Yes, We Are Batty!

Happy Halloween!

Disney Secret ----shhhh

This past weekend we took the kids to Disney. I had a conference in Orlando, and so we took them out of school for 2 days and had a BLAST. More on that later.

For now - I found out one of the BEST KEPT SECRETS of Disney. If you are a Disney freak (like me) you are well familiar with the Bippity Boppity Boutique, where kids can get made up like a Disney princess. It it awesome, and the girls did it last trip. But at $55++++ per child, it wasn't in the cards for this visit.

But on my first day there, I saw a little girl with her hair up in a bun, bright colors, and sparkles. It was so cute. I asked if she had been to Bippity. Her mom said no. And then she told me. At the Main Street Barber Shop (in the Magic Kingdom) you can get a little color and sparkle for $7.50. I KNOW! Awesome! They even do boys with hair gel and they can even make a little Mickey head on their hair. (Big Man didn't want it, so I don't have pics). It was certainly not as fancy as Bippity, but it was really cute, the girls got LOTS of compliments, and for less than $8??!! AWESOME!

Will surely be on our to-do list for future trips!

That's what Works for Me! Find other Works for Me tips here!

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Fulfilling a life long dream, DH and I finally went to the Baseball Hall of Fame. And it was amazing. There are SOOOOO many artifacts! We could have been there for 6-8 hours easy, but the kids took it happily for about 2 1/2. The museum is great in that is includes a scavenger hunt for kids that keeps them engaged!

We particularly like the multi-media movie presentation, the individual team "lockers" (see Nats above), and many of the fantastic displays like the All American Girls League, baseball in movies, and specific milestones in baseball history. Would have loved to spend more time watching all many short interviews and taped stories. Just means we need to go back again! If you are a baseball fan at all, I highly recommend it!!!

Loving the Foliage! (and apparently beer)

2 weeks ago we went on an RV vacation - this time to New York, specifically Cooperstown. The leaves were in FULL color and just GORGEOUS!

Here in the DC area, we had a bit of a drought, so the leaves are not that great. But up North a few hours - spectacular!

We had a great Fall weekend of not just leaf-peeping, but apple loving too! K especially liked cider press, as she is learning about simple machines in school. We went to several apple mills and enjoyed cider slushies, a cider float (cider, vanilla ice cream and ginger ale!) and lots of cider donuts!!



We also went to 2 local breweries, which had root beer for the kids. Naturally, when Big Man had to tell about his weekend at school he said he went to Yogi Bear Town (it was a jellystone campground) and to breweries. Nevermind the Baseball Hall of Fame, Howe Caverns, Herkimer Diamond Mine, etc. He posts on the weekend summary at PreSchool for a week that we took him to breweries. Gotta love it.

Fun Easy Craft

I got a bunch of these bottle caps to try the bottle cap necklace that is all over the blogosphere. They are super easy, and I think they are cute. Really takes just 6 steps.

1) put caps in small frying pan and heat up for about 5 minutes. This allows you to peel the wax/plastic thingy from the bottom.

2) using a nail and hammer, make 2 small holes in the side of the bottle cap.

3) find images on line and print them out at about at the size of 1".

4) cut out the images and glue them in the bottle cap.

5) cover with either a plastic disk, or with diamond glaze

6) thread string through two holes.

I think they are adorable, and the kids LOVE them. Very easy to personalize for anything they want. If you have a kid that I know IRL, expect to get some of these. We may make a bunch for Halloween too!

Easy Peasy Knitting Project

So we went on a fabulous RV vacation last weekend (the kids didn't have school thurs, fri and monday!) that I will share with your soon. While we were gone I made two really cute scarfs that were SOOO easy, and probably took about 1-2 hours each. The girls love them. I just used this yarn:

Just one ball and it makes this:



Isn't that so cute? B got pink and purple and K got black and white (her favorite colors). They are so soft and warm and easy as pie. I highly recommend. To make the scarf (directions on the ball) you just cast on and knit knit knit. Nothing to it!

Can't wait to get more of this yarn to make some more!

disclaimer: nobody is paying me anything or sent me anything, or knows anything about this review!

This Election Makes Me Crazy

The Republican rhetoric of this election is making me NUTS. Don't get me started on the Tea Party crazies, but even mainstream Republicans are just spewing it....

First - check out this awesome video. Its great to say you are going to cut spending - but how??? Love to hear someone who knows.

Second - Everyone hates TARP. Just a clue - TARP was signed by President BUSH - not Obama. BUSH. On October 3, 2008 - BEFORE the election. This was a REPUBLICAN plan.

Third- Saying only Republicans can solve the deficit. Two things have contributed most to the deficit.

1) the war. BUSH's war. That and all our other military conflicts. In fact check this out. Almost FIFTY percent of the entire World's annual Military spending is by the U.S.. Cutting U.S. expenses in half would still be more than next five or six countries combined. Notice no Republicans propose cutting defense spending in any way.

and 2) the collapse of the economy - again, happened under BUSH - due strongly to government deregulation. But what is the Republican answer? Smaller government - getting government out of business. REALLY?

ARGHH - best I can say is people, VOTE. VOTE VOTE VOTE. Vote early and vote often. We need all reasonable adults out there at the polls.

Making Xmas Gifts

K started a knitting class last week, and is hoping to make some scarfs for Christmas gifts this year. That got me thinking that I should get all 3 kids involved in making some presents. We are going to do these to start.

1) Marbled Paper (with shaving cream!!) We did this years ago, and ended up losing all the papers we made accidentally. Will try this again. Directions here.

2) Bottle cap necklaces. I think these are so cute. We made a few this weekend and will be working on more. Great gifts for the girls to give their friends! Cheap too!

Any more ideas?