Sunday, April 22, 2012

Boneyard Arts Festival

Parker has loved the art festivals in our town since he was a baby. He would get really upset if we ever missed one. This year the Art Club at his school displayed some of their works at Caffe Paradiso for the annual Boneyard Arts Festival so he had even more excitement than usual. We took in the sights and sounds Friday and Saturday in both twin cities. Friday night we walked downtown to check out some of the art displayed in downtown Champaign and went to Cream and Flutter to watch Ryan Groff perform. We've been fans of Ryan and his band, Elsinore, for years, but just recently Rob and Dema started taking guitar lessons from Ryan so Dema didn't want to miss seeing him perform.
Josie on the walk downtown (she put her outfit together herself just for the show, complete with cheetah print shirt, black scarf, and silver earrings).
Unfortunately, Cream and Flutter is about as unvegan-friendly as you can get (they don't even have soy milk for the coffee), but we ate downtown before we went to Cream and Flutter and there was some fruit at the art exhibit attached to Cream and Flutter. One of the downsides of our eldest going to public school now is that all the kids have a pretty firm bedtime now. We used to be able to go out to events and the kids would be fine all night, but now they all start to fade around nine. Josie was super disappointed when we left before Ryan was done and begged me to stay with her until the end, but we were with our friends Monique and Aidan who sweetly offered a ride home in the chilly night air. I knew staying until the end would mean walking over a mile home with a heavy sleepy four and a half year old in my arms.
We arrived very early to get seats (the place was packed by the time we left). Josie was hoping Ryan would ask her up "on stage". I don't know where she gets these ideas. She wasn't disappointed to just watch him perform though.

Saturday after Josie's soccer game, we all walked a few blocks to take the bus to Caffe Paradiso. We met Parker's charming art club teacher (a student at the local university and we've heard she is interested in veganism) and checked out their work.

 I love the idea of this project. They were supposed to send a text message to the world.






After taking in the art exhibit, we walked to a newish Thai restaurant on campus. Bangkok Thai and Pho 911 is in the same space that used to be Zyggyz and before that it was the original Basil Thai (whoa, we have been in this town too long now). Anyway, the ambiance is the same. Slightly greasy and fast food feeling, but the food was pretty good for the price.
Rob's Mussamum Curry with Tofu
Parker's Yellow Curry with Tofu
Josie's Pad Thai with Tofu (no egg)
Dema's Pad Lard Nar with Tofu
My Eggplant with Basil Leaves
We all agreed the curries were good, but not great (everything was a bit greasier than we like), but we would get the Pad Lard Nar or the Eggplant with Basil Leaves again. We would take our Klean Kanteens and bamboo forks next time because all they have is plastic wear and Styrofoam cups. We ate our fill and I walked with the boys to the library and Rob walked with Josie to the Walnut St. Tea Co. We met up halfway home to all walk home together. We thought about renting a Zipcar for the day, but it was so much nicer taking the bus and walking. We didn't get as much done, but it was so much more fun doing it. We made it home in time to visit with our friend Kurt (former neighbor) in town from California and Rob and I used the long afternoon walk as an excuse to take a luxurious late afternoon/early evening nap. We had family movie night of Sky High (pretty cute and one of the characters is veg!) and popcorn with nutritional yeast and pepper.

4 comments:

Gita Carey said...

I'm wondering if Josie was missing her pink polka dot rain coat on Friday night, although the blue one looks pretty snazzy with her outfit, I must say. Anyhow, we'll try to get it back to you guys or you can stop by and pick it up any time if she's missing it.

Glad to hear about the new Thai place. We also had Thai out last night at our regular spot which was MOBBED.

Great work, btw, Parker! Super fun pieces. So nice to have an inspired art teacher. They looked like fun projects.

VeganLinda said...

Gita, she was missing it, but luckily she has awesome friends who keep her closet full and she did think the blue looked better than the pink for that outfit (she insisted on the blue and green socks too).

It was nice to find a place that wasn't packed since this weekend was also Mom's Weekend on campus.

He's been very fortunate to have two creative and inspiring art teachers this year for art club. He has are this quarter during school too and I can't wait to see what he brings home from the class.

mydogoona said...

I thought the students' work at Paradiso was wonderful. Emily seems to bring out the imagination that lives in all of them.

VeganLinda said...

Parker really enjoyed Emily's way of teaching and the art club was one of the highlights of his first year at public school. I was really impressed with all the art the kids created.