OMGBEAR!
Today I went up to Alderwood to go shopping with ![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
firesplace and megami. mightyflorist and a friend of his came along too. Fire had been doing wedding stuff in the morning, so she had her hair done and her makeup done and I almost didn't recognize her!
Anyway, we had fun going around the mall. DJ had alerted us all to the existence of a Daiso shop there (and by Daiso, yes, I do mean this Daiso). It was just like being in Japan... except, just as in those sorts of shops in Japan, I don't really NEED bowls or cups or sensuu or uchiwa or glasses or purses or medicine or pencils or... so, yeah. But still, it was really fun to wander around a big store full of Japanese-labelled stuff where all the aisles were too narrow and everything was in wrappers and cute.
We stopped in various other shops, but the one where I actually spent money was the Build-a-Bear Workshop. I'd always kind of wanted to do the bear-building thing, but I always felt like I'd be too ashamed to go by myself... and fortunately, Fire and Rumi had gone a week or two ago before, and Rumi wanted to go back, so whee! Rumi made a Mulan bunny and I made... err... well, here, see for yourself:
Yes, I made a Mariners bear. Or a Beariner. Or whatever. Right now his name's "Bearemy Reed" (like the Mariners' center fielder Jeremy Reed) although that might change. He is INSANELY cute. And I don't even like bears that much, remember.
Right, so let me describe the process of how Mr. Reed got constructed. First, you go through the store and pick out a stuffed animal shell, essentially -- it looks like an empty bear backpack, kind of. They also had a puppy and some rabbits and monkeys and cows and such too. I was torn between the velvet bear and Bearemy, but it looked like the velvet bear wasn't going to stand up, and a baseball bear would look really stupid never standing up, so I went with Bearemy - that is actually the name of this particular model of bear, most of them are called things like "cocoa bear" or "butterscotch bear" or "velvet bear", but he has a name.
Then, you go up to the stuffing machine, where they have you step on a bearpaw pedal and it pumps stuffing into your bear. If you've picked out a sound button for your bear, they'll put that in as well. I picked out a "take me out to the ballgame" song sound button. After the bear is stuffed, you pick out a heart for the bear, and they have you rub the heart in your hands, and against your nose and your belly so you "make sure the bear's heart is linked to yours". That's the embarrassing part. Then they sew up the bear's back by pulling strings and tying them, and off you go to decorations and such. You can also stop to "give the bear a bath" if you want, which is basically taking a brush and brushing off any excess stuffing and such.
Then you dress the bear. Me, I picked out a Mariners uniform for my bear, which consisted of a jersey, pants, stirrups, and a hat. Spike sneakers were extra, and they also had a little baseball set with a glove, ball, and bat, so I got that too.
Then you go over to the personalization booth and type in information, and they print up a birth certificate for your bear (or is that a bearth certificate?).
Then you pay. Or more like, you try to pay, while the store is erupting in chaos as ninety billion kids run all over the place as part of various birthday parties, and the staff can't seem to figure out who's working the register anyway. And eventually, you manage to get to a register with a staff member and you give them money and they put your bear in an "adoption box". Today, they even were giving away free t-shirts. I think I might just send the t-shirt to my mom, since there's no way in hell *I* am going to wear a t-shirt that says "Party with the bears!"
Wooo, bears.
Anyway, after that we wandered around the mall a bit more and eventually decided to go get dinner at Ruby's Diner, which had pretty much typical Johnny Rocket's type fare, burgers and fries and all. However, I did have a caramel milkshake and it was one of the best things I've ever had in my life. Yum.
DJ and Crystal left after that to go home. Rumi and Fire and I went to another part of the Alderwood compound, namely the one with the Old Navy and the Barnes&Noble. Went and tried on some clothes in Old Navy; then looked around B&N for the March 2006 issue of Travel & Leisure because I am a big dork who really wanted to see the baseball fashion spread with Joe Mauer, Noah Lowry, Ben Broussard, Jose Molina, and Carlos Delgado, ever since Bat-Girl posted the Joe Mauer fashion plate pictures. I didn't find it at B&N, but I did find it later after we'd gone back to the main mall thing, when I stopped by Borders. Hot damn, it's... well, "hot damn" is about the most appropriate thing I can think of to say. Since I'd already seen the scans of the Mauer pictures, I was ready for that, but my god, Noah Lowry is pretty good-looking too; he'll be battling Zach Duke for the NL LHP spot on my All-Cute list next year, that's for sure.
Anyway, not to derail, but yeah. Rumi and Fire actually went home after the Old Navy part, because it was like 8pm by then anyway. I went home after Borders.
After taking a few minutes to breathe, I went over topauldf's place for his fudge-cooking party. I didn't really know any of the people there, though I think I have met some of them a few times. Jarrett and Katy were there, so it wasn't all total strangers. I mostly stood in the kitchen chatting with Jarrett as we worked on cooking fudge. Paul's recipe is really, really, REALLY weird. First you cook the fudge in a pot -- then you cool the fudge down to nearly freezing -- then you let it get back to room temperature -- and then you pull it, like pulling taffy...
...and then, after like 10 minutes of pulling fudge like taffy, suddenly, BOOM, it turns from wet sticky taffy into dry flaky chunks of fudge. It was SO bizarre, too. One second I was commenting on Jarrett's taffy-pulling-as-performance-art ability, and saying his hands looked like a cookie dough mixer, and then the next, the fudge was literally falling out of his hands.
It was pretty good.
I guess I was there for an hour and a half when I realized I was feeling really out of it and tired, so I came home. And I took pictures of OMGBEAR! and stuff. And that is all.
firesplace and megami. mightyflorist and a friend of his came along too. Fire had been doing wedding stuff in the morning, so she had her hair done and her makeup done and I almost didn't recognize her! Anyway, we had fun going around the mall. DJ had alerted us all to the existence of a Daiso shop there (and by Daiso, yes, I do mean this Daiso). It was just like being in Japan... except, just as in those sorts of shops in Japan, I don't really NEED bowls or cups or sensuu or uchiwa or glasses or purses or medicine or pencils or... so, yeah. But still, it was really fun to wander around a big store full of Japanese-labelled stuff where all the aisles were too narrow and everything was in wrappers and cute.
We stopped in various other shops, but the one where I actually spent money was the Build-a-Bear Workshop. I'd always kind of wanted to do the bear-building thing, but I always felt like I'd be too ashamed to go by myself... and fortunately, Fire and Rumi had gone a week or two ago before, and Rumi wanted to go back, so whee! Rumi made a Mulan bunny and I made... err... well, here, see for yourself:
Yes, I made a Mariners bear. Or a Beariner. Or whatever. Right now his name's "Bearemy Reed" (like the Mariners' center fielder Jeremy Reed) although that might change. He is INSANELY cute. And I don't even like bears that much, remember.
Right, so let me describe the process of how Mr. Reed got constructed. First, you go through the store and pick out a stuffed animal shell, essentially -- it looks like an empty bear backpack, kind of. They also had a puppy and some rabbits and monkeys and cows and such too. I was torn between the velvet bear and Bearemy, but it looked like the velvet bear wasn't going to stand up, and a baseball bear would look really stupid never standing up, so I went with Bearemy - that is actually the name of this particular model of bear, most of them are called things like "cocoa bear" or "butterscotch bear" or "velvet bear", but he has a name.
Then, you go up to the stuffing machine, where they have you step on a bearpaw pedal and it pumps stuffing into your bear. If you've picked out a sound button for your bear, they'll put that in as well. I picked out a "take me out to the ballgame" song sound button. After the bear is stuffed, you pick out a heart for the bear, and they have you rub the heart in your hands, and against your nose and your belly so you "make sure the bear's heart is linked to yours". That's the embarrassing part. Then they sew up the bear's back by pulling strings and tying them, and off you go to decorations and such. You can also stop to "give the bear a bath" if you want, which is basically taking a brush and brushing off any excess stuffing and such.
Then you dress the bear. Me, I picked out a Mariners uniform for my bear, which consisted of a jersey, pants, stirrups, and a hat. Spike sneakers were extra, and they also had a little baseball set with a glove, ball, and bat, so I got that too.
Then you go over to the personalization booth and type in information, and they print up a birth certificate for your bear (or is that a bearth certificate?).
Then you pay. Or more like, you try to pay, while the store is erupting in chaos as ninety billion kids run all over the place as part of various birthday parties, and the staff can't seem to figure out who's working the register anyway. And eventually, you manage to get to a register with a staff member and you give them money and they put your bear in an "adoption box". Today, they even were giving away free t-shirts. I think I might just send the t-shirt to my mom, since there's no way in hell *I* am going to wear a t-shirt that says "Party with the bears!"
Wooo, bears.
Anyway, after that we wandered around the mall a bit more and eventually decided to go get dinner at Ruby's Diner, which had pretty much typical Johnny Rocket's type fare, burgers and fries and all. However, I did have a caramel milkshake and it was one of the best things I've ever had in my life. Yum.
DJ and Crystal left after that to go home. Rumi and Fire and I went to another part of the Alderwood compound, namely the one with the Old Navy and the Barnes&Noble. Went and tried on some clothes in Old Navy; then looked around B&N for the March 2006 issue of Travel & Leisure because I am a big dork who really wanted to see the baseball fashion spread with Joe Mauer, Noah Lowry, Ben Broussard, Jose Molina, and Carlos Delgado, ever since Bat-Girl posted the Joe Mauer fashion plate pictures. I didn't find it at B&N, but I did find it later after we'd gone back to the main mall thing, when I stopped by Borders. Hot damn, it's... well, "hot damn" is about the most appropriate thing I can think of to say. Since I'd already seen the scans of the Mauer pictures, I was ready for that, but my god, Noah Lowry is pretty good-looking too; he'll be battling Zach Duke for the NL LHP spot on my All-Cute list next year, that's for sure.
Anyway, not to derail, but yeah. Rumi and Fire actually went home after the Old Navy part, because it was like 8pm by then anyway. I went home after Borders.
After taking a few minutes to breathe, I went over to
pauldf's place for his fudge-cooking party. I didn't really know any of the people there, though I think I have met some of them a few times. Jarrett and Katy were there, so it wasn't all total strangers. I mostly stood in the kitchen chatting with Jarrett as we worked on cooking fudge. Paul's recipe is really, really, REALLY weird. First you cook the fudge in a pot -- then you cool the fudge down to nearly freezing -- then you let it get back to room temperature -- and then you pull it, like pulling taffy......and then, after like 10 minutes of pulling fudge like taffy, suddenly, BOOM, it turns from wet sticky taffy into dry flaky chunks of fudge. It was SO bizarre, too. One second I was commenting on Jarrett's taffy-pulling-as-performance-art ability, and saying his hands looked like a cookie dough mixer, and then the next, the fudge was literally falling out of his hands.
It was pretty good.
I guess I was there for an hour and a half when I realized I was feeling really out of it and tired, so I came home. And I took pictures of OMGBEAR! and stuff. And that is all.
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Your bear is so cute!
I think I'll have to go out and find that issue of Travel & Leisure . . .
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I'm not kidding. It's only like, a ten-page advertising insert, but oh man. I wonder if T&L had a spike in their sales of this issue due to the Mauer and Lowry fans out there...
The Build-a-Bear line actually moves relatively quickly. I think there's one in the Mall of America, isn't there? You could go there on a non-weekend afternoon or evening and I bet it'd be pretty quick... sometime when it's not likely to have a lot of traffic from kids.
(though I'm not sure I can think of a real convenient Twins name for a bear. Shame Bearzynski isn't around anymore.)
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How tall is he? Obviously there's no scale, but I'm guessing he's a cuddle-in-one-arm bear rather than a two-arm bear or a hand bear.
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You could give it to a gay bear!
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