Chinese Firecrackers

When we were up in Chinatown last week, we stopped into a bunch of curio and souvenir shops.

At one place, while I was picking up a (super cheap!) silk-covered glasses case for Kelly, I noticed these lovely sticks-with-streamers. When I asked the lady behind the counter, she said they were fireworks for Chinese New Year. Like sparklers, but multi-colored.

And each pack of six was only a dollar?

Sign me up!

I don't have a photo of the actual sparklers un-lit, but they're lovely and sort of magic-wand like. Maybe I can get a good shot this afternoon, if I can ever get some natural light in the house... it's foggy, but I think it's gonna turn into a nasty rain storm before noon, and the house is all grey and huddling inside.

Anyways.

Last night, it was pretty lovely outside, so when we got home from dropping Skip off at Kung Fu, I took the Littles into the back yard, and they got to have some sparkler fun.

Man alive, though, do those things ever give off a lot of smoke and smell. I hope the neighbors don't think we were burning down the house.

[insert Talking Heads musical interlude here. Because that is now my ear worm...]

There were six sticks, so Nate got three, and Kelly got three, and they took turns setting them off.

First, Kelly lights Nate's sparkler. Some of these shots had a real Harry Potter magic wand sort of vibe. It was fun!

Expelliarmus!!!!!

Expecto PATRONUS!

The sparkers weren't your basic fizzy sparklers, either. They'd hiss and pop, and BLAMMO! and honestly, it kind of felt dangerous.

I'm sure that's what made everything That Much More Fun.

Allo homora!

Dangerous! I mean check this out! It's so bright, it gives Kelly a dark shadow! Like daylight!

In retrospect, I think we probably were quite lucky to come away from this with our vision intact, and our house and land not singed.

But hey, it was a lot of fun for a dollar.

And we still have six more sticks for another night.