Every Little Step

Saw an AWESOME movie last night. If you ever saw the musical "A Chorus Line", you must see this. I saw A Chorus Line 3 times on Broadway. Seriously. When I was a kid every year or so we would take a trip to NYC. We would get to pick our choice of show (often ones we could get at the half-price TKTS window). Every year, I picked A Chorus Line. 3 times my parents relented. The last time (I believe I was 15 or so), I went alone. My family had had enough. But I never have. I LOVE LOVE LOVE that show. Everything about it is so great. I think I can sing the words of nearly every song by heart.

So when I saw there was a documentary about the making and casting of it, I knew I would love it. It was so fantastic. I highly recommend it. They tell you about how they developed the idea for the show, and take you through a real casting of the revival. It is really powerful. You get in the heads of these dancers/actors/singers. It is a quick movie - about 90 minutes - but so good. I highly recommend Every Little Step. Easy to get on Netflix!

RV vacation - continued

So after dragging the kids away from the amazing fun at Luray, we headed across the state to Williamsburg. Here we stayed at a KOA, which was very nice. I did not have nearly the amenities of the Jellystone, but was still lots of fun. The kids enjoyed the pool, the bouncing pillow, and activities like Tie-Dye (again). They also LOVED LOVED LOVED the pedal karts you could sign out for free.

It was interesting that this campground was more expensive (despite being more rustic) - clearly because it was near lots of stuff (Colonial Williamsburg, Busch Gardens, Water Country, Yorktown/Jamestown, etc). We also learned here that we definately want to get an RV that is towed by a car. Not having a car was a drag. We have good friends in the area and in order to go out with them we either had to unhook and look for places to park the RV, or they came and picked us up.

But we had fun walking around Williamsburg, attending a Pirate festival in Hampton Roads, and having ice cream and amazing snow cones (with options of dozens and dozens of flavors!!).

But for the big news. How was the trip overall? Did we like it enough to think about buying our own rv? YES!!! We are now RV shopping. We definately want a Travel Trailer (which also means purchasing a big honkin' SUV to pull the sucker), and want something with 2 bedrooms (a Q and a bunkbed room) so we have more free living space when it is just the 5 of us (or more sleeping space when it is more).

So I am sure there will be more coming up, but for now we are doing research, asking questions, and window shopping!!

Worst Case Scenario

While we were on our trip, my MIL came and visited us at the campsite. When she went to leave her car wouldn't start. Nearby campers jumped into help, but the kids (down for bed in the camper) were getting worried. I went in to talk to them and said, c'mon guys, let's think - worst case scenario, Nana& Grampy can sleep in the camper with us! They were excited about that, but wanted to know what "worst case scenario" meant. So I did my best to explain.

4 days later we went to Silver Diner for breakfast. Big Man turns to me and says, "I want the french toast, or maybe the pancakes. Worst case scenario I'll have the pancakes." hee hee hee

We Did It!

Last week we went on our first RV trip as a family and....had a blast!!! We rented a Class-C travel trailer. For those not "in the know", that is the kind of RV you drive that looks like a truck in the front. We decided to go not too far away, so we planned for campgrounds just a few hours away.

We picked up the RV on Saturday and had the day to pack it, as we couldn't get in the campground we wanted until Sunday. Which actually worked out great, in that the kids had a chance to get accustomed to the RV and we could spend some time getting everything in there.

We woke up on Sunday and jumped in the RV. The kids were very excited for the drive, and we made our first stop at Luray Caverns. I hadn't been there since I was a kid, and the rest of the family had never been there. Despite it being the busiest day of the year, we had a great time. They have an audio tour for both adults and kids, which is a nice touch. I would highly recommend visiting it if you are in the area. The tour is about 1 hour and does involve a bit of walking (about 1 1/4 miles), but is really intersting and just cool to look at.


Then we hit the first campground - Jellystone Camping at Luray. This place was amazing - like a resort more than anything. It had 2 pools, a huge water slide, laser tag, miniature golf, paddle boats, and a jumping pillow. It also had many activities - like you were on a cruise ship. And the setting was beautiful!


It was really so much fun. The kids were amazed at every little thing. Jiffy pop on the grill (we can't have it on our ceramic cooktop), breadsticks on - sticks, pizzas on the grill, etc. The kids did tie-dye, candy bar bingo, and we made a bunch of friendship bracelets.

And campground people were really nice. Friendly, helpful, etc. It felt like a community.

On Thursday I'll post more about our adventures at stop #2 - Williamsburg KOA.

And the question everyone is asking - how did DH feel about it, and is he sold on getting one of our very own????

Beautiful in Pittsburgh - who knew?

Last week I went to Pittsburgh for work. I had never been to Pittsburgh and always thought Pittsburgh was kind of a industry, dirty hole. I could not have been more wrong.

Pittsburgh is GORGEOUS!!! REALLY! I know! I was so shocked. The waterfront (3 rivers) is beautiful! The skyline is awesome! You know how a lot of cities have just a bunch of tall buildings with little interest? Pittsburgh has a great mix of old and modern architecture making up a really pretty skyline. The baseball stadium is AWESOME and open right to the river. I was in shock. (and don't get me started on the housing prices - people around here pay more for cars!)

I didn't get a chance to spend time in the city (although the nice folks there did drive me though downtown and by the ballpark), but I really want to go back. They have these cool funiculars (they call them inclines) that go from the city (in the valley) to the top of the bluffs. My kids would LOVE that. There is also a cool Andy Warhol museum, a science museum on the river, a children's museum, lots of river cruises, and of course, the awesome ballpark.

We will be back to Pittsburgh, seriously one of the prettiest cities I've seen in a while. Who knew??!!


(i took the pic at the top, but didn't have a good skyline one, stole this from a random site)