Category Archives: Travel with kids

The Boyhouse Takes An Epic Road Trip

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The clock in the kitchen has been two minutes slow for weeks now, and although there are two other clocks – on the stove and microwave – I always find myself glancing at that one. Yesterday I decided to seize the day and after changing the time, I hung it back on the wall. I did not, however, hang it properly, as evidenced by the smash and shatter that came a minute later. I knew that I would be constantly glancing at the bare spot in the wall, trying to ascertain the time of day, and so after dropping the kids at their swim lessons, I found myself at Bed Bath and Beyond.

What is it about that store? I have been very conscious about what kinds of things I purchase, and the quantities thereof – I don’t want to add to the landfill any more than I have to, and also I don’t want a whole lot of clutter in my house. However, walking into Bed Bath and Beyond, I find myself completely and immediately overwhelmed. Do I need a spiralizer? Do I need a floating cooler? How about Jelly Belly flavoured syrup? What about these throw pillows? What about a shower caddy that has a separate waterproof pocket for my phone? Does Barkley need a cooling bandanna? In the end I walked out with only a clock, thanks only to iron willpower. I was sorely tested though, even when I made it through the store. Near the checkout I was very tempted by a deal on streak-free stainless steel and granite cleaner, scented hand soap, and special pens for writing on glass.

Iron willpower, and maybe I am also a little shopped out since I crossed a new line this week: I bought so much at Costco that I could – and this is not an exaggeration – barely move the cart. I normally am at Costco every 2-3 weeks, but due to vacation it had been almost five, and I was into my backups of almost all my staples. The cart was so heavy that it was taking every ounce of strength I had to move it, and I briefly wondered if the slight incline in the parking lot would be the actual death of me. I pushed with all my might, inching through the lot, while cars zoomed past me, probably raging about the renovations at the gas station. The next day my back and shoulders were a bit sore and I wondered if that counted as the World’s Lamest Injury.

Speaking of vacation, I meant to write about it before now, but clearly I have been too busy breaking clocks and buying groceries to do so. It was, the kids said, our Best Canadian Trip Ever. Emphasis is on Canadian, I guess, because hey, Disney World. But we did have a wonderful trip, starting with a drive up the Icefields Parkway to Jasper.

Hoo boy, that was a cold hike! My husband and I went to the Athabasca Glacier on our very first trip together, way back in 1998, so it was very fun to see it with our kids, twenty years later.

We did lots of great hiking, and also went white water rafting for the first time. In the evenings we played board games and cards, and it was, all in all, fabulous.

Circling back to my shopping challenge, I purchased these boots in 1998. They have seen a lot of kilometers in the past twenty years. I was going to boast about them, how they are still going strong, but sadly the soles are coming off! I don’t even know if I can get them repaired, sad trombone. Anyway, twenty years is pretty decent for a pair of hiking boots, and they saw me through all the hikes we did in Jasper.

After Jasper we headed for the coast. I hadn’t been to Vancouver since I was pregnant with my oldest, which was fifteen years ago. I was Quietly Pregnant, and we stayed with the same friends we stayed with on this trip. We had a lovely time with our very generous hosts (HI CHRIS) and spent time at Kitsilano Beach, Granville Island, and the Seawall.

The original Lululemon! I did not even go inside because I was still on my shopping challenge, and a person can only take so much temptation.

After Vancouver we went to visit my mother-in-law, and a number of friends, in Kelowna. The four hour drive ended up taking seven and a half hours, due to – dramatically – a truck and trailer on fire a few kilometers in front of us. Other than that little blip, we had a great time enjoying the heat and the water.

Just as we were getting back into routine last week, I decided to take advantage of the hot weather and took the kids up to my parents’ place mid-week for a mini-vacation. We paddleboarded and boated, and the kids were getting a little hot so I encouraged them to jump out of the boat and swim to shore. It turned out to be a lot farther than I initially thought but hey, they did it!

So now we are home and back in the swing of things, with slightly tighter pants – sigh – and lots of great memories. A friend of my husband’s is very sick and it’s on my mind a lot, how time can be fleeting and at the end of the day, this is what matters most. I don’t ever wish to go back in time but I do wish I could slow it down just a little – the boys are back to school in less than three weeks, it’s mid-August! – but failing that, I guess we just need to enjoy the time we have together. xo

Huatulco Heat

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Well, hello! I got back Saturday night from a blissful vacation in Huatulco, Mexico, where it is gorgeous and sunny and at least 32 degrees everyday, and there are unlimited mango margaritas to be had, to cold and snow and The Coldest Easter Calgary Has Experienced Since 1940. Well. That was a bit of a slap back to reality, oh, there goes gravity. From I’m a bit too warm in this bikini to I’m wearing all the clothes like Joey from Friends, but not commando.

Also in the past 24 hours I have done five loads of laundry.

But I’m not complaining because really, it was a wonderful and fun vacation with family and friends, and we did so many fun activities – a snorkel/ whale watching trip, jet-skiing, sea kayaking, drinking mango margaritas, karaoke…but more on that later. Huatulco is a very pretty little place in the midst of a national park, and so it is less commercial and busy than other places in Mexico. It was plenty busy, though, with Mexican vacationers on Easter holidays, which made it very fun – a busy resort is a lively resort, in my opinion.

Isn’t it beautiful? I was so ready for a vacation; this winter has been, as I have mentioned numerous times, relentless and – given that Today’s High Is Minus Seven – endless, and life has been, as it is wont to be, Busy. The month of March was particularly hectic, with the week prior to vacation crossing over from Hectic to Frantic. For some reason I thought it would be a great idea to schedule a dentist appointment for myself, an orthodontist appointment for the soon-to-be-braceless-child, teach several extra classes in addition to my regular ones, throw a birthday party for my now-fourteen-year-old, bake and decorate those cupcakes for the party, pack all the suitcases, individually measure out and package 20 meals for the dog as per the kennel instructions and get said dog to the said kennel, and get a wax and pedicure. Sure, the last two could probably have been omitted, but it was a beach vacation, and some things are just not negotiable. I also wrote up a couplet-rhyming treasure hunt for Easter eggs so as to be prepared for the holiday when we returned, which REALLY could have been omitted but I didn’t want to. In other words, I was more than ready to relax, read, and enjoy everything.

Speaking of reading, I finished a number of books on vacation. In A Sunburned Country is a fun read if you are interested at all in Australia. I didn’t think I was, but I ended up fascinated. I also read the very popular The Light We Lost but ended up being infuriated with the main characters. A lady on the beach was also reading that and mentioned that her friend had read it and cried throughout. Do you…find it sad? I asked her. No, not at all, I have no idea what is wrong with my friend. Well. Maybe she was in a different headspace than the two of us, but I found I kept mentally telling the main character that Gabe sucks, and dump him, and enjoy what you have with the guy who planned a weekend to Paris to propose to you, and who cares if he didn’t ASK YOU FIRST ENJOY THE SURPRISE. If you’ve read it I would love to hear your views on it. For me, I found myself becoming very angry, and not at all teary.

I also re-read Asymmetry, and it was even better the second time around, In This Moment, which was a perfect beach read, and this:

The author grew up in Calgary, which is something I really like in authors. I like to see if I can pick out the Spirit of the West, as it were. But it’s a really entertaining read, particularly the essay about the Perfect Skirt. I lent it to my friend to read on the plane home and she also devoured it.

I have much, much more to say, but the dryer just beeped, I need to pick up the dog – Barkley photos to come! – and regular life is calling me. The vacation is already taking on a dream-like quality, like I visited a different planet several years ago. Maybe that’s just the Reynaud’s relapse talking. xo

Kitchen Reno, Five (plus) Years Later

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Hoo boy, has it been a long week or what? I know it’s technically a short week, but it feels…trying. Trying and LONG. Last Thursday night my son got home from Quebec, and early Friday morning we got in the car for an eight-hour drive to visit my mother-in-law for the Thanksgiving weekend. In order to do this, between getting home from the airport and getting in the car, the following had to be done: a) laundry, b) pack all of said son’s clothes and personal effects, and c) pack up the car. I’m just going to say that I am very happy to be home, but exhausted by the laundry. I always feel a little strange complaining about laundry – it’s not like I am personally scrubbing lye soap into clothing on a scrub board, or using a wringer washer, or even hanging things (other than Lululemon) to dry, but my god, the laundry. I think it’s because, to paraphrase Newman from Seinfeld, the laundry never stops. Even when you are caught up, you are immediately behind again because people change their underwear, there are towels to be washed, and sheets to be changed. No matter what, I will be folding clothes until I drop dead. Hopefully one is not correlated with the other.

Anyway, laundry aside, it’s nice to be home and eating normally and being back into normal routine. It was an unsettled eleven days, what with the Quebec trip and then the road trip, but we are home, home, home. Home with a great deal of grapes and apples, so all is well.

As a side note, it’s hilarious to me how people always say, when I mention I have thirty pounds of apples in my cold room, that I’ll be able to make so much pie and apple sauce! I tend to look at them blankly, because to me, that is a WASTE of an apple. If you don’t think I can single-handedly consume thirty pounds of apples before they go off, then you are vastly underestimating my abilities. Maybe it’s the Alberta Girl in me, but it never, ever occurs to me to use fresh fruit to make pies or jam – I buy frozen fruit in bulk from Costco, and I use that. Fresh fruit is for EATING, in my humble opinion. Also, I find apple sauce to be a bit…unappealing. No offense to all you apple sauce lovers out there, but I cannot think of why I would need more than the occasional jar from Co-Op to make hippie-style-fruit-sweetened muffins.

Perhaps I would feel differently if I lived in a place in which the fruit crops were more than crabapples and saskatoon berries.

The one exception is my stash of Concord grapes, because my generous mother-in-law gives me so many that it is actually not physically possible to eat them all before they turn. In that case, I make fruit leather. Here’s my un-recipe: make thick, pulpy grape juice using a juicer. Peel, core, and slice apples (I often save my tree ripened ones for eating, and buy bulk bags at Costco to use for this. I know! I’m terrible at sharing apples). Put both in a food processor until they reach a smooth applesauce-like-consistency, then pour onto parchment paper-lined sheets in the dehydrator for 10-12 hours, depending how thick you pour it. As for quantities? I don’t know. What am I, a food blogger? Oh, right. Anyway, I don’t really measure here, I eyeball it. Fill your food processor with apple slices, add grape juice until it’s purple and smooth but not runny, and run with it.

So other than doing laundry I spent quite a bit of time in the kitchen this week, and speaking of kitchens…

Nicole’s Kitchen Renovation Five (plus) Years Later

I know, I wrote about renovating back in August, planning to write the kitchen installment “next time” and if I put it off any longer, it will be Nicole’s Kitchen Renovation Six Years Later. I’m sure you were on the edge of your seat! Does Nicole still enjoy the kitchen renovation of 2012? Does she have regrets? What would she do differently? I’m sure you have been dying to know, so here goes.

When we bought the house, the kitchen was, for lack of a better word, disgusting. The cabinets were homemade, and the fellow who made them was not an artisan craftsman. The drawers were always stuck, the hood fan was completely coated in grease, the countertops were a pale yellowish green with swirls. The walls, in keeping with the pink-and-green theme of the house, were covered in five different but coordinating patterns of wallpaper. The dishwasher had once been a rolling mobile one, but someone had cut out a part of the cupboards and wedged it in, so it stuck out at an angle, and it also had a wooden cutting board on top which was pretty grim from years of use. The linoleum was an ugly pattern from the early 80s; in short, it was perhaps not the ugliest kitchen in the world, but it was a contender.

When we bought the house we couldn’t afford a big renovation, so we did the best we could. We scraped off the wallpaper and painted the walls a butter yellow, we painted the cabinets a warm white and changed out all the hardware. We did our best and then in 2003 we did our first of two kitchen renovations. Yes, we have renovated the SAME KITCHEN TWICE. We replaced the homemade cupboards with white Shaker-style ones that actually opened and closed on demand. We redid the floor and the countertops, put in an island, a proper dishwasher, and repainted everything. In a bid to save money we did most of the work ourselves and, because we both worked full (and more than full) time, it took four months to finish.

Back in 2012 when we made the decision to renovate, I wanted this NOT to happen. I wanted my renovation, and I wanted it quickly. Fortunately Ron and Don, the brother team, were also of the mindset that the sooner they finished the better, and they set to work. We didn’t change the cupboards because I still liked the white Shaker, but we put in granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, hardwood to match the rest of the house, and the World’s Biggest Sink.

I’m going to tell you right now that I love my kitchen. I also want to point out that it took 16 1/2 years from the time we moved into the house to the time we put a window covering on that window. The original was a cheap brown plastic blind and I planned to replace it when we took it off, back in 2000. And replace it we did, in January of 2017. It improved my life immensely since that is a southwest-facing window, and the sun would blind me in certain seasons when I was trying to make dinner.

One huge regret I have about our kitchen renovation is the range. It’s a Kitchen Aid, and it works just fine, but it has a fan that goes constantly whenever the oven is turned on, and about thirty minutes after it is turned off. It is loud enough to be very intrusive; music has to be turned up, I can’t hear the kids when they talk to me if the oven is going, etc. Also it takes forever to heat up. Huge regret but since it is very functional, I cannot justify buying another.

Another thing – this is not a regret, per se, but more of an observation – while I like the giant square double sink, it is a bitch to clean. The corners tend to get dirty and it is annoying, but on the whole I do like the look of the square sink. Other than the dirty, need-to-be-cleaned-with-a-toothbrush corners.

I’m still happy with the granite we chose, although if we were to do it now I might think about quartz instead. That wasn’t an option back then, and I do like how the granite matches the bathroom (and, foreshadowing, other parts of the house too).

Banana stages: a study. That’s part of a banana loaf in the background. How many bananas do you go through in a week? Our banana usage varies between 14-25 per week, which means there are usually many bananas in various states on my countertop.

When you were a kid, was there a chore that you detested and you swore you would avoid it like the plague as an adult? For me, that chore is drying dishes. Hence the sturdy dishrack on which are always many containers, that air dry so I do not ever have to. On nights when dinner creation has led to more dishes than the rack can hold, one of the kids dry them. Note the wine bottle in the background, and also my favourite small appliance: the Vitamix.

In terms of large appliances, I love my dishwasher. Here’s one major reason why:

A silverware rack! No more putting all your mucky silverware in gross little cup holders, this baby keeps them separate, clean, and easy to put away without getting your fingers on the parts of the silverware that go into people’s mouths.

A peek inside my fridge because, frankly, I love seeing the inside of other people’s fridges and pantries. This is not a euphemism! My friend Joanne (HI JOANNE) posted a photo of her pantry that her daughter had recently organized, and I stared at it happily for longer than is probably normal or healthy.

So there you have it – I still love my kitchen reno, save for the noisy range, so I would say that it was a success! What do you think? xo

Spring Break in Mexico! Busting Loose!

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Hi! Happy April! Can you even believe it?

We spent a week of Spring Break in an all-inclusive in Mexico, and now I am completely spoiled. The whole trip was perfection; we went with another family and all eight of us get along like a house on fire, so much fun was had by all. The weather was perfect, the resort was perfect, everything was perfect.

This made the entry back to real life kind of rough: I had immediately become accustomed to not cooking, and having someone come by with a fresh drink every time mine was empty. I mean, my god, it is 4:53 as I write this and not one mango margarita have I consumed. One week ago, I would have had several by this hour in the day.

But one cannot be on vacation all the time, or one would not appreciate all the glories of sunshine and ocean breezes, am I right? And so today was the first day the kids were back to school, husband was back to work, and regular routine resumed. Which is not to say the past four days after our return were leisurely and relaxed; mostly I did load after load of laundry, grocery shopped, finished deadlines, and wistfully remembered, as if from a dream, this view:

Sigh.

What is it with post-vacation laundry? Mine was a dire situation, and I am one of those people who MUST unpack almost immediately upon walking in the door. My husband had to restrain me from starting the laundry at 9 pm after travelling all day. The following three days were almost entirely filled with laundry, punctuated with other drudgery, work, and – bizarrely – an orthodontist appointment. Note to self: never again book an orthodontist appointment on the day after a vacation, because you will regret it with every ounce of your being.

Anyway. The laundry is now done – as much as the Sisyphean task is ever done – I have meals planned for the week, and everything is caught up. Now for the vacation photos!

We met these guys on a bicycle excursion. One is male, one is female, and we were the happy viewers of live iguana porn. In fact, the whole iguana mating procedure seemed really bizarre, and it must have been, because the guide looked very taken aback by the strangely vigorous thrusting. “I’ve never seen THAT before,” he said, completely earnestly.

This led to a hilarious joke that we carried on throughout our trip: my friend and I were sitting by the pool, having a drink, when a large man came over, unloaded the children’s towels off of one of our pool chairs, picked it up, and carried it away. We were too taken aback – and tipsy – to say anything. The next day we saw him do the same thing to someone else. For some reason I nicknamed him Gary, and he was the unknowing butt of iguana jokes for the remainder. Hey, if you’re going to take chairs while children are swimming, then you should be laughed at, in my mango-margarita-fueled opinion.

Moving on, we also saw this guy on our bicycle excursion, and I did NOT name him Gary. He probably had a name.

The mango margaritas that started it all.

My husband and I celebrated our anniversary, on the same day that our older son – and our friends’ older son – turned 13! Serendipity.

One thing I LOVED about this resort was all the scheduled activities that anyone could join in. One thing you may or may not know about me, if someone is asking for a volunteer for an activity, I am first in line. This is how I ended up doing zumba and/ or water aerobics almost every day, and also how I somehow got involved in Crazy Games where I had to race across the pool on a floaty, while being splashed in the face and held back by one of the Entertainment Team.

I wasn’t the only adult doing zumba, by the way. The rest have been cropped out to maintain privacy. It’s really fun, once you get over the weirdness of dancing in your bikini in front of everyone around the pool.

It was fairly spring-like when we got home, the snow was melted and Jake and I even did some garden clean-up on Saturday. Sunday morning, however, looked like this.

Oh well, I guess it’s still good to be home.

If it’s not Scottish it’s crap.

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I have been browsing through a Facebook page for a brand-new, just-opened-in-November, Mexican resort. On the page are the sort of reviews one might expect: terribly bitter complaints about some small bit of incomplete construction or a delay in service on opening week, complaints about having to walk fifty steps from the pool in order to obtain nachos and margaritas, anger over the Teen Club being restricted to 13-17 year-old people when one’s son is 10 and wanted to enter said Teen Club to play video games, and extreme disappointment in the resort upholding a dress code for the fancy restaurants despite said dress code being clearly indicated on the website.

However, this morning I came across this glowing review:

“Our group has experienced many resorts and this is by far the best for me, lots to do…food is great, room service food is good, food at the restaurants is good, top shelf booze, pools are amazing. Put your anxiety and worries away, you’ll love it. If you need anything the brown shirt people will help you with almost anything to make your stay as enjoyable as possible.”

Ah yes, put your anxiety away because the brown shirt people are there.

I feel that this review could have been better worded.

Today was Parent-Teacher Interviews for the junior high, and believe me when I say that there is no injustice faced like that of a grade six student heading off to class with the knowledge that his brother is home for the day. Life, as we all know very well, is not fair. In an attempt to assuage these resentful feelings, I whipped up a batch of cherry muffins, to be eaten warm when the long-suffering sixth grader came home.

Small digression: I have, on many occasions, poked fun at my old copy of the Lutheran Ladies’ Family Favourites, particularly because of their truly astonishing variety of Meat and Macaroni Jello Salads – an actual section in the book – and also their head-tilting casserole recipes, such as Vera’s Wiener Pie. The latter is a melange of cream sauce, a variety of root vegetables, and a package of wieners and a pie crust. It is hard to take a recipe seriously when the main ingredient is a package of wieners, in an unspecified size and quantity. Well, it’s hard to take it seriously when the main ingredient is a package of wieners, period.

But I will tell you this much: when it comes to baked goods, the Lutheran Ladies do NOT fuck around. I have yet to try a muffin, square, slice, cookie, or sweet loaf that has not worked out well. The beleaguered sixth grader had gone through it and marked off every recipe he thought we should try out, and one of those was Cherry Muffins. I was all for it until I read the recipe; it was bizarrely complicated and involved immediate pan inversions. It seemed more like an upside down cake, in muffin form, and so I took Dorothy’s Basic Muffin, added some vanilla and a cup of frozen cherries and voila! Cherry muffins. They have been pronounced “great!” and so my work here is done.

As those of you of Scottish heritage will no doubt know, this Wednesday was Robbie Burns Day. Actually, I forget it every year, and am reminded by my father, who texted me to wish me a Happy Robbie Burns Day. Since I was chaperoning a field trip to the Astrophysics Observatory with fifty-seven fifth-and-sixth graders, which was an interesting and informative trip but sadly involved over ninety minutes on an overheated and stinky school bus, sitting beside a student who had little to no concept of personal space, I did think my dad’s suggestion of a dram of single malt did not seem amiss. However, the day passed mostly unmarked, since I do not actually like Scotch. It tastes like burning.

However, I did consider my Scottish heritage as I was faced with the unmistakable fact that my life has been greatly improved by three small things: a vegetable peeler, garlic press, and spatula. I purchased all three of those things, at the absolutely lowest cost, in the late Nineties, when I moved out of my parents’ house. For the most part, these humble kitchen items were a lesson in You Get What You Pay For, as the blade often popped off of the handle of the vegetable peeler, the garlic press was mediocre at best and the white, probably-carcinogenic enamel had started to chip off, and the spatula? Well, the spatula was fine but after nearly twenty years of use the rubber had cracked, rendering it fairly useless.

My mother, probably at the end of her rope watching me with my substandard equipment, bought me a new peeler and garlic press and people, PEOPLE. The difference is obscene. I feel like a super-fancy lady, peeling even butternut squash with ease and using the reverse-action to get the weird garlic remnants out of the press. It’s the most luxurious thing and I had the sad realization that I could have done this earlier, I could have purchased these items years ago and thus would have been living my best life.

And the spatula? For less than four dollars, I am now living the life of luxury, spatula-wise. Things are scraped out of mixing bowls with ease, the last tiny bits of cashew cheese are easily removed from the Vitamix. I feel like I’ve entered into a new era: my post-crappy-kitchen-utensils era. I am now looking around the kitchen for items that I bought on the cheap for my first apartment and maybe, MAYBE by next Robbie Burns Day I will replace them.

I’m still half-Scottish, you know.

Disney’s Hollywood Studios, Where I Connect With My Star Wars Alter Ego and My Longtime Muppet Love

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Doesn’t everything feel a bit like a Herculean effort during the month of January? Yesterday morning was a feels like minus 32 with the wind chill kind of day, plus it had snowed overnight, sending traffic into one gigantic snarl, not that I’m battling traffic when I’m doing the school drop-off, but still. Just getting things done takes massive amounts of willpower: a) getting out of my cozy bed into my 16 degree house, b) getting into the freezing cold car to get to yoga, c) leaving the warm yoga studio to get back into the even-more-freezing car, d) getting out of the steamy hot shower, e) taking off the fuzzy robe to put actual clothes on in my chilly bedroom, and f) leaving the house several times a day to do various drop-offs, pick-ups, and errands. It takes a lot of effort and layering of clothing just to get through the morning routine around here.

Whenever I start to feel a bit sorry for myself in this cold climate that I am NOT suited for, I think of the Ingalls family, in their crappy little house in town. I mean, 16 degrees is nothing compared to sleeping in an unheated, un-insulated attic with only your sister’s body and a heated brick to keep you warm. It’s not like I have to undress in front of the stove, the only source of heat in the house, that is running on twisted pieces of hay. It’s not like my daily sustenance is one baked potato and a slice or two of bread. Winter life: it’s not so bad, really. Of course, comparing anything to the Ingalls’ way of life is bound to make you feel thankful for everything.

On that note, I have more to say about my Florida vacation. What? I know I’m stretching it out, but it’s JANUARY. If I don’t write about Disney’s Hollywood Studios, I’m going to be writing about how cold it is and how busy it was at the grocery store, my two usual January topics. You know you want to hear about my latest Costco experience. No?

 

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Me, in an attempt to look glamourous for Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Fun fact: I put this tank top on – containing a shelf bra – backwards, and wore it as such for a solid two hours before realizing that it was backwards, in what is the saddest commentary on my bosom ever. In fact, the only reason I realized it was backwards was that I noticed the lululemon symbol, which is normally on the back.

But I digress. No one wants to hear about my deflated state of affairs. Let’s talk Hollywood!

We went to Hollywood Studios the day after our epic Magic Kingdom day, which meant we were all a bit more tired than normal. We had planned for this, since Hollywood isn’t the biggest of the parks; in fact, we only walked 11.2 kilometers. Hollywood Studios is home to Aerosmith’s Rock and Roller Coaster, which is a blast – literally – and a stunt show starring Indiana Jones (not, obviously, the REAL Indiana Jones).

There is also the Great Movie Ride!

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This ride is so fun as it is set up like Mann’s Chinese Theatre, and while waiting for it to start a number of classic movie clips and interviews are shown. It’s very fun, and again made me wonder about the lives of the cast members involved in this ride. Basically, it’s a large tram that takes you through a number of classic movie scenes, narrated by a tour guide, and co-starring a gangster moll who hijacks the tram. I wondered how many times Aidan said “I’m your tour guide, Aidan, and I just LOVE movies!” in the course of a shift. I guess if you were an actor, maybe this would be a great on-the-side gig for you, but it WOULD get pretty repetitive. Would narrating the same thing every ten minutes with the same amount of enthusiasm lead to madness in the end? Only time will tell, I suppose.

Outside of the Great Movie Ride are the handprints and footprints of certain celebrities, just like in the real Mann’s Chinese Theatre. I tried my footprints against the Star Wars character who – according to my kids – most resembles me.

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It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and I’m wondering if it would be suitable to watch with the kids. I think I was about 13 when I saw it, so maybe? Then again, that was in the 80s, and we all know “anything goes” back then.

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My kids have flipper feet.

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KERMIE! More on him later.

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Hollywood Studios is also home to all things Star Wars, and although we were told that the Storm Troopers do NOT pose for photos, we did manage to get a family photo with Kylo Ren. Meeting Kylo Ren was much more fun than I imagined, although not as much fun (and not as soft and snuggly) as meeting Chewbacca.

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If it wasn’t insanely expensive, I would have made my husband buy this costume for (ahem) personal use.

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He wanted to buy this one though.

I have always been a big fan of the Muppets, and I was sadly disappointed when the new Muppet show was cancelled.

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Oh well, Kermie. We’ll always have Orlando. Here’s looking at you, kid.

Magic Kingdom, or The Land of Many Mouse Ears

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It’s January, so no one should be surprised, but I still shuddered a little when I checked the weather forecast, and the following warning popped up at me:

BITTER COLD AHEAD FOR ALBERTA IN JANUARY

Not just cold, BITTER cold!

sunrise

This was the view from my parents’ place on Boxing Day, when it was minus 32 with wind chill. Pretty! But so cold.

Well. ‘Tis the season, and there’s nothing for it but to bundle up and drink a lot of cinnamon tea, which is precisely what I am doing right now. That and keeping warm by thinking of our Florida holiday – we’ve been home over a month and I still haven’t written about Magic Kingdom! I shall rectify that immediately.

We went to Magic Kingdom on the third day of our holiday. Magic Kingdom is the most popular of all the Disney World parks, as evidenced by the giant double buses that transfer people from the resort. The funniest moment of the day came on the bus, on the way to Magic Kingdom. A group of moms with their kids were standing near us, holding the rails, and one little boy said, in a very loud and clear voice, “ARE YOU GOING TO POLE DANCE, MOMMY?” I am going to assume that she is a practitioner of pole dancing fitness classes, and not a stripper, but still, it was amusing.

At the Disney resorts, there are waiting areas for each of the buses, and it’s kind of alarming to see the huge lineup of people waiting for the Magic Kingdom bus; happily, since the buses are gigantic, they can accommodate a lot of people and all their strollers and paraphernalia. Of course, there are more strollers here than anywhere else, since Magic Kingdom is the park that is most enjoyable for the little ones. It is also the park that has the most toddler meltdowns per square foot, the most little girls dressed up like princesses, and the most mouse ears.

Side note on the princesses: IT IS ADORABLE. At Magic Kingdom, there are so many opportunities for kids to meet the “real” characters, and it seems like the big attractions are meeting Cinderella, Ariel, Belle, and the other big-name princesses whose names I do not know because I haven’t seen a Disney princess movie in some years. Kids can also get all dressed up, and get their hair done as well, for these experiences, so everywhere you look there are tiny princesses in pouffy dresses with updos and tiaras. It is pretty cute. Apparently there is a more masculine option for little boys – I think it’s to get dressed up as a pirate – but to be honest, I didn’t see any.

Interestingly, there is a rule at Disney that dressing up as a princess is only for the under-14 set. So if you have your heart set on wearing your ballgown and tiara to Disney, you had better save the luggage space for regular clothes. There is a very good reason for this, and that is that Disney doesn’t want unauthorized princesses on the premises, because guests might think that they are employees. This is very smart, because at Universal Studios, there are thousands of people walking around in Harry Potter robes, and it is easy to assume that you might be able to ask them questions about the park. It’s actually a bit disorienting, so I applaud Disney on that rule.

Another side note: the mouse ears. Remember back in the day when the only mouse ears were those felty black hats that had names embroidered on the back? Life has changed since then and there are so many mouse ear options. There are women walking around with bridal veil mouse ears, accompanied by girlfriends wearing sparkly bridesmaid-style mouse ears, there are Christmas-themed mouse ears, full-on Minnie Mouse ears with bows – pretty much anything you can imagine, you can buy.

Yet another side note: the fashion. The last time we went to Disney, I wore my support stockings under my capri-length jeans, and my mother was MORTIFIED on my behalf. I answered that if she saw what people wore at Disney, she wouldn’t be so concerned. Now, there are no judgments here. I am not the fashion police. I understand the desire to keep everyone together. And still. And still I was a little bit surprised at the sheer volume of groups of people wearing matching shirts. Smith Family Disney Vacation 2016! the shirts proclaimed, in bright colours. Daddy Mouse, Mommy Mouse, Brother Mouse, Sister Mouse said others. So many custom shirts in matching bright colours – even fluorescent tie-dyed ones. That’s great, but I have a question.

Do people wear the matching shirts every day and if so, how badly do they smell at the end of the vacation? Or do they wash them in the sink on a daily basis? I mean, it’s hot in Orlando. When we were there I was precluded from even being a fashion disaster by wearing my support hose, because it was too hot. The thought of putting on my medical grade stockings made me want to die, so I didn’t. So, you can imagine how hot and sweaty and humid things are – what happens to the matching t-shirts?

Also, occasionally I would see a teenage girl wearing her matching monogrammed shirt, trying desperately to pretend that she didn’t belong to the super-embarrassing group. It reminded me of Rusty in European Vacation, with his monogrammed beret. Won’t someone think of the teenagers? If my parents had, GOD FORBID, made me wear a matching shirt when I was that age, I would have literally died.

Anyway. Back to the park. We split our day up into two parts: we went early in the morning for a few hours, and then went back later for fireworks and extended “Magic Hours,” which meant we were there until 1:00 in the morning. Zzzz. Magic Kingdom is kind of old-school, with rides I absolutely love, like the Jungle Cruise.

junglecruise

Everything was decorated for Christmas, including the fake tarantula:

tarantula

I ended up wondering about the employees, as is my wont, and particularly if the rehearsed speeches by the Jungle Cruise Tour Guides would haunt them in their sleep. How many times would a Jungle Cruise guide – or ANY employee dealing with public speaking – say the same exact thing during a shift? Would you go home and just start cracking bad jokes about watching your step, so you wouldn’t have TWO bad trips instead of one? Would it just become second nature to say “I’m Nicole, I’ll be your skipper today” when meeting someone new? When I worked at Pizza Hut as a teenager, I often answered our home phone with “Hunterhorn Pizza Hut, Nicole speaking.” I can only imagine.

Magic Kingdom is split into Tomorrowland (featuring Space Mountain), Adventureland, Fantasyland, and, my kids’ favourite, Frontierland. Frontierland is home to Big Thunder Mountain and Splash Mountain, both big favourites in the Boyhouse. I lost count of how many times we went on those. We were only able to go on the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train once, but it was very fun. There is also the famous Sleeping Beauty castle, which is kind of dull to walk through, unless you are having breakfast with Cinderella or something. It makes a fabulous backdrop for a photo though.

castle

The most special experience of the trip was the fireworks. After our morning at Magic Kingdom and an afternoon relaxing by the resort pool, we went back for fireworks. The best place to view them, after some discussion with employees, is on the green space between Casey’s Corner and the ice cream parlor on Main Street. The fireworks start at ten, but we were pretty exhausted, so settled on a patch of grass shortly before nine. It was well worth the wait. The experience was truly incredible. No one does fireworks like Disney.

After the fireworks we slowly edged our way through the massive crowds – be prepared for MASSIVE CROWDS – and enjoyed the shorter lineups for Magic Hours. We then dragged our exhausted selves to the bus stop and waited for what seemed like an interminable time for our bus. It was probably only 15 or 20 minutes but at that point we had walked for 19.1 kilometers, we had been up and at it since 6:30 in the morning, and we were pretty tired of people, in general. Still, a great day and a wonderful experience. I didn’t meet any Disney characters but I did get to eat a delicious frozen strawberry bar, so I call it a draw.