BUNNIES COMING OUT OF THEIR EARS; CUDDLY COUPLE SHARES PASSION FOR FURRY THEME.Byline: Jenifer Hanrahan Daily News Staff Writer One bunny started the obsession, of a man and a woman for each other, and the couple for their rabbits. That first bunny was a fuzzy gift-shop toy with floppy ears and a plastic heart clutched in its paws. But it multiplied - like rabbits do - into more than 7,500. Beset by bunnies, Steve Lubanski and Candace Frazee have turned their Pasadena house into what they call the Bunny Museum. Things are hopping this time of year at this home of many hares. After all, for rabbit lovers, this is the most wonderful time of year. ``It's our favorite holiday,'' Frazee said. ``Christmas is for angels and fairies and Santa Claus Santa Claus: see Nicholas, Saint. Santa Claus jolly, gift-giving figure who visits children on Christmas Eve. [Christian Tradition: NCE, 1937] See : Christmas Santa Claus . Halloween is the witch ... Easter is for bunnies.'' Visitors should follow a couple of rules. Don't call a bunny a rabbit. ``That word is too cold,'' Candace said. And leave your lucky rabbit's foot rabbit’s foot proverbial good luck charm. [Western Folklore: Misc.] See : Luck, Good at home. The obsession took root five years ago when Lubanski and Frazee met at a singles mixer. Lubanski liked Frazee's blond curls and smile. Frazee liked just about everything about Lubanski. That first Valentine's Day Valentine's Day: see Saint Valentine's Day. Valentine's Day Lovers' holiday celebrated on February 14, the feast day of St. Valentine, one of two 3rd-century Roman martyrs of the same name. St. , Lubanski bought Frazee the fuzzy bunny. He considered a teddy bear. But that seemed too predictable, and the romance blossoming was special. Was it a corny corn·y adj. corn·i·er, corn·i·est Trite, dated, melodramatic, or mawkishly sentimental. [From corn1. gift? Would Frazee have preferred diamonds? No way. He was her ``honey bunny Honey Bunny is a cartoon character owned by Warner Bros., although she has never appeared in a single animated short. A female rabbit, she was designed by Robert McKimson as the girlfriend of Bugs Bunny for merchandising purposes in the late 1950s. ,'' and she, his. Multiplying At first, they gave bunnies to each other on birthdays and holidays. But after they married four years ago this May, they began buying each other bunnies every day. ``Oh honey bunny! It's a bunny!'' Frazee said, when she spotted the day's surprise, a stuffed bunny holding a baby bunny, perched on the display case in her husband's Open Road Bicycle Shop in Pasadena. They have music-box bunnies, flowerpots with bunnies, cookie jars with bunny ears, bunny penny banks and bunny salt and pepper shakers Salt and pepper shakers are condiment holders used in Western culture that are designed to allow food eaters to distribute edible salt and ground pepper.[1] This is a conjoined term for salt shaker and pepper shaker. . ``You have to meet Flipper,'' Frazee said, taking a battery-powered rabbit from a shelf. ``He does a flip.'' Miniature bunnies, bunny-shaped candles, marionette marionette: see puppet. marionette Puppet figure manipulated from above by strings attached to a wooden cross or control. The figure, also called a string puppet, is usually manipulated by nine strings, attached to each leg, hand, shoulder, and ear bunnies, cotton-ball holder bunnies, ceramic bunnies and kissing bunnies stock floor-to-ceiling living-room shelves. A wine rack is stocked with Adj. 1. stocked with - furnished with more than enough; "rivers well stocked with fish"; "a well-stocked store" stocked furnished, equipped - provided with whatever is necessary for a purpose (as furniture or equipment or authority); "a furnished apartment"; ``Rabbit Ridge'' vintage. The biggest hare - er, bunny - is on the front lawn, a 12-footer on roller skates roller skates npl → patines mpl de rueda roller skates roll npl → patins mpl à roulettes roller skates roll npl from a Rose Bowl float. For anyone who might think this couple is a carrot's length away from hopping off the deep end, Frazee and Lubanski say there's nothing hare-brained about being bonkers over bunnies. ``It's really an expression of our love,'' Frazee said. ``It's our life, our expression, our thing.'' Cottontail cottontail a wild rabbit, Sylvilagus spp. motif In the dining room, bunnies are dressed like Elvis, Santa Claus, St. Patrick's St. Patrick's or Saint Patrick's may refer to:
Still, the couple won't buy just any bunny. ``There's a lot of bunnies that look angry or scowling scowl v. scowled, scowl·ing, scowls v.intr. To wrinkle or contract the brow as an expression of anger or disapproval. See Synonyms at frown. v.tr. . We only buy cute bunnies,'' Frazee said. Their favorites are their real ones that leave half-eaten carrots underfoot: Honey bunny, Buddy bunny, Bonnie Bunnie and Robbie-Rah, whose namesake is a character in the bunny-populated book ``Watership Down.'' ``They run around the house like pussy pus·sy adj. Containing or resembling pus. puss, pussy term of endearment addressed to a cat. Called also moggy. cats, and they are completely potty-trained,'' she says. Celebrity bunnies - Bugs, Thumper, Roger, Peter and the Energizer - have their own areas. They re-created the biblical Easter story ``in bunny,'' complete with little bunny angels. They even have a bunny toilet-seat cover and a bunny suit hanging where you might expect a terry-cloth robe. ``This is a normal house, only if we can find it in bunny, we have it in bunny,'' Frazee said. Expression in red She draws the line with bunny-mania in fashion. They only dress up like bunnies on special occasions. The rest of the time, she wears red. Only red. She has a closet full of red blouses and sweaters. She even wore a red wedding dress. ``Red represents love, too,'' she said. They had a carrot cake at the wedding. They eat with bunny silverware on bunny dinnerware (everyday and fine china). They are both vegetarians - rabbit food - although the only cuisine they share with the rabbits is fresh fruit and papaya papaya (pəpī`ə), soft-stemmed tree (Carica papaya) of tropical America resembling a palm with a crown of palmately lobed leaves. tablets to help with hairballs (for the rabbits) and digestion (for the humans). The license plate on their sport-utility vehicle says: ``H BUNNIE.'' Some of the guys who come into Lubanski's bicycle shop tease him about the bunnies. They think he's indulging his wife. ``A lot of my friends think it's her thing, but it's our thing,'' said Lubanski. ``I love it. A lot of people say, `How can you live there with all those bunnies?' You don't need that much room to live.'' Bunnies have started taking over the bicycle shop as well. About five months ago, they began selling bunny books and rabbit food in the bicycle shop. The newest venture is the ``world's only bunny store,'' they say, to go with ``the world's only bunny museum.'' Lubanski looks for bunnies in antique stores, flea markets, the Salvation Army thrift store and at yard sales. Frazee finds her bunnies at gift shops and by mail order. They don't encroach encroach v. to build a structure which is in whole or in part across the property line of another's real property. This may occur due to incorrect surveys, guesses or miscalculations by builders and/or owners when erecting a building. on one another's bunny territory. About the only bunnies not represented are the leggy leggy said of animals that appear to have legs longer than normal for the species, breed and age. ones that wear high heels and cottontails, better know as Playboy's. ``This is an expression of our love,'' Frazee repeats. ``That's garbage and pornographic, and that's not what this is about.'' CAPTION(S): 7 Photos Photo: (1--Cover--Color) H BUNNIE A warm and fuzzy Pasadena museum born out of a rabbit-a-day obsession. (2) Steve Lubanski and Candace Frazee have turned their passion for bunnies into a daily habit of exchanging rabbit-themed gifts. (3) The 7,000+ bunnies in Lubanski and Frazee's collection are organized by theme. This is the Music Department. (4) The cookie jar collection is full of sweet expressions. (5) An area is set aside for figures of children dressed as bunnies, which Frazee calls ``The Pretenders.'' (6) ``A lot of people say, `How can you live there with all those bunnies?' You don't need that much room to live,'' says Steve Lubanski. (7) The giant bunny in front of Frazee's home was seen by millions on the Rose Parade float for the city of Downey. Hans Gutknecht/Daily News |
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