More Anaka

Since Anaka headed off to her first day of... wait for it.... wait for it... MIDDLE FREAKING SCHOOL today, I thought I should post some more pix of all the fun we had when she came to visit.

One thing that Ray and I always try to do is introduce her to new foods. This could mean forcing sushi on her like we did last summer; sometimes it just means cooking something she's never had before. Of course, food is about what you ingest, but it can also be about the experience. That is what we were going for when we brought her to The Melting Pot for fondue fun. We got a sitter for the boy and had a more mature night out. It was a blast! We all ate wayyyy too much but sometimes that is the point!

One of Anaka's weird, pre-teen food things is that she doesn't like melted cheese (well, except on pizza). She doesn't like grilled cheese sandwiches or queso or anything like that. However, some melted swiss with all that fonduey extra goodness turned this girl real quick. Here she is trying to scrape the last cheesy bits from the side of the pot (are we sure she and I are only related by marriage??):

For dessert we went all out. Ugh. I was stuffed before it even got to the table, but who could resist chocolate with flambeed marshmallow? I think I dipped every piece of banana. I really didn't care if it wasn't fair. There were also graham cracker coated marshmallows, strawberries, pound cake and a couple other niceties. We ate about 3/4 of it, which was impressive. A trip to The Melting Pot is worth it for the dessert course alone!

While she was here, I introduced Anaka to one of my fave things: a tin of strawberry lip balm by I-dont-even-know-what-company. It's printed in some old fashioned font and made to look kind of antiquey. So, whenever I bust it out, I ask Ray "Would you like some old timey strawberry lip balm?" I did this to Anaka as well. We ended up getting her a tin of her own. Like the good girl that she is, after dinner she promptly asked "Uncle Ray Ray, would you like some old timey strawberry lip blam?" That's my girl!