Yummy Matcha KitKat
It has finally happened. The Torrey household has gobbled up a couple library books and refused to disclose their location! Unfortunately, this feeding frenzy is quite entirely my fault. We found a couple of great books for our adventures through Asia a week early, so I checked them out and….well…put them safely away. Somewhere. To save for this week. I need a book-hunter.
Look, interest in maps revived this week!
As most travels do, this week in Asia started with a snag. When Joshua and I were embarking on our very first international trip together (married two months maybe) the trip nearly ended at the boarding gate in San Antonio. In sitting down to put on his shoes after the security checks, Joshua also set down his passport…and promptly forgot it. Thankfully a good Samaritan, angel-in-disguise, found it and took it back to our airline’s check in gate (on the other side of security…things were more lax ten years ago!), and our wings to Spain were saved. I am still awaiting my miracle for those too-tempting library books, and fear I shall soon be paying the library to own them!
Our journey commenced despite this hurdle, with Nine-In-One Grr! Grr! told by Blia Xiong, adapted by Cathy Spagnoli, illustrated by Nancy Hom and Dragon Kites and Dragonflies adapted and illustrated by Demi. Nine-In-One, “a folktale from the Hmong people of Laos” is one we have enjoyed before, with almost patchwork illustrations highlighting a humorous tale of repetition and forgetting. Demi’s The Empty Pot is a favorite of mine, and one of the two we are searching to find. Her Dragon Kites and Dragonflies proved an acceptable substitution, the pictures nearly telling the rhymes for her! Judah could have spent hours viewing the horseback charge against a fortified city, while Kenzie loved the whimsy and freedom of the kites found throughout.
We watched an entertaining YouTube channel featuring two young sisters trying out six, new Asian foods for the first time (linked from the Summer Book Club). My littles were excited to recognize the first food – green matcha KitKat bars! Some of Joshua’s generous co-workers brought these back to us from recent trips to Taiwan, and they are a huge hit in our home.
Unfortunately for Asia (but great for Latin America – our next destination) the Olympics started on Friday – and we LOVE the Olympics. Thus, we had some focus shifts toward the end of the week – Go Team USA! Moving right along this summer, to catch a world-wide event in Latin America. See you next week.
