Huntington Beach Kite Party

First things first, I would really like to extend a very warm welcome to Joanna (from the US) and Susy (all the way from Italy - benvenuto!).  I'm so glad to have you join me and I really hope you'll enjoy following along!

I am soooo very behind in getting this posted!  The Huntington Beach Kite Party was held Saturday, March 12th (the same day I went to see Wicked, which I blogged about in my last post) and also on Sunday, March 13th. 

I went on Saturday morning, which started out overcast and gray.  I was uncertain if they would still be holding the kite party because of the tsunami dangers from the horrible and devastating earthquake in Japan the day before.  But, I decided to go ahead and head on down to check it out anyway.  I was a little nervous about being on the beach, but I think the warnings had already expired, so I thought it should be safe.  And as it turns out, it was, but I did keep a wary eye on the surf throughout my stay!

When I got to the beach, I found a spot on the sand to plant my towel and then started snapping some pics.  Some of those kites are huge!  In the photo above you can see a man standing next to the kites as they are trying to get them in the air so you can see just how large they are!  You certainly cannot always tell how big they are in the other photos when they are flying high, as you have nothing with which to compare them!

Some were just colorful . . .

And others were just whimsical . . .

I really liked this caterpillar, but I had to work to get him.  He had a bit of a difficult time getting air!

There were a couple of these intricate looking white kites.  They kind of looked a little like snowflakes to me.

This cute little rainbow was actually 7 kites locked together, moving in tandem.

Here was another with several kites joined together with their tails looking like confetti dancing in the sky.

Tinkerbell and her new pet dragon were flying high!

A bleeding heart contrasted nicely with the pretty blue sky!

Kite dancing!  Who knew?  They played music on the loud speakers and the kite handlers manipulated their charges to the beat.  It was fun to watch.  Sometimes they had several kites all dancing together.  I tried to film some of it, but my camera doesn't do great video and I was too far away to get great images, and you can't really hear the music very well (you can almost hear a bit of it here and there - Stairway to Heaven) . . . but, here is a little taste of what they were doing so you can get a little idea of what they can do with kites these days!

Something about watching kites takes me back to long, lazy summers, lying on my back in carpets of soft, fragrant, green grass, watching kites and clouds in the bright, blue sky.  Back to the days when I had nothing more to worry about than which combination of sodas to order at the local hangout.  Makes me want to go fly a kite myself!  

I will be anxious for the next Seal Beach Kite festival in October.  It is billed as the largest kite festival on the west coast.  If I get a chance to go, I'll be sure to share!


Well,  I guess that is just about it for now!  I hope you enjoyed this little excursion! Until next time!  Baci per i miei amici!

Wicked!

All photos from the Souvenir Program!

Well, my pretties, I had a GREAT time!  The costumes!  The choreography!  The music!  The color!  BRAVO! ! ! !

By now, we all know the story of The Wizard of Oz, but do we all know what happened prior to Dorothy's little sojourn there?  Wicked is the prequel to TWOO.  And, probably everyone but me has already seen it, but this was my first time and I absolutely love-love-loved it!  Now I know how the tin man, the lion and the scarecrow came to be and more importantly, the backstory to The Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda, the Good Witch.  Things are not always what they seem, are they?  "Are people born wicked, or do they have wickedness thrust upon them?" muses Glinda.

You take a bored housewife, mixing it up with a traveling salesman from Kansas, who's pushing a green elixir and you end up with a child who comes out with a distinctly emerald complexion, whom the husband abhors.  She was named Elphaba, as in EL-faba.  When they find out they are expecting again, the husband is so worried the next child will also come out green, that he forces his wife to chew milk flowers, but that ended up causing the baby to come early with legs that did not form properly and caused complications that ended up taking the life of the mother.  This daughter was confined to a wheel-chair.

As kids do, the poor girl with the emerald skin felt her mother's death and her sister's deformity was all her fault and really took it to heart when her father charged her with the care of her younger sister.  

Now, send both girls to school (one to care for the other) and add one shallow, extremely pretty, spoiled and self-absorbed room-mate and you get sparks.  Galinda, that's Galinda with a Ga, is the popular one, whose sole aim seems to be to embarrass and taunt Elphaba, but slowly, she begins to change because of Elphaba's influence.

Eventually, they end up being good friends.  That is, until you add in a boy.  Galinda had her sights set on Fiyero, the new boy in school, who on the surface, appears to be just as shallow as Galinda, but he seems to have his sights set on Elphaba.  But, more on that later . . .

One of the instructors in the school is a goat.  Prior to the arrival of the Wizard during the great drought, animals always spoke and everyone got along.  But, something happened and animals were starting to be persecuted and caged.  Once caged, they began to lose their ability to speak.  Elphaba was speaking out in their defense.  The instructor was taken away and a new professor came in with a caged lion cub and began extolling the virtues of caging animals and taking away their ability to speak.  (This cub later became the cowardly lion.)  Galinda, loses the GA and just becomes Glinda when she decides to show her solidarity for the animals for her friend, as the goat professor could not say the name Galinda correctly.

Elphaba and Glinda end up going to the Emerald City to meet with the Wizard (who, unbeknownst to any of them was Elphaba's father), which is when Elphaba found out that he was not the great wizard everyone thought him to be and that it was him who was behind the caging and persecution of animals.  He gave her a book to see if she could read the spells in it and in doing so, she was tricked into casting a spell that caused the monkeys to grow wings.  (Flying monkeys, oh my!)  She was horrified at the pain she had caused them during the transformation.  When the Wizard found he could not control Elphaba, he sent his guards to kill her, but she escaped, and became known as the Wicked Witch of the West.

Cut to the younger daughter, Nessa, who had fallen in love with Boq, the munchkin boy who was, in turn, in love with Glinda.  Elphaba had gone to visit her sister and fix her legs with a spell so she could walk.  The jeweled slippers her father had given Nessa as a gift for going to school, were turned into ruby slippers in the process.  But, then Nessa became enraged when she found out Boq did not love her and cast a spell from Elphaba's spell book that cause his heart to shrink and disappear.  Elphaba tries to save him, but in doing so, he was turned into a tin man and Nessa blamed Elphaba for it.

When the guards captured Elphaba, Fiyero came to her rescue and she was able to escape, but he was then taken into custody and punished for helping her.  Elphaba cast a spell to keep him from being killed, but it caused him to be turned into a scarecrow.

And, at some point in there, Elphaba discovers the travel charms of the broomstick and mysteriously Glinda begins to transport herself via bubble, which, when Glinda disparages the broomstick transport allows Elphaba the great retort:  "Well, we can't all come and go by bubble."

Then the brat from Kansas (and her dog Do-Do, as Glinda called him in Wicked), landed her house on Elphaba's sister, killing her and stole the ruby slippers and set off for Oz to see the wizard.  And, well, you know the rest . . . or . . . do, you?  Is Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, really melted?  Or, was that just an elaborate ruse so that she and Fiyero could steal away to live the rest of their lives in peace?  Hmmmmmmm . . . . 

If you haven't seen it, go see it.  If you have seen it, go see it again!  It's that good!  Really!  Here is a link to the script.  And, another one here.  I just wish I had the video of it to share with you, too!  It was simply fantabulicious!  No wonder it is so pop-pu-lar!

Wicked - Score! ! ! (. . . and my shopping loot!)

From OCPAC's website.

OMG!  SCORE! ! ! !   I can't believe I was able to get a ticket at the last minute for Wicked - front and center (just 8 rows from the stage)! ! !  The week following the date I am going, the same seat goes up to $163!  Wooo hooo!  I was so stoked!  I missed it the first time around and kept forgetting to check on tickets this time until this past week.  It begins its run at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa on Wednesday, March 9th.

From OCPAC's website.

This is what OCPAC has to say about it on their website:

"The New York Times calls Wicked 'Broadway's biggest blockbuster,' 

and when it first played the Center in 2006, it broke box office records 

and sold out in record time.  Winner of 35 major awards, including a 

Grammy® and three Tony Awards®, Wicked 'is hugely entertaining' 

and 'brilliantly crafted' (Orange County Register).

Long before that girl from Kansas arrives in Munchkinland, two girls 

meet in the land of Oz.  One -- born with emerald green skin -- is smart, 

fiery and misunderstood.  The other is beautiful, ambitious and very 

popular.  How these two grow to become the Wicked Witch of the West 

and Glinda the Good Witch makes for 'the most complete and 

completely satisfying new musical in a long time' (USA Today)."

Anyway, I am so excited to be able to go and will let you know how it is!

I went shopping yesterday and ended up with all kinds of of pretty things. Looks like I am getting ready for spring and summer!  I really liked these pretty little pastel ramekins.  I have put different items in them for these photos, but I wish I had also picked up some pretty candies to increase their cuteness factor a bit more!  Pastel M&M's or candy coated almonds, or maybe some jelly beans.

I also found these cute little buckets and a little pink tray.  I picked up 6 of these buckets, as they were only $1 each, and am not entirely sure what I will end up doing with them, but I think they will make nice little containers for some tasty treats one of these days, dressed up with some iridescent cellophane.  I can't wait to make some cupcakes to decorate with these pretty little dragees.  But, this weekend is packed with a to-do list a mile long, so it will be a while before I will have any time for baking!

The ramekins will be perfect for little scoops of ice cream drizzled with chocolate or some little treats like strawberries!  Yum!

I picked up a couple dozen plastic eggs, they were so shimmery!  They will make nice Easter decorations.

The ramekins could also hold decorative items like bits of sea glass, or shells, or maybe supplies for your desk, like pastel-colored paperclips.

Or, they could be used on a vanity to hold your jewelry.  If you want to really see some great pics of these little ramekins, Jessica over at Such Pretty Things has some really eye-popping snaps of them!  Her whole blog is truly pretty!

I have been wanting an hour glass and liked the simplicity of this one with the green sand.  I think the color will work perfectly when I get everything repainted and am ready to start decorating!  I am painting all the walls white and I want to go with a beach cottage look and will be focused on aquas, turquoise and blues with occasional little pops of green.  I liked the little vase with the little dots of white.  It reminds me of a gorgeous urchin shell I had once.  It was quite large and I wish I still had it, but it got broken about a year ago.  :-(    I haven't been able to find another one like it.  In hindsight, I wish I had tried to glue it back together!  I also liked the turquoise hanging wire candle holder.  And, in keeping with the beach theme, I also picked up the koi statue and a ceramic coral candle holder.

Well, that's a peak into my little corner of the world today!  Hope you have a great day!  See you soon!