Category — About the Blog

I don’t have a quality post for you tonight. Instead, I was doing some housekeeping. The cute little icons for Facebook and other social media had inexplicably vanished from my blog, so I put in a new plug-in. It was very, very easy to do, but I’m concerned that its floating-ness might be too annoying. Cute W says it’s fine.  At least it doesn’t flash. If nothing else, Capital District Fun will always be a safe haven from those irritating animated shrinking women: “From Size 14. . . to Size 8!” Ugh, I hate those.

I also moved my links over from the left-hand column over to the right instead. I wanted to make sure that everyone could find the playground list, but then I got a little link-happy and added KidsOutAndAbout.com links galore, too.  Although I’m wondering, now, if I should move the Search box to the top? Does anyone ever search? The searching is unwieldy at best, and that’s coming from the gal who can remember direct quotations often.

Oh, and speaking of the KOAA links, KidsOutAndAbout.com‘s own Debra Ross will be on WNYT NewsChannel 13 Live at Noon tomorrow (Tuesday). She was also just on PBS, and that’s at the top of the Youtube channel at the little link if you hit the brand new floaty Youtube icon over to the right. Because sorry, people: I don’t have a Youtube channel. I know that this is heartbreaking for you all, but you’ll just have to get over it.

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Remember the Hunger Games issue? After blowing through two books that were clearly too easy for her and ignoring several other books that are both age- and reading level-appropriate, M picked up The Hunger Games. In fact, she started reading it the night before I’d planned to just go by myself while the girls were in school. . . and so then I had to put it off again. She finished it on Saturday, but we’re waiting to go see it with Kelly (commenter #1 on that previous post) and her daughter when she finishes it. Incidentally,  M powered through all of those Harry Potters and never cried once, not for ______, or _________, or even for __________, for crying out loud. But the night I tucked her in after ___ died–you know, the scene with the singing?–she was full-on sobbing. Which was lovely, I thought. I like a little sobbing over a book sometimes.

She’s partway through the second one now.

Cute W arrived home from work and asked, “What time are you going to your Snobby Book Group?” Uhhh. . . I’d forgotten about it entirely. Nevertheless, I’d read the book (Let the Great World Spin), and there’s always good food (tonight, homemade baklava by a mother of 4 boys under 6, not like you should feel inadequate, but holy crap, how can one not feel inadequate?) and plenty of wine. So of course I had to go.

In any case, I got behind schedule. So, I’m shifting gears for today’s weekend post. I’ve said for a while now that it’s a goal  for me to stop doing the weekly listings as I’ve been doing them. With KidsOutAndAbout.com, I can rely on listings that the different libraries and museums and other organizations create all by themselves. And it’s getting to the point where it’s just silly for me to replicate the work. In a month or two, we’ll have a special report that will allow me to do listings very similar to what I’ve always done, except that 1) I won’t have to work so hard to find the information and 2)  listings will be updated and accurate because they’ve been created by the organizations themselves.

For now, we’ve got a bit of a transition: I’ll highlight what I think is especially interesting or fun, and I’ll link to KidsOutAndAbout.com for events each day.  Hopefully, by sometime in March, I’ll have listings that look quite similar to what I’ve usually done, except that I’ll have extra time to write more creative and fun stuff, too.

The main reason that I started Capital District Fun was that I felt like families really needed easier access to information about all that’s fun in the Capital District. The secret, unstated reason was that I was interested in writing, and I didn’t have any confidence that anyone would be willing to read what I wrote unless I provided a huge amount of information as well. When I started the blog, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to keep up with it for a whole week. There was never a long-range plan in which I spent years and years typing events in for another weekend post. KidsOutAndAbout.com offers a splendid opportunity for me to ensure that you all know what’s happening while allowing me to focus on the writing that I enjoy so much. In fact, if anyone has any suggestions or favorite posts or topics, I’d love to hear about it, because I’m excited to use this time and energy to spend on writing new and different stuff, for Capital District Fun and other projects.

Thank you, especially, to all of you who have commented or emailed me with kind words since I started Capital District Fun. Your encouragement has made me two things which I didn’t realize, but it turns out I had always wanted to be: a braver person  and a writer.

Some of you may have noticed that I now have these cute little buttons over to the right.

That’s because I’ve been tinkering. I am not particularly tech-savvy. Pretty much a Bambi in the forest when it comes to the whole, entire internet. But people are always telling me that I’m supposed to be better at this whole social media thing. So, I ignore them for as long as I possibly can, and then I grudgingly comply.

I started tweeting, gosh, almost 3 weeks ago now. It took me a while to get around to figuring out how to put the little buttons on my blog, which is why I didn’t mention it before.  I’d been immune to Twitter’s charms all this time–really, it seemed pretty stupid. But I like it more than I expected. I like how direct it is, and how uninhibited people can be, and how witty and clever. It feels a bit like a cocktail party, if you could enjoy a cocktail party while in your pajamas. And I truly appreciate the 140-character limit. I really like editing, so it’s sort of fun. Although, I have to admit, if we were to take the metaphor further, I’m currently like the quiet girl standing against the wall in a boring dress who, at least, can tell you where to find the yummiest appetizers.

Of course as soon as I started tweeting people told me I had to do Google +, too. Jeez! I finally managed to sign up, but I haven’t figured out how to get a cute little button yet. Maybe next year.

Meanwhile, in case you’re wondering, I’m going through a Stages of Vacation Planning that’s rather similar to the Stages of a Kid’s Birthday Party that I recently described. At noon I was feeling great about getting so much Kids Out and About work done, but by 3 pm I was wishing I’d done more actual packing–so much more tangible! Then around 6 pm I was feeling super-awesome because I’d buzzed through an entire small Frommer’s guide while J was a gymnastics. But on the way home from gymnastics I did my CSA pick up and had a daunting load of vegetables, again. I managed to “process” a bunch of kale, a bunch of dirty, dirty leeks, and some other items, but I still had this many peppers.

In despair I made a decision, which was basically: “Katie, you simply cannot handle anymore work. You need to get these out of the house. Put them on the back porch where they’ll stay cool without taking over your entire fridge and insist that Cute W distribute them at work.”

I agreed with myself: it was the only sensible solution. So, exhausted, I went to the back porch and got the scare of my life:

Hell, NO.

We have NOT just been booed.

If you’re not familiar with “Boo-ing,” it’s basically like a Halloween-Secret Santa-Chain Letter. For a better description, you can check out Albany Kid’s post.

While I like the idea of neighborly giving in theory, I now have to decide if I’m adding this to the pre-vacation to-do list, or if I can wait until after vacation, when, granted, by the time I get to it, it will be so late that it’s practically too rude to even pass along. Oh, jeez. I have to do it, don’t I? I curse suburbia! Or, no, I don’t curse suburbia. This is a pretty good life, isn’t it? I’m going to Disney and random people leave us treats out of the goodness of their hearts.

Well, in any case, if any of you local friends and neighbors would like  some apples, beets, or peppers in the next two days, please comment ASAP. But you’ll have to pick them up from my screened porch. Because I’m too busy packing and, apparently, shopping for Halloween crap.

UPDATE:  I woke up this morning and it occurred to me that whoever “booed” us could very well read the blog, and boy, that was not gracious, was it? The girls were thrilled. And, as an added bonus, we can give some CSA apples as part of our boo gift. So I’ve successfully navigated the panic stage once again. And I thank you.

I’ve mentioned that I’m a bit overwhelmed lately, and I’m going to be out of town 11 of the next 17 days, so I’m just warning you now: I’m going to shamelessly milk J’s party for all it’s worth by breaking up the various tasty Halloween treats and other activities. Here’s a photo of the snack spread:

Details on how to make things, and whether to bother, will follow, along with some party activities, one of which J invented herself.

I’m also putting out a call for Guest Posts. Yippee! If you’re new to Capital District Fun, when I go on vacations, I ask my gentle readers if they’re willing to submit a guest post. It’s a nice way to dip your toe into the blog pool or give some attention to an organization that deserves it. It can be a favorite Capital District destination, something fun to do. . .  whatever. Photos attached with the email are great (I’ll assume that you’re okay with me posting them, too), and links are great, too, but if you don’t know how to embed them, I will. If you have a blog and want to submit one of your old posts or something new, that works for me. I’ll link back, of course.

Oh, and I’ve added a new feature, in case you want to see some examples of guest posts: a new category over there on the right-hand column called Guest Posts from Readers. I did my best to find all of the old guest posts, but if I didn’t catch yours, let me know and I’ll tick the little category box so that it shows up.

Some people have mentioned to me in the comments or in person that you’re willing to do a guest post, and that would be wonderful, but I also won’t hold you to it. I know people get busy, so no guilt! I prefer, anyway, to keep my expectations low, set a deadline, and then work with what I’ve got. After I get submissions, I still need to read them over, ask questions if necessary, figure out how I’ll schedule things, and put items into the blog, so that’s why I’m firm on the deadline.

Email me with your submission by Tuesday, October 11th, at noon. That email is capitaldistrictfun [at] yahoo [dot] com. If you’d like to write me with questions before that, that’s fine. If you’d like to send submissions before then, that’s super-awesome.

Thanks to everyone who’s contributed in the past, via guest post or comments! I truly love hearing from everyone.

I met some friends at the playground the other day. There was a bit of chat about the blog, and a few of them told me that I should explain a little bit better about Capital District Fun and Kids Out and About. So I’ll try.

If you’ve been reading for a while, you might recall that on my one-year Blogiversary last December, I said that I had no plans to make money from Capital District Fun. I’d looked into it, and if I started selling ads I’d have to worry about the statistics of how many people visit the blog, sell myself, and figure out all sorts of things, like setting ad rates and sticking the ads into the coding to make them actually appear.  Now, if I wanted to do these things, I’m sure that I could. But in keeping with my longstanding tradition of choosing the least paying employment possible (hello!  graduate student, museum educator, stay-at-home mom? Nice!), I decided that I’d rather focus on writing. So I’ve been doing other writing projects, including re-writing blog posts into more formal articles that I’ve sold to different regional parenting magazines.

Here’s the thing: there’s a lot about the “Mommy Blog” world that just isn’t my cup of tea. First, I don’t spend a lot of time reading blogs as recreation. Many successful bloggers read tons and post comments here, there, and everywhere to get people to link back to their own blog. I do follow blogs with Google Reader, but I just don’t have much of an emotional investment in most of them. I’m bad enough at keeping up with my real-world friends. Second, there’s a lot about advertising and promotion that seems perfectly natural on other people’s blogs that just feels icky for me personally.

I had decided that I was just going to blow off trying to make Capital District Fun a money-maker, and to value it for what it is for me, which is a gateway to feeling less frightened about writing and a place to vent or rant at the end of the day. The truth is, I don’t love putting together the listings of events. I know that people rely on it, and I sort of consider it a public service, but I’d love to avoid it.

This was my basic mindset when I received an invitation to lunch from Debra Ross in March. A mom of two, she had begun a website in Rochester called Kids Out and About several years ago, and she was launching Kids Out and About in additional locations, including Albany.

I looked at her site, and I decided that I was probably invited to lunch because Kids Out and About would be squashing Capital District Fun like a bug and Deb, who seemed like a lovely person, felt a little bad about it.  At Kids Out and About, different organizations can enter their own events, classes, and camps. The listings are free, although people can also pay for additional advertising or enhancements to get more attention. I love the idea of different organizations putting in their own information, because it means that they can give complete and accurate info. At lunch, we agreed that  once enough organizations participated, I could link to Kids Out and About instead of putting together my own listings and spend the extra time writing, and they linked to my blog in their newsletter. In the meantime, we’d do some friendly linking back and forth. It was just a bit of informal mutual aid.

As we shifted from spring to early summer, things evolved. I was hired as their Editor for the Albany site, which means that I’m being paid for what I do with Kids Out and About. Deb has also helped me with a bit of assertiveness training so that I can score admission to events that I review and things like that. And, since this is my official employment with actual salary, I’m tracking business expenses to claim, which was something that I didn’t feel comfortable doing when things were “just” for Capital District Fun.

If things go according to plan, in the future I’ll be focusing on writing. Tech-y people do the tech stuff and business-y people do the advertising sales, which is much more appealing to me than trying to do it all for myself on Capital District Fun. Right now I’m writing the local-specific portion of the Kids Out and About newsletter each week as well as reviews (like these from Lake Placid and Washington DC) and articles (like this one about area playgrounds). I’m also spending more time than I’d like ensuring that there are events and other information while we try to get more organizations on board, which is making it difficult to keep up with everything.

Ideally, I’d love to get as many organizations as possible listing their classes, events, and camps on Kids Out and About, because then:

• We’d all have a huge resource that would have listings that are more complete, detailed, and accurate than one mama –awesome though she may be–can do by herself
• More organizations involved would probably increase the number of organizations advertising, which would mean more money for me (yes, please!)
• I’d be able to spend more time writing fun stuff, like reviews,  essays, and articles

I’m explaining all of this because some of my friends at the playground were concerned that I was being exploited (don’t think so) or still working for nothing (nope), or they said that they hadn’t signed up for the Kids Out and About newsletter because it seemed disloyal to me (it isn’t). And it’s true that when I first started mentioning Kids Out and About, I was feeling only cautiously optimistic. Now I’m much more gung-ho about the whole venture.

So, if you want to check it out, two good places are pages that Deb put together on Apple Picking and Corn Mazes in the area. When you go to look at them, there will be a little pop-up box that asks if you want to subscribe to the email newsletter, so you can conveniently subscribe to hear from me every Thursday. And if you want to make the pop-up box go away and you don’t see the little x in the upper-right-hand-corner, click there anyway to make it go away. Poor Deb managed to figure out how to make the pop-up box appear, but she has yet to figure out the little X part.

I would truly appreciate it if you’d check out the site, sign up for the newsletter, and list your events if you’re part of an organization that has fun kid stuff. All of that would be helpful to me, but I think it would help you out, too!

I like writing Capital District Fun, although I feel like I’ve been swamped and it’s been a bit dull lately, which will hopefully pass once the kids are back in school. I’ll still post here even if the listings take off on KOA and I can skip them here or just link over.

Feel free to email me if you have questions at either capitaldistrictfun@yahoo.com or my Kids Out and About email, which I just yanked off of here because the spammers have now discovered the address. It’s my first name [at] Kids Out and About [etc.]

I really needed a cool, rainy day. My house is unbelievably disorganized, so it was lovely to spend most of the afternoon at home, picking up clutter and moving it all to slightly more satisfactory locations. The girls even took it upon themselves to tidy up the basement playroom. Although the verb “tidy” is misleading, giving you the impression that the room is now (adjective) “tidy,” when really it’s just possible to move about without stepping on toys and trying not to curse in front of the children. For the record, I frequently say, “Fudge!”, “Oh my stars!”, and “For the love of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.” I was a dork pre-kids, but they’ve helped me to achieve a whole new level of dorkdom.

Anyway, a couple of random pictures:

Every time I drive by one of these big stone signs (they have them for Rte. 87 and Rte. 7, maybe others), I get irritated. Seriously? How much did these stupid signs cost? And usually they’re within about ten feet of the regular old highway signs which, incidentally, all colorful and reflective and easier to read. Now, don’t get me wrong: I love, love, love the good old-fashioned architecture from long ago, when they made schools and post offices and train stations gorgeous. But this is so basic and boring. I mean, it’s okay, I guess, but I have a feeling that if I knew how much these signs cost I’d be appalled. Or am I becoming a curmudgeonette in my old age? Am I the only person who unreasonable considers curmudgeon to be a masculine word?

Another picture:

Hello? How did I miss that duct tape is now available in fabulous colors and patterns like purple, turquoise, and Hello Kitty? Holy cow, I am fantasizing about the possible duct-tape-related crafting opportunities. And if you need help getting started, check out this website. Of course, here’s where I differ from all of these people. I pause in the store (Target), considering fabulous crafts, and then slowly, regretfully, move on. Apparently there’s a small-but-effective population that buys the stuff, creates awesomeness, photographs it, and uploads it. All of which makes me torn between admiration and alarm. Like, couldn’t people use all of this creativity to make the world better somehow? Same with planking. But who am I to cast stones, right? I’m blogging about duct tape.

Okay, I have to kvetch about Facebook. It sort of freaks me out. And not in that scared-for-my-privacy way that freaks everyone out, because I am past the stage when people can really take compromising photographs of me (thank you, FB, for not arriving until after I graduated college). No, what drives me crazy is that when I go on the Capital District Fun page, it tells me over on the side, just like on any page, how many of my friends “like” Capital District Fun. And what’s ridiculous is that it’s always different. I’m a pretty passive FBer, and I don’t push the blog on my personal account. So I have about 60 “friends” who also “like” Capital District Fun. Except some days it’s 59, or 57, or 58. Which, obviously, I don’t really think that I have all of these people who are “liking” and “unliking” me all over the place. I’m sure that most of them joined up once to be supportive and pretty much forgot about it. And yet, seeing that number going up and down unnerves me. Because, you know, when people “like” me, they pop up and I can see who they are (I never actually contact anyone because it would seem alarming and stalker-ish, I think). But when someone decides that they don’t “like” me anymore, they just drift away, sort of like friends. Oh, crap, I’m imagining people reading this and going, “Great! It’s safe to unlike Capital District Fun now!” Agh. I’ll try not to look.

Enjoy the cool evening breezes, everybody.

We are super-excited that we’ll be spending a week at a lake near Lake Placid again this summer. We’re leaving shortly after school ends for the girls, and this time my sister and her family are joining us. Hooray!

View from the dock

We’ll be getting away from it all. And when I say “all,” I mean, in part, the blog. We have no tv or internet on this vacation. Actually, I like it that way. Last year my friend and I were a bit concerned that our children would be difficult to entertain, but they switched right into vacation mode, playing games, mucking about in the shallow water, and reading books on the hammock. It was excellent for everyone.

I’ll try to do some auto-posting, but this is also an opportunity for you, gentle reader, to contribute. If you have a favorite Capital District destination, or just something fun to do, you can email me about submitting a special Guest Post. A couple of readers have been kind enough to do one in the past (thanks Carolyn and Amy), and I’d welcome contributions if you can get them to me by Tuesday, June 21st, at noon. Email me at capitaldistrictfun [at] yahoo [dot] com.

And in case you’re new to the blog and missed them, here, here, and here are some posts from last year’s trip to Lake Placid.

So, I got this email from Megan Edgeller, who works at Build A Sign.com, which makes (wait for it) signs, but also banners and magnets and custom bumper stickers. She offered to make me something, and I said, yes please! I enjoy me some gracious gifts. Plus, a few people had asked for bumper stickers, but since I’m cheap, I hadn’t looked into making one. Instead, I just wished I had a bumper sticker and then, poof! I got a Fairy Bumper Sticker Mother! Yippee!

Okay, so first of all, you should know that I’m a bit of a bumper sticker freak, myself. I have two problems with them:

First, I can’t choose. Yes, I think that we should coexist, and I realize that I wouldn’t have any food if it weren’t for farms and I support breastfeeding and I think that peace starts at home. My various beliefs  are too numerous to narrow down to one or two bumper stickers, but I absolutely believe that too many bumper stickers just looks too much like you’re still in college. Although I love to wait behind these cars at red lights. So I tend to only place a bumper sticker on the car if it has a specific and defined advertising purpose, like my nursery school magnet.

Second, I take it way too seriously. I don’t think that I present my best self as a driver, and I’m concerned that when I drive poorly, I could be scaring people away from “my side.”  During the 2008 presidential election season, I taped a campaign bumper sticker into my car (because I fear commitment and would not actually stick it anywhere). Occasionally I would be, say, trying to merge onto a street, and I would honestly fear that if I quickly cut someone off, or irritated someone by waiting too long, I could have an adverse impact on voting in New York State. I understand that this is freakish. But I feel like I’m suddenly representing someone or something else, and the responsibility is crushing when I’m a nervous driver, anyway.

So, yeah. I’ve got issues. But in this case, Capital District Fun could absolutely use some advertising, and while I am not always an excellent driver, I don’t believe that I’m so poor that someone will actually look up the blog and write a mean comment. But if someone did, I moderate comments, anyway! Phew. Still, because I fear commitment, Megan made me a few magnetic bumper stickers along with a bunch of regular stick-on ones. Actually, I like the way the standard bumper stickers look a little bit better than the magnetic ones, so I’m glad I had a chance to see both.

The fun part was creating my very own Capital District Fun bumper sticker. You may remember that I’d made my own business cards (with Cute W’s help) a while back, using J’s photo in the design.

J Dancing at Schenectady Kids Arts Fest

So I thought that I’d put that in. Of course, poor M’s been feeling a bit neglected since she isn’t on this stuff. Back when I was deciding what to put on the cards, my other finalist was this one of M:

M playing basketball years ago.

Adorable, right? I ended up going with the J picture because the color was a little more vibrant and because J was actually having Capital District Fun (dancing on Jay Street for the annual Arts Fest which is this weekend), while M was just hanging out on our driveway. I showed M the photo recently and of course she thought that it was undignified and humiliating and abolutely not bumper sticker-worthy. She preferred this action shot:

M playing soccer last fall.

I know! Are you shocked? You can see her recent face! We decided together that we were okay with this. After all, she’s been in the Gazette, like, three times with her full name. Doesn’t she look like such a bad-ass? Honestly, she is a bad-ass. There’s no getting around it.

Anyway, I took these photos and followed Megan’s instructions to design my own bumper sticker and came up with this one. Not bad, right? I sent it on, and Megan suggested getting the name itself bigger. She simplified it a bit more and suggested this one. I liked the idea of saying CDF twice, but the family was a little too generic for me, so I settled on this lovely design, which is what the bumper stickers look like. Cute, right? Well, I’m happy with it, and the girls are completely thrilled. Plus, it was so much easier and more fun than trying to do my business cards, which was a huge pain in the neck. This was basic and easy.

Then, because she’d been so nice already, I asked Megan if she could possibly please smooth off dear little J’s head. Because I’m only capable of the most rudimentary Photoshopping, she’s had a bumpy head for at least a year now (you can see it on the picture above). Thanks for being too polite to mention it. Megan fixed it up, so she’s cured!

J dancing with a smooth head.

So now I’ve got fabulous new bumper stickers! Hooray! If you email to ask me, include your mailing address, and solemnly promise that you will actually put it on (or tape it in) your car, I will mail you one of these paper Capital District Fun bumper stickers while supplies (and my postage stamps) last.  And if you happen to be a friend, I am not going to offer you a bumper sticker, because then you’ll feel like you have to take it and put it on your car and perhaps you, too, have peculiar bumper sticker issues. Which I completely understand. But if you ask me for one because you’re actually willing to put it on your car, I will happily give you a bumper sticker.

Someone emailed me today asking about the Capital District Fun Facebook page. Turns out that my link (down on the left column) wasn’t working anymore. Anyway, I thought that I’d take this opportunity to ask all of you to please, please let me know if you click a link and it doesn’t work. It’s like I’ve got spinach in my teeth–you’d tell me, right? You wouldn’t let me walk around looking stupid, would you? I don’t mind so much if the links for time-sensitive stuff on old, old listings of events, but on any of my pages (which is the stuff over there on the right, like the Big Ol’ List of Links), I’d love to know if something’s not working. Email me, please, or comment.

And as long as I’m on the FB topic, I’ll make my semi-annual plug:  if you’re on Facebook, please do consider “liking” Capital District Fun. If you already like Capital District Fun, it would be a lovely and delightful favor if you’d share or like links that you think your FB friends might find useful as those links come along, because then other folks will get a little more fun. Okay–end of FB ad.

Last night we went out on a date for our anniversary. We went to New World Bistro Bar in Albany, and it was tasty. We managed to snag a spot on the patio, which was lucky because they were booked up when we called for reservations (admittedly, like, two hours before we wanted to go). The best surprise was that everyone was right and the “No Crash Brown Rice ‘Risotto’” was actually quite scrumptious. On my first visit to New World (with folks from All Over Albany), I asked someone what I should order, and that was the answer. Inside I was screaming: seriously, people, do you realize that I don’t get out much? Because I deserve something more decadent than anything which is  brown-rice-based could possibly be. So I asked someone else. Same answer. And again, and again. Then I ignored them and went with something else entirely (Thai Italian Love, also tasty). Last night I knew that I had to suck it up and try the brown rice thing. We ended up getting three main dishes, because we couldn’t decide and I was sulking about what I considered to be my moral obligation to try the brown rice. But it was yumalicious, and it turned out to be our favorite main dish.

Did anyone else see the double rainbow tonight? Gorgeous!

Holy cow, people I just spent waaaaay too much time updating the playground list. If I had the technical know-how, I’m sure that I could make it more efficient, but as it is I have a convoluted system that includes steps with Google Documents, then Excel, then a Word mail merge, then uploading into WordPress. Along the way there are numerous false starts (for example, when I didn’t realize that I was working with April 2010 data for. . . a while. I don’t want to talk about it). To complicate matters, when folks were contributing for the circus giveaway, I received a couple of duplicates. I included everyone’s general comments (because that’s the best part) and did my best to create compromise information when it varied slightly (1 sunny all the time + 1 mix of sun and shade=mostly sunny), but occasionally people just gave totally different Information. I’d make my best guess (one person says there’s a stream, another doesn’t, but maybe they just don’t know about it?) or include both votes. So if things seem slightly different from what you put in, that’s why. If anyone thinks something’s totally wrong and off, please email me to let me know.

Anyway. . . . TA DA!  The new and improved Playground List has at least 35 fabulous playgrounds from around the Capital District! That is awesome! Thank you so much to everyone who’s shared information to create this list. I truly appreciate your help. I’m especially excited that we’re getting great geographic diversity these days, since early on it was all playgrounds that were already in my rotation, because it was just my most helpful friends and I participating. Please: if you visit a great playground, you can always share the information with us by filling out this survey.

Now, go have some fun!