House of Estrogen

SoCal Day 8: California Adventure and Mickey's Halloween Party

Our next morning at California Adventure was a bit more relaxed. We were mostly trying to knock out a few rides we had missed the day before. We rode Soarin' which is always a favorite. It was probably our last time to ride it as "Soarin' Over California" too as Soarin' is getting ready to undergo major renovations both at Disneyland and Epcot to become "Soarin' Over the World".

 We got warm hugs from Olaf,

and Nina and I went on Tower of Terror.

We were dying to try out the snacks at the Cozy Cone Motel, so we headed over to Carsland.

The Cozy Cone is just too cute. Each cone sells a different snack... Popcone, Cone Queso, Ice Cream Cones, Cone-Coctions, Cones, cones, cones! We tried just about everything.

Elise and J.C. got bread cones filled with chili or barbeque. Addison and Nina got ice cream cones. I got a cone full of mini churros with Mexican chocolate dipping sauce. Delish!

Carsland is all about the details... love it.

Despite all of J.C.'s protests about not wanting to get wet, we convinced him to go on Grizzly River Run which was a blast. Then we had lunch at Smokejumpers Grill and went back to the condo for our usual afternoon siestas.

(Disney Photopass stock photo)

For the evening, we had purchased tickets to Mickey's Halloween Party at Disneyland. The Halloween Party is a separate ticketed event. The park closes at 6:00 to anyone who doesn't have a Halloween party wristband. I had always wondered how they actually enforce that, but they do it quite well. They are checking for wristbands everywhere you go... before you get on a ride, before you get in a trick-or-treat line, entering or exiting different areas of the park. They definitely manage to lock it down to just party guests and escort anyone out who doesn't leave on their own.

I was pretty sure I couldn't convince the family to go entirely in costume, but they were all completely onboard when I suggested that we wear super hero t-shirts to go along with Addie's Wonder Woman costume. I think we turned out rather festive looking even if a t-shirt is a bit of a costume cheat. We were certainly a lot cooler and more comfortable than some of the people we saw walking around in full-on furry or leather costumes in 90 degree heat.  People watching is half the fun of the Halloween Party. Guests go all out with their costumes.

Our first stop was the Little Red Wagon for their famous corn dogs. Holy awesome hand-dipped corn dog, Batman! Excellent dinner! We enjoyed people watching while waiting for the sun to go down, so it would start cooling off.

There is an overlap from 3:00-6:00 when party goers are allowed in the park and non-party-goers haven't left yet. It is very crowded during that time, but as soon as you start approaching 6:00, ride lines drop dramatically. We rode Star Tours and Astro Orbiter.

The Halloween Party was a bit of a mixed experience for us. The kids loved the trick-or-treating. It was fun seeing both party-goers and characters in costumes. The decorations were great, and the short lines for rides were a real treat. On the downside, the party specific things like trick-or-treating, meeting the villains (who are rarely seen in the parks), and meeting the characters in costume all had very long lines.  It was a strange mix of crowded and not crowded. If you wanted to meet Malicifent or Cruella de Vil, your wait was well over an hour, yet if you wanted to ride Space Mountain Ghost Galaxy, your wait might be just 10 minutes. The Halloween Party is definitely a great way to ride lots of the popular rides that usually have long waits. The main goal for us though was the more Halloween-specific activities, and those were all more crowded than I had anticipated.

The castle looked appropriately creepy and Halloweeny. The lights and sounds on Main Street were fun, and the Halloween fireworks show is neat.

Rivers of America was spooky as well with fog and special lighting.

(Disney Photopass stock photo)

It was all good. Everyone had a good time. Nina and I rode Haunted Mansion Holiday (Haunted Mansion at Disneyland gets redone this time of year with a Holiday overlay.). I think Addie rode the Winnie the Pooh ride 3 times in a row with no wait, and how cute is Pooh in his bee Hallloween costume?

Am I glad we went to the Halloween Party? Definitely.  Would I go again?  Not sure.  I think you have to go with the right expectations. You are not going to meet every villain. You may not meet any villains unless you are willing to spend a lot of your evening in line. You are not going to see every character in costume. You are going to have to battle bigger crowds at times than you feel like you should given the price you paid for the ticket.

We ended the night with this lovely photo of me on Splash Mountain (which was walk-on... no line at all). Nice.  This was another one that Addie had begged to go on but then came off declaring she would never ride it again.

It was a fun night. It definitely didn't quite live up to expectations, but it was fun regardless.

Day 8 Favorites:

Addison: Grizzly River Run and Trick or Treating

Nina: Grizzly River Run and Star Tours

Elise: Star Tours, Trick or Treating, and Splash Mountain

Ann: Grizzly River Run

J.C.: Star Tours

SoCal Day 6: Disneyland

When it comes to Disney vacationing, I'm a planner. I like to plan strategically to maximize fun and minimize waiting in lines. Although we had never been to Disneyland before, I had done my research, created my itinerary on Ridemax, and we had a plan.

 

We arrived at the park prior to rope drop, excited to see all the Halloween decorations.

We rushed straight to Peter Pan's Flight, knowing that our only shot at riding it with a short wait was first thing in the morning. So much for my fastidious planning... we got there to find a 35 minute wait. We weren't hardcore enough Peter Pan fans to waste precious morning low-wait time waiting for that one ride, so we gave up on Peter Pan. We'll have to save that for another trip. Fortunately, every other ride in Fantasyland had no wait at all, so we were able to cram in a bunch in that 35 minutes when we would have just been standing in the queue waiting for Peter Pan.  JC ran off to get fastpasses for Indiana Jones Adventure while the girls went on the Teacups. They practically had the ride to themselves!

Next we went on the Storybook Land Canal Boats which I absolutely loved. It definitely ranks up there as one of my favorite Disney rides of all the Disney parks.

It is so beautiful.

(stock photo from Disney Photopass)

(stock photo from Disney Photopass)

We were trying to focus on rides that are exclusive to Disneyland that we can't ride at Disney World, so next we were off to Alice in Wonderland, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, and Matterhorn.

(Disney Photopass stock photo)

We had just enough time to sneak in a ride on the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage before it would be time to race to our Indiana Jones fastpass return time. I was a little worried I would get claustrophobic in the submarine, but I did just fine. I think it helped that I was one of the last ones in and first ones out.

It is a cute ride. Now that I've done it once though, I don't feel the need to climb down into one of those submarines ever again.

Indiana Jones was next. Most of the family loved it. One didn't. Poor girl... I think we scarred her for life. It wouldn't be the only time on this trip either.

To offset the trauma of the Indiana Jones ride, I took her on the carousel while everyone else went off in search of churros.

We had a mediocre lunch at Village Haus restaurant, took a few more pictures, and then headed back to the condo for naps. It was H.O.T.!

After wonderful naps, we came back refreshed in the early evening as it was finally beginning to cool off.

You may be looking at these pictures wondering if we lost Nina somewhere along the way. Posing with characters is like her own personal version of torture. You won't find her in any character pictures by choice (we did force her to get in a couple photos though later in the trip).

Dinner that night was our best meal of the entire trip. We all still start drooling a little if you mention it. Big Thunder Ranch BBQ. I would recommend it to you, but they are closing it in January to make room for Star Wars Land, so you'd have to plan a trip quick. It would be so worth it though. Seriously. Yum. Heavenly. Mmmmm.

I mean what's not to love about BUCKETS of BBQ?  J.C. thought he had died and gone to BBQ heaven.

Star Wars, Schmar Wars... it is criminal that they are closing this place.

I think we had planned to go on Big Thunder Railroad right after dinner, but that sounded like a big pukefest waiting to happen after our huge meal.

 

We opted for Jungle Cruise instead. Addie was very excited that it was now dark enough to turn on her ears.

(Disney Photopass stock photo)

J.C. and Nina don't have quite the Disney stamina that the rest of us do, so they headed back to the condo. Elise, Addie, and I planned on taking the Disneyland railroad to another part of the park to ride a couple more rides before the parade. The train was out of order though, and our feet were out of order as well. We just plopped down on the curb and hung out resting, waiting for the parade to start.

Addie got to see Goofy again. He signed her autograph book...

and then tucked her pen in her braid.

 

The Paint the Night Parade was fantastic. I'm normally not a big Disney parade fan. We usually skip most of the parades at the Disney World parks. It is Disney blasphemy to even admit that, but I'm just not much of a parade person. Paint the Night is a new parade this year for Disneyland's 60th Anniversary though. I had heard it was spectacular, and I'm so glad we staked out spots to watch it.

 

The fireworks were great too, but my pictures are awful, so I'm not even going to bother sharing them. The parade was really the big highlight for us though. After the fireworks, we headed back to the condo to get some sleep before our big California Adventure day.

SoCal Day6 Disneyland Favorites:

Addison: Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage and Mad Tea Party

Nina: Alice in Wonderland ride

Elise: Paint the Night Parade

Ann: Storybook Land Canal Boats, Big Thunder Ranch BBQ, and Paint the Night Parade

J.C.: Indiana Jones Adventure, and Big Thunder Ranch BBQ

 

SoCal Picture A Day: Day 8

Thanksgiving 2014

Do bloggers have some obligation to wax poetic about all their blessings on Thanksgiving? Just in case, this is my requisite Thanksgiving post.

This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for Tamiflu, Sudafed, Motrin, Nyquil, and streaming Netflix.

Hope your Thanksgiving was healthier than ours.

Back to bed.

Halloween Heartbreak

This Halloween, we had an Elsa, a minion, and a teenager dressed in black jeans and a black shirt who claimed she was a "vampire hunter". Her mother made her put on a cape, so she at least had some semblance of a costume.

The vampire hunter deserted us for a friend's neighborhood. That's the cool middle school thing to do. Elsa had a great time in the gorgeous dress my mom made.

She trick-or-treated with Batman for a while and then hooked up with several other Elsas and assorted princesses. She was even brave enough to to reach over this not so dead corpse to grab candy.

The adult trick-or-treating was pretty stellar this year. I ended up with a glass of wine, a toasted marshmallow shot of Kahlua, and a Frito pie. Plus, I stole all the girls' Kit Kats. Score.

Then we have the minion. Weeks of planning went into putting together the perfect minion costumes with a friend. Minion socks, a minion jack-o-lantern, figuring out who would be the yellow minion and who would be the purple minion and then deciding they should both be yellow minions, making minion goggles... it seemed to be the grand master plan leading up to a perfect night of minion trick or treating.

Until it wasn't. Nina burst into the house sobbing, completely heartbroken. Apparently her minion partner in crime had left to trick-or-treat in another neighborhood with another friend. With tears streaming down her face, she declared, "I don't want to trick or treat at all!"  It ripped my heart out just a bit to see her so upset. She had been looking forward to this night for weeks. I don't know how things fell apart, whether Nina had bigger expectations about being together that night than the friend, or whether the friend got a better offer and ditched her, but at that point, it didn't matter. She was learning that awful lesson that we all learn at some point... friends sometimes let you down, and it hurts. I gave her a hug, wiped the tears off her face, and told her not to let that ruin her night. I convinced her to go find another friend. By the end of the night, she had hooked up with four other girls and had a ball. Thankfully, the night was salvaged.  She came home with a big sack of candy and a smile on her face.  She still can't really talk about the whole minion ordeal though. It was definitely a night of Halloween heartbreak for one yellow minion and her mom.

Snowshoe, Picture A Day, Day 2

Happy 4th of July from Snowshoe Mountain!

They Better Enjoy It!

This past Christmas, Nina asked for a backyard zipline. J.C. and I talked it over, scoped out a location in the backyard and decided it would work. We knew we would need to take down a few small trees in the yard, but that shouldn't have been a problem. About a month before Christmas, a tree man knocked on our door saying that he was in the neighborhood taking down a tree for a neighbor and wondered if we had any trees that needed work. Without thinking much about it, J.C. told him no and sent him on his way. A few minutes later, it dawned on us, "the zipline!"  We brought the tree guy over and asked him to cut down the one tree that J.C. was a little nervous about felling himself. It was leaning toward the house a little, so J.C. thought it was best to have a professional do it. Of course, the tree guy recommended a bit more work when he pointed out some trees that were brushing up against our roof. Five hundred dollars later, we were missing two trees and a bunch of limbs. Talk about an impulse buy. Anyway, Nina wanted the zipline, and we had been convinced the other work was necessary, so good-bye five hundred dollars. She better love that zipline.

Two days later, we received this email from our neighborhood HOA.

Good afternoon!  The Architectural Committee of REDACTED wanted to reach out to you and get a little more information on a tree or trees you recently had removed.

 

Could you please provide more information on the removal, such as how many, why they were removed, do you plan to remove any more, etc., and I will forward to the Committee.

 

I have also attached the architectural guidelines. Tree removal is referenced on page 23.

 

Seriously? It was two trees... out of our backyard of MANY, MANY trees. Nobody could have possibly noticed that the trees were missing, but clearly somebody had noticed we had tree men in the yard. A neighbor had felt the need to report us to the HOA police. This didn't go over well with me, so I might have sent this email in response.

 

While I appreciate that the architectural committee has a job to do to keep our neighborhood looking neat and tidy, I do not appreciate the "Big Brother is watching over you" email two days after we had some work done. 

 

My front yard is landscaped, and we keep the grass trimmed. My garbage cans are adequately hidden from view of the street. When the tree in our side yard was threatening to fall on our neighbor's driveway, we removed it and replaced it with a more suitable tree for that location. My backyard is woodsy and will continue to be so.  I believe that my house and yard fit in with the rest of the homes in the neighborhood. The goal of the architectural committee is to maintain the overall aesthetic appearance of the neighborhood and to protect the value of our homes. The work done Monday did nothing to change that.

 

I should not have to justify the removal of two trees on my own property. Anyone driving past my house would notice nothing different from the way it looked a week ago. If the neighbor who turned us in would like to come talk to us directly, I'm usually home in the evenings to talk with my neighbors and answer any questions they may have.  I've always thought of REDACTED as a friendly neighborhood where neighbors would reach out and talk to each other when they have questions or concerns, but apparently I was wrong.  The architectural committee's response to seeing a tree removal truck in front of my house is overblown and unnecessary.

 After much aggravation and many emails back and forth with the architectural committee, we got approval to remove the last few trees we needed to take out to make safe passage for the zipline. It turns out any tree over 4 feet tall that you want to remove needs approval. Really? Isn't anything under 4 feet tall a shrub?  I understand the HOA's policies of approving paint colors before you paint your house fluorescent pink, and I understand why they have a rule against broken down cars in your front yard. I will never understand the amount of red tape we had to go through to remove a few small trees. We had to get approval from every neighbor whose property touches ours. One poor guy had just moved in that week. "Welcome to the neighborhood! Will you sign this form saying I can cut down a couple small trees in my own backyard?"

Needless to say, had we known ahead of time the expense, aggravation, and time suck that this Christmas gift was going to be, we never would have gone for it. Now that it is here, THE KIDS BETTER ENJOY IT. Daily. With friends. Without friends. During all their free time. For years. When they are home from college over Christmas break.

Fortunately, they are loving it. If it had been one of those gifts that is played with Christmas morning and then tossed aside, we might have tossed Nina out with it. It is now almost April though, and it still sees play time every weekend and during the week too.

 

The entire neighborhood seems to be enjoying it, so I'm expecting to be cited with noise complaints any day now. Surely I am breaking some HOA rule by having this many kids in my backyard without pre-approval.

 

Want to come over and ride the zipline?

HoE Christmas 2013

We have had a lovely Christmas season. Having the kids off of school for the whole month makes holiday fun so much more relaxing. Of course, we have had our fair share of "I'm bored", "You're the meanest sister EVER!" and "Mommmmm, she hit me!", but overall, it has been good. We have baked cookies, decorated gingerbread men, attended holiday parties, and pigged out on holiday donuts at Krispy Kreme. (The BEST donuts ever. All you Dunkin Donuts fans (RB... talking to you!) need to get your taste buds tested. There is no comparison. I know this as fact because I went to school in Winston-Salem, NC, where Krispy Kreme started. Beat that.)

We went to see the Nutcracker Ballet. Note that my mom dressed for "the season" while the rest of us dressed appropriately for the weather!

Disney on Ice was the other holiday show we attended. Now, someone answer this question for me. See the ridiculously overpriced snowcone Nina is holding in this photo? They had that identical cup in four characters - Cinderella, Tinkerbelle, Mickey and Minnie. The Cinderella and Minnie snowcones were $10. The Tinkerbelle and Mickey snowcones were $12. What gives? Doesn't that seem unfair to moms of boys? They were all the same size, yet if you had a boy who insisted on a Mickey snowcone, you had to cough up the extra $2. Needless to say, Nina's choices were limited to Cinderella or Minnie.

As Christmas Eve rolled around, I decided my old lady hip was not up to cooking a big dinner like we usually do. Instead, we declared it finger food night, and everyone chipped in. J.C. made sausage balls. Elise made pigs in blankets. Addie put together a crackers and cheese plate. Nina cut veggies for veggies and dip. I made Grinch kabobs. Cute, eh? Credit goes to some creative person on Pinterest. I just copy.

I can remember Christmas dinners growing up when we each made a dish. My dad always made an appetizer - usually involving smoked salmon and hearts of palm. I would usually make a veggie or dessert. My mom would make the rest. It seemed all family-family-joy-joy and Christmasy at the time, but now I get it. It is really nice to have help in the kitchen! I'm thinking finger food Christmas Eve where everyone pitches in may become our new tradition.

Christmas Eve night, I had my heart set on watching either Arthur Christmas or Elf. I figured between Netflix streaming, Amazon Prime streaming, Uverse on-demand, and HBO on-demand this would be as easy as turning on the TV and hitting play. WRONG. We couldn't get either of those movies through any of those methods without paying about $10. What? Huh? It used to be you could find Elf on TV on just about any station any time of day for the whole month of December. Now I have to pay $10 for it? Bah Humbug. We watched some forgettable princess movie instead. Between now and next Christmas, I will be purchasing DVDs of Elf and Arthur Christmas, so we will have them for next Christmas Eve.

Before heading to bed to wait up for Santa, the girls opened their Christmas Eve PJ's and we lit the luminarias on the driveway.

Christmas morning featured Christmas morning video failure for the second year in a row. Why am I so incompetent when taking videos on Christmas morning? I don't have this problem any other time I want to take videos. Frustrating as it may be, if you could see the video, it went something like this: Kids running down the stairs. Nina and Addie run to their Santa gifts saying, "Yea", "Cool", or "Awesome". Elise runs to her Santa gift and yells, "A phone! OMG! Santa got me a phone! I can't believe I have a phone! Squeee!!! No way!! No way!  I have a phone! OMG! I have a phone! What's my phone number? Squeee!!! I can't believe it!!"  The other kids can barely be seen or heard in the background. Anyway, it would have been a great video, but you'll just have to use your imagination. I don't even have photos showing her excitement because I was so busy "videotaping". Sigh.

The rest of the morning was spent opening gifts,

cheering about good ones,

and putting new ornaments on the tree.

My parents came over for brunch which was very low-key. I was all about simplicity this year. I know you can hardly see these in the photo, but my mom made the Christmas cowboy boot napkins and table runner for me. I love them!

After opening gifts with my parents,

we played some games,

read some new books,

played with the new Guitar Hero set,

and Nina did some sketching with her new pens and sketch book.

In the afternoon, Nina put on her new favorite shirt (for fun... ask Siri "What does the fox say?"), and ...

we went over to J.C.'s parents' house for more gifts, more food, and fun with cousins.

While 2013 was my year for scaling back Christmas and cooking as little as humanly possible, my mother-in-law went in the opposite direction. She decided to turn Christmas dinner preparation into an Olympic sport. I don't think I've ever seen that much food in my life. It covered every square inch of the kitchen counters and kitchen table, and then overflowed to the top of the washer and dryer and into the garage. I think she deserves a medal, or at the very least a weeklong nap.

The big feast was enjoyed by all though.

 

After dinner, we decided to attempt mission impossible - a photograph of all 27 family members in attendance without an SLR camera, a wide angle lens, or a tripod. J.C. came up with this brilliant idea for a tripod though. Nice, eh?

Given the circumstances, I think the picture turned out remarkably well!

I apologize for the length of this post. I certainly had no intentions of it growing this long when I first started writing it. 2013 really was a nice Christmas though - full of fun, smiles, family, and food... just as it should be. I hope yours was too.

 

 

Merry Christmas, Y'all!

Holidays are in da House!

We are in full-on holiday mode here. The kids are out of school for the month, report cards have come home, and we are DONE.WITH.HOMEWORK for the year. Done. Having the month of December off of school has to be one of the greatest perks of year-round school. We can enjoy holiday parties, weeknight shopping, and Christmas TV specials without homework and school bedtimes interfering. Being done with school also means that we have a month of not having to face the school bus driver at the end of the day to hear her report about our little kindergarten school bus bully. <Sigh> Apparently one of Addison's quotes on the last day of school was, "I'm going to kick the poo out of your vagina." Nice. If she doesn't get kicked off the bus before the end of the school year, it is going to be a miracle. Yes, a month off of school is something we all desperately needed.

Back to holiday mode... our trees are up.

The stockings are hung, and the folk art Santas are chilling on the mantle.

We have finished up the school holiday parties,

made Christmas trees at holiday camp,

and attended the holiday mini-build at the LEGO store.

Elise has performed in her holiday band concert. (As a side note, you can see her braces are in the holiday spirit as well with red and green rubber bands.)

Addison has done rounds at a rehab center with her Daisy troop, singing songs, and doling out homemade ornaments. When I asked her how it went, she said, "Two people didn't have any legs, and one person was missing all their fingers."  I'm just picturing this entire troop of girls staring at injuries, completely forgetting to sing. I hope they didn't traumatize any of the patients too much. (For any of you fashionistas taking note... yes, she is wearing Oilily with cowboy boots. That's how she rolls.)

I have purchased mint chips and red and green m&m's under the guise of baking. We'll see if any baking actually occurs. Buying supplies is the first step though, right?

I haven't put up any outdoor lights yet, but I'm contemplating skipping them this year. If I consciously make the decision to forgo outdoor lighting, then I can say that job is done. I'm kind of liking that plan.

All in all, the holiday spirit has definitely taken over here at the House of Estrogen. Holidays are IN DA HOUSE!