Julia's New Restaurant

Julia is back in the restaurant business, with both a new name and a new location.  Instead of on the living room rug, this new restaurant is behind the living room couch, in close proximity to the play kitchen.  Get your first look here at the brand new Cafe Caré (this is merely how imagine it spelled; the way Julia pronounces "Caré" essentially rhymes with "hooray"):

Cafe Caré

Madeleine at Cafe Caré

I have had the great fortune of patronizing Cafe Caré on several occasions, and have had the honor of Julia as my waitress.  Yesterday I ordered a coffee and a fruit salad, yet this morning I got adventurous and opted for pizza and a cupcake.  While I have nothing but rave reviews for the food at Cafe Caré, I did have a bit of an unusual experience with my waitress this morning.  The service was awfully slow; I had intended to try and get (real) coffee going for Ethan for his Fathers Day breakfast, but my waitress was taking so long cooking my pizza that I was kind of trapped over in Cafe Caré, leaving Ethan to make his own coffee.  Then, as I waited (and waited, and waited) for my food, my waitress disappeared up to her room for a long time, leaving me wondering if she had abandoned the game.  I finally just up and left my table to go get a bagel in the toaster for Ethan as he got dressed after his shower, and while I was in the middle of breakfast preparations, Julia re-emerged from her room, dressed in a fancy outfit, presumably to better look the part of waitress.

"Mom?" Julia called out, coming into the kitchen.  "So, pretend that never happened."

Okay.  I'll pretend you never left the game to go get dressed for a long time, if you'll pretend I already ate my food and left the restaurant so that I can now focus on eating my REAL breakfast.

Once Ethan sat down to eat with me, the girls flocked around him to present him with their Fathers Day gifts.  Julia handed him a very sweet card:

I totally agree, Julia.  The hart IS the best part.

Then there was this SECOND card from Julia, which is inexplicably decorated with the numbers 4 and 8, as well as a maple leaf:

ME: Julia, what made you write fours and an eight on the card?
JULIA: Uh, I dunno...I just decided to.  There was, like, paper and tape lying around on the table, so I decided to just do that.

There was also a gift that Madeleine made at school:

I don't really understand why she was capable of coming up with actual, legitimate things about Daddy when her teachers asked her, but when I asked her, it was all "peeing" and singing "Five Little Laps."

Madeleine also had a home-made Fathers Day gift for Ethan:

ME: Madeleine, can you tell me what this picture is?
MADELEINE: It was a little girl named Olivia, who was HOPPING on those lily pads, and her FEET were in the water.

Oh, of course.  Because that has EVERYTHING to do with Fathers Day.

At any rate, I am currently being roped into putting on a puppet show with the kids (they are WAY into this idea; we all have pretend names and ages, and Julia made all sorts of signs for the show, as well as a script) while Ethan takes a nap on the couch, so hopefully he's getting to enjoy a peaceful Fathers Day afternoon.  If nothing else, at least he is off the hook from participating in the fun of pretend play!

Happy Fathers Day, Ethan!