Today at the market I met Madeline Mary Frances, eating her broccoli like an ice cream cone.
(She prefers it to crepes. What a healthy girl!)
The Brown Chicken Brown Cow String Band was playing up a storm, and in the MVCC Green Booth, local solar company Constant Solar was on hand lending out Kill-A-Watt devices and in general letting Mar Vistans know about their services. 
I borrowed a Kill-A-Watt and I’ll be reporting on how much electricity we’re wasting without even knowing it. Stay tuned.
If you have a Wii and a wireless broadband internet connection in your house, you can subscribe to Netflix’s new on-demand movie and TV service. We were already Netflix subscribers and we have a Wii and the wifi, so we were able to start right up. And we highly recommend it — even the Mar Vista Dad got in on this one.
The good: you can instantly watch anything Netflix has in its Instant View list, and the picture quality has been great for us so far.
The bad: The Instant View list is kind of short, shorter than their regular list. And an annoying thing — it seems to change every day. One day there was SpongeBob Season 2 available, then the next day it was gone and Season 3 was there instead. Fine for me, rotten for my 7-year-old who wanted to watch the same episode again (and again).
On balance, it’s still very cool and I am glad we have it. I can’t compare it to other on-demand services because I don’t have those. If you do, please leave a comment below and we’ll compare.
PS — if you need help connecting your Wii to the internet, this is a very handy video tutorial Nintendo produced.
I want Free Wi-Fi just as much as the next woman (maybe more), but I can’t condone this kind of graffiti being done in our neighborhood. 
Please vote for the Free Broadband Pepsi Refresh Grant, which will bring free wifi to the whole Westside, but please don’t deface any more public property. Thank you.
Last night City Councilman Bill Rosendahl came to the Mar Vista Recreation Center to swear in the newly elected Mar Vista Community Council Board of Directors. 
From left to right: Geoffrey Forgione, Bill Koontz, Maritza Przekop, Marilyn Marble, Kate Anderson, Councilman Rosendahl, Sharon Commins, Laura Bodensteiner, Tara Mulski, Bill Scheding, Alex Thompson, Chuck Ray, Babak Nahid, and Board Chair Albert Olson.
And I’m so excited! The space is gorgeous and the food is terrific. 
This morning my husband bought me breakfast as we helped welcome them to the neighborhood. I had the Breakfast Salad 
and he had the Sugar Bush sandwich. 
Both were really good. I am not a huge fan of sweet food for breakfast, so the salad was a perfect dish for me. And the sandwich is a little sweet, but not too Belgian Waffle-y, so that’s good. 
I have tried their sandwiches for the past few weeks at the MV Farmer’s Market as they got themselves up to speed and I am a big fan of the Pig n Fig and the Heartichoke, but I didn’t even know about the breakfast salad, so that was a great surprise.
Welcome to Mar Vista, Earl! I hope you live long and prosper.
Earl’s Gourmet Grub, 12226 Venice Blvd., Mar Vista 90066
I love Spanish style houses and I love this round entryway.
It’s full-on Spring here and the produce is awesome right now. Two kinds of cherries, 
strawberries, 
Wong Tomatoes are back, 
and Lilacs! 
Plus Yvonne’s Gluten-Free Goodies had a booth here today — 
and great news for me and other fans: The grass-fed lamb and beef booth from Cali Farms
is now accepting credit cards! 
Then in the MVCC Green Booth, Farmscape was on hand showing off one of their demo gardens.
Plus The Real Princesses were there doing face painting 
and reDiscover Center was helping kids make last-minute Mother’s Day crafts. 
Gotta love that.
Happy Mother’s Day from Mar Vista Mom.
Imagine this: you’ll never have to look for the remote control ever again. Sound good? Well I have seen the future and it is XBox 360 Project Natal. No remotes; not necessary. Just use your hands. And arms. And legs. And the rest of your body.
The Xbox 360 Project Natal system has a sensor that reads your body and responds to your movements. It’s really amazing to watch it in action — take a look for yourself as my son tries it out at the demo event we were invited to:
And here are a couple of stills of the action of each of my sons getting into the game. 
It’s still in demo mode at this point, but it’s coming for Holiday 2010 and I’m really looking forward to seeing what they’ve got in store for it. It really gets you up off the couch, that’s for sure. Could be a great way to be indoors and still be active.
Stay tuned.
{FULL DISCLOSURE} {The Xbox 360 people hosted us for a demo of the game system where we shot this video on an adorable FlipCam they gave us. They also took the photos and gave me permission to post them here. As always, my opinions are my own and have not been influenced by any compensation.}
Have you seen our fabulous local soap maker, Soaptopia, lately? They are in full Mother’s Day mode! And why shouldn’t they be? Their products are perfect Mother’s Day gifts. I’ve been a fan since the beginning. My favorite soaps are Red Hot Lover and Mint Condition. And I must say I love them even more now — now that they have flattered me with a fun spot on their website, *ahem*.
Kate Anderson is a Mar Vista neighbor running for State Assembly to fill Ted Lieu’s seat in the 53rd District. As much as I’d miss seeing her around the neighborhood if she wins and goes to Sacramento, I am heartily endorsing her. I think she’ll do a great job and bring a common sense approach to the State House. 
Education is a high priority for Kate and she is very involved with the Mar Vista Community Council. Her level of commitment is fantastic and our whole community has benefitted from her volunteer efforts. You can read more about her on her campaign website.
If you’d like a chance to meet and talk with Kate Anderson, join me at a house party this Saturday morning, May 8th, from 10:30am – 12:30pm, co-hosted by Annie Barnes of InspireTheChange.com. Refreshments will be served and conversation will be had. RSVP to Annie Barnes at acmags (at) mac (dot) com.