World of Reading

World of Reading, one of our Junior League's signature projects, was a great success. Hundreds of children turned out last Saturday to "travel the world", getting their passport stamped as they completed activities with themes from various coutries and getting to pick out a free book of their choice by showing their stamped-up passport. Many of these children come from homes where they do not have their own books to read. With the help of many generous sponsors and funds raised through PigFest, the event was totally free to all participants--from the cookies, popcorn, balloons and juice, to the bounce houses, magicians, music, puppet shows, crafts and books the children got to take home. Here are a few pictures:

Passports provided to all of the children:
Bounce Houses Galore:

(our girls and their little friend Miss. H were happy to provide entertainment for those waiting in line)

Crafts:

(here our girls are decorating boomerangs in "Australia")

A Great Playground:
A Book to Take Home:
In our girls' eyes, their Mama had the most important job at the event--popping and serving popcorn! Ha! They were so proud!

Strawberry Season is Here!

We live in the "Winter Strawberry Capital of the World". Quite an impressive title for our teeny-tiny town situated in the middle of 5,000 acres of strawberry fields. We've grown to love it. We reside in a 107-year old Victorian house, surrounded by a picket fence and lots of friendly neighbors. We're just a few miles from our hometown, where we go to church, Mr. B works, where our kids will go to school, and where our parents and lots of other extended family live. We're close to the beach, Disney, and all of the fun to be found in Orlando and Tampa. Not to mention the fact that we and our girls love strawberries. We buy them "by the flat" and eat enough between February and April to get us through the rest of the year. This weekend, we celebrated the arrival of strawberry season.

The Parke family has been growing strawberries in our community since 1956. They harvest over 3 million pounds a year. We spent Saturday afternoon getting a tour of Gary Parke's unique organic, hydroponic strawberry operation. It was such a fun afternoon and Gary was such a great host--his enthusiasm makes it obvious that he loves what he does. He let us sample 5 different varieties of strawberries and then fill our baskets with our favorite kind (which was "Treasure", by the way). We picked 5 pounds of strawberries (though judging by the number of empty stems in the girls baskets, we probably should have put the girls on the scale on our way in and out to get a more accurate indication of the weight of strawberries we picked).

On Sunday, we visited the Parkesdale Farm Market run by Gary's sister, Cheryl. Sunday afternoon trips to Parkesdale Market during shortcake season have been a B family tradition for years. Parkesdale Market is the best place in central Florida to buy fresh fruits, vegetables and ornamental plants. They also have the best orange juice around and a "World Famous" strawberry shortcake available only during strawberry season. If you're traveling down Interstate 4 in Florida, it's a stop not to miss (both McCain and Obama dropped by as their campaigns blazed through our state).

Mmmmmm. How sweet it is!