I could tell she didn’t like it, but because we were having a tea party, she kept asking for more. She especially liked clanking the teacups with us, which I’m sure is a cultural no-no, but I thought it would add that element of fun to encourage her to try new things.

We picked an entree for Jasmine that was pretty much fried chicken and had them put the sauce on the side. She was a trooper and tried several bites of new foods like egg drop soup, fried rice, fried wanton, spring roll, and different sauces before settling down with her chicken strips and ketchup (which the kind server brought in an ornamental Chinese serving dish).

Of course the best part of going out for Chinese food is having left overs to take home, yum.

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I’ve learned the secret of getting a 5 year out the door with no fuss. “Would you like to go to the park after we do some errands?” There was a cartoon puff of smoke and Jasmine was miraculously dressed with brushed teeth and hair at the door ready to go.

As you can see in the photos, Jasmine is becoming quite the monkey bar expert. The other kids her age  attempt to match Jasmine’s skills on the monkey bars but end up walking away in shame. (Hmm, I wonder if I have developed the “my kid is better than yours” syndrome.)

Emily and I also got into the swing of things trying out some of the playground contraptions.

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