a peek inside the fishbowl

Regular readers already know how important I believe the arts and culture is in the development of our young citizens. I believe that exposing children to great music, film, and theatre is essential to young brains and helps create more intelligent, sensitive, compassionate, and creative individuals. The more you expose your kids to the arts, the broader their worlds will be.

The Arts! They are good for the soul! And we are lucky to live in the kind of city where it’s an accessible activity… especially when it comes to families with young children.

Fishbowl patron OSSD (Ottawa School of Speech & Drama) is hosting this giveaway. They’re giving away a family pass to a Young Audiences production of  “Jelly Belly makes Garbage Delight of Alligator Pie” a play that has been adapted from the poems of Dennis Lee and features second year students from the Ottawa Theatre School. There will be three days of performances: February 18, February 20 (Family Day!), and February 25.

Want to win? All you need to do is leave a comment below telling us what your favourite poem or story was when you were a child.

And now for the fine print:

• This giveaway is for one family pass (maximum four people) for one showing. Show times are as follows:
  Saturday February 18, 4pm and 6pm
  Monday February 20, 11am and 2pm
  Saturday February 25, 4pm and 6pm

• This giveaway is open to anyone residing in the Ottawa area but is void in Quebec.
• The winner will have to pick up their pass at the OSSD. They’re located in Westboro at 294 Picton Avenue.
• One entry per family please! We want lots of people to have the opportunity to win.
• If you can’t post your comment because you’re behind a firewall at work or whatever, you can email it to me for posting: andrea at quietfish dot com, but please be aware that I cannot be responsible if your entry is lost in a vortex of Spam
• I will do a random draw of all qualifying entries using Random.org at noon EST on Friday January 13, 2012.

Sound good?

Before I end this post I wanted to add a very important reminder for Ottawa parents: registration for OSSD winter programs and March Break camps is now open. Summer camp registration is coming up very soon too. The Ottawa Theatre school will also be starting the audition process for next year as well.  There’s a lot going on! It’s worth checking the website and having a look around.

Over to you. Good luck!

Today’s column over at Canadian Family Magazine is truly for the birds. And it’s really fun and cheep, er cheap. Check it out over here. And if you like this post, please tweet it! ;)

When I posted about my fish chowder I promised to share a fish recipe that my kids loved. Frankly, I was amazed that they liked this recipe as much as they did. I loved it too – and so did Mark – so it gets FOUR thumbs up… which is very rare around these parts. It’s a TOTAL KEEPER, which is great, because I have been looking for ways to add more fish to our diet.

As an added bonus it made fantastic leftovers for my lunch the next day. See?

At first, Sarah was sad to hear that fish cakes aren’t actually fish-shaped CAKES (you know, the kind that are made with sugar and have frosting on top), but once she got over that she was ok with the idea. :)

Fish cakes may seem fancypantsadvanced but they are deceptively easy to make. I used this recipe from Epicurious, using some frozen tilapia that I bought on sale, but you could probably use any white fish. Just pulse it in the food processor with some other ingredients, shape into patties, fry, and you’re done. By the way, I recommend making the mayonnaise too. It was a great addition and the kids loved it.

My only advice is to make sure you don’t make the patties too thick!

I served it with baby greens, rice, and lightly sautéed snow peas. Let me know if you try this one!