Category — Outside the Capital District

Hello! Well, first, this is super-long. Sorry. But I was looking around for information on this myself, and it was limited. So I threw in the details. Second, you might notice that I’m showing J’s current face, which is unusual for me. Well, it’s because 1) with her hair pulled back so severely she looks different from “real life” and 2) she’s just so cute that I couldn’t restrain myself. J approved, but M opted out of facial frontal.

Both Cute W and my sister-in-law had heard from coworkers that the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique was a must-do. Our niece is a devoted princess fan, so she was in for sure. At 9 and 7, my daughters have passed through their own princess stages;  M actively scorns princesses, and J is torn between liking them and thinking that they’re too prissy and babyish. As feminist parents, we had gritted our teeth through the earlier princess infatuations, and we weren’t too enthusiastic at the prospect of the boutique. But we liked the idea of embracing the Disney experience for what it is. Our girls had weathered the princess storm and sailed on to become confident, consumer-wary, girl-power advocates, and we knew that even with our vastly inferior budget, our parenting had already prevailed over Disney. We left the decision up to the girls, and in the grand tradition of children who are ever offered something expensive by their parents, they went with “Yes, please.”

We (and by we, I mean Grandma and Grandpa!) purchased the deluxe or Castle Package for all three girls (our daughters and niece), along with a Knight Package for our young nephew. The Castle Package includes a princess dress with matching shoes, tiara, and wand, and a princess sash; spa services including a hairstyle, quick coat of nail polish, light make-up job, and general fawning; and a photo shoot of your little princess at the nearby Castle Couture (one 6” x 8” and four 4” x 6” photos). Details on the various Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique packages and prices are available here.

The Magic Kingdom (there’s also one at Downtown Disney) Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique is in the rear of Cinderella’s castle, just off a lovely little hallway with gothic-looking arches that burst from small sculptural vignettes of the helpful mice and other Cinderella characters. Mosaic scenes are lovely and worth a closer look, which of course every single child is simply too wound up to do. Waiting parents, however, might kill a few minutes that way.

We went, with appointments, on a Sunday afternoon. At that time, guests without a reservation weren’t even permitted into the waiting room. A friendly young godmother-cum-bouncer stood at the door handing out informational brochures to visitors attracted by the crowds coming in and the sparkling little princesses fluttering out. At one point I saw a little girl staring sorrowfully through the doorway from her stroller. She was all decked out in her Belle outfit and tears coursed down her cheeks while her parents conferred with a godmother, who’d been pulled from the fray to speak their native language. After they were gently but firmly dismissed, the couple turned on each other and launched into a passionate argument, I assume over exactly who was responsible for breaking their daughter’s heart by not knowing about this (now missed) opportunity.

Those of us fortunate enough to be admitted within the waiting area turned our attention to the racks of princess dresses and other princess paraphernalia. Girls make two big choices: first, they pick a princess ensemble and second, they choose from three possible hairstyles. This was a point that had confused me prior to the trip, because I saw the choices of “Fairytale Princess,” “Disney Diva,” and “Pop Princess,” and I thought that these choices extended to wardrobe. After all, Disney is also well-known for stars like Vanessa Hudgens and Demi Lovato. My slightly-too-sophisticated-for-princesses daughters would have loved a hip little outfit like those worn on Wizards of Waverly Place. Nope. These are fairy godmothers, and fairy godmothers make princesses.

The princess costumes are all lovely, and one is available for each princess, although a princess fanatic might not see exactly what she wants. When my niece asked about Cinderella’s wedding dress, the assisting fairy godmother broke character to explain that that one is “a Disney store exclusive.” Whatever. My niece moved on and chose, like her young cousin, Tiana’s dress. It is beautiful, with a sweet flower on the skirt and, of course, the princess brooch on the bodice, which my daughter wanted to remove immediately. She loved the dress, but she didn’t want to be Tiana, she just wanted to be herself, extra pretty. M, meanwhile, chose Jasmine, which seems to be the choice of all the girls who might actually be too old to participate. With a separate top and pants, it had wonderful jangling coins but left more bare midriff than I would normally allow.

Once each girl chose her princess, she was presented with an outfit and the matching shoes, tiara, and wand that come with the outfit (there’s no mixing-and-matching at the boutique). They’re brought through the salon to a dressing room in the back, where usually mom and daughter will get the girl changed. In our case, we had three girls, two moms, and a grandma all ushered into the same dressing room. The room was generous for two, crowded and claustrophobic for six. But if you’re sensitive to crowded, claustrophobic settings, I’d probably avoid Disney World altogether!

In the dressing room

Dressed now, the girls again waited to be placed into a chair by their assigned fairy godmother. After carefully covering the new princess clothes, the fairy godmother asked for each girl’s hairstyle choice. The options are:

• Fairytale Princess: a sleek-looking classic bun with a small tiara & sparkly barrette.
• Disney Diva: hair is placed in a bun, then a hairpiece is attached and teased mercilessly to make the hair look voluminous, then decorated with sparkly hair clips.
• Pop Princess: hair is placed in a bun, then colorful branded hair extensions are added and decorated with sparkly hair clips.

Each hairstyle shares some basics, with hair all pulled up and away from the face tightly and sleeked into some variation of a bun with copious hair product and a generous sprinkling of glitter. On the other hand, the fairy godmothers are truly ingenious in their ability to take all varieties of hair and gel them into princess-worthy submission. The three girls in our party, for example, looked similar on first inspection, but each of their hair had been treated differently in order to achieve The Look. Both of my daughters chose the Fairytale Princess style, while our niece went with Disney Diva. My younger daughter J, with short, fine hair, had a lovely little basic bun, and the fairy godmother managed to shellac away the half-fringe of bangs that the 9-year-old cut a few months ago (I’m not even going into it; I’m still angry), while my older daughter’s longer hair was ratted at some point (I missed that) to achieve a smooth fan-shaped bun, and our nieces thick hair was put into two kicky little braids that were coiled and hidden under the faux hair. While we were in the salon, I saw one girl with an enormous amount of humidity-frizzed hair that seemed challenging to any stylist, but when I saw her later, she was almost unrecognizably sleek.

Our niece’s Disney Diva, J’s Fairytale Princess from the rear to show off the Mickey barrette, M’s fan-shaped Fairytale Princess with tiara:

 I’m torn, here, between appreciating the fairy godmother-stylists’ skills and wishing that becoming a princess didn’t mean taking what is unique about each child and reshaping it into an identical model. The fairy godmothers are friendly and sweet, but they’re not flexible. J preferred a cross between Fairytale Princess and Disney Diva (really, she wanted Disney Diva without the fake hair), but that was not an option. M said “No thank you” to the sparkly gem stickers for her cheek a few times before sighing and permitting the persistent godmother to stick them on. Our nephew was insistent: “NO MICKEYS!!” when a fairy godmother offered up some Mickey hair confetti (who knew that such an item existed?), but before his parents noticed and could stop her, she painted a red Mickey on the back of his hair. When he saw he protested. Meanwhile the fairy godmother explained that the red Mickey would be wet and smeary for an hour until it dried. We were baffled that someone would put wet paint on a young boy’s head when he was clearly going to be posing for pictures with beautiful princesses in expensive dresses. A lethal combination.

Our niece gets her hair done while J & M fuss nearby

In spite of these minor issues, all three girls enjoyed themselves and would recommend the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique to friends. During the hair styling process, each fairy godmother engages her protégé in princess patter, chatting about the other princesses who come there and quizzing the girls on their princess knowledge. For a girl deep in the throes of princess love, this would be thrilling, but M looked blank when she was asked about her monkey friend, and when J was asked if she could guess each princess’s tiara, she was stumped until the godmother dropped hints. While hair is being done, roaming fairy godmothers come to apply make-up (light and not bad at all) and a coat of sparkly nail polish. The method is brilliant, because it allows the Disney folks to multi-task while the effect for each girl is that she is fawned over as if she were the center of attention even when it’s happening simultaneously to several other girls. Our girls were thrilled with the process. They were pampered and coddled, and they loved every minute of it. The styling occurs with the girls facing away from the mirrors and out toward their waiting families, leading to the stunning “reveal” moment when the girls are turned to see how they look. Even our sophisticated 9-year-old beamed pure joy as her fairy godmother said a little spell over her head before turning her to the mirror. They were all delighted with their princess-y reflections.

M enjoying the attention

Our preschooler knight received a quick styling that gave him a bit of attention along with a nice quality foam sword and shield.

Fierce princess J uses her wand against her cousin's sword

Then it was a short walk over to Castle Couture for a photo shoot. Here the 9-year-old balked. M said that her hair was “too tight,” but the real problem was walking out into the park—necessary to get to Castle Couture—in costume. Immediately after posing for pictures she and I hightailed it to the restrooms for a costume change. M wanted to ditch the tiara, too, but when I told her that I had no idea how to pull it out without mussing the all of her hair, she reconsidered and retained the Fairytale Princess bun. The younger girls, meanwhile, pranced all the way to Akershus Royal Banquet Hall in Epcot’s Norway to dine with other princesses. Many girls keep their hair—and even their outfits—intact for the remainder of vacation. Our daughters woke the next morning in despair over the stickiness and tightness of their hair, and I was relieved when it washed out so quickly and easily.

So, is Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique “worth it”?

The Coach Package costs about $50 hairstyling and make-up, while the Crown Package costs about $55 for hairstyling, make-up, and nails. Under normal circumstances, I’d never agree to spend $50 per daughter in a salon. And if I did, I’d expect individualized service that took my girls’ preferences and hair types into account to make them look their personal best. On the other hand, anywhere else would not include a castle setting and genuine fairy godmothers. So it’s your own judgment call. As for upgrading to Crown, you’ll be paying $5 for a coat of nail polish and the remainder of that bottle of polish, which your princess will take home with her.

How about the $190 Castle Package? Are the extras that you get—a complete costume and a photo package—worth the extra $135? After we visited the boutique, I found the same costumes and accessories at a gift shop at Epcot, and individual retail prices for the items were: $65 for the dress/outfit, $18 for a crown, $20 for a scepter, and $25-30 for a pair of shoes, or about $128 to $133 for the complete outfit. On top of the outfit, there’s the photo shoot and five printed photos. In other words, if you’re willing to drop $65 for a beautiful princess dress, then it’s worth your money to do it all. On the other hand, will your daughter actually recognize the difference in quality between a $20 dress and a $65 dress? Nope, and you could easily bring your own outfit and surprise her, and she’d still feel like a fabulous princess. For us, part of the joy was sharing it with our cousins and Grandma, so of course that’s priceless. Or, as long as Grandma thinks it’s priceless, in the grand tradition from the first paragraph, I’ll say yes please.

Interestingly, I wasn’t able to locate most of these outfits on the internet for comparison shopping. I did, however find a few of the accessories that the girls received, including the Tiana light-up wand, the Tiana crown, and the Jasmine light-up wand at Your WDW Store and the Jasmine slippers elsewhere. In all cases the prices were equal or slightly greater than those I found in-store. Along with these “official” activities, the girls go home with hair accessories and their leftover make-up and nail polish. I set out some of the girls’ take-home items so that you could get a look. The first picture is the portraits and goody bag contents, then the nail polish and make-up for each girl, then a collection of hair accessories and sparkly stickers:

Another point to consider is that, while you can avoid  Disney Quest or the water parks if you don’t plan to pay for them, it’s tough to avoid all those fancy-dressed, slick-haired princesses walking all over Disney World. So if you’re not going to do Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, it’s worth pondering your response to kids’ inquiries ahead of time so that you can deflect the kids with minimal drama.

Bottom line?  If you have a daughter who’s 3 to 6 years old and a princess fanatic, I’d do it. She’ll love it. Older girls should consider whether they’d be comfortable walking around as a Disney princess.

Suggestions if you plan to visit the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique:

• Book an appointment as soon as you can, and remember that it’s Disney World, so even with reservations you might end up waiting. I’d shoot for late morning on a day when you’ll be dining with princesses as ideal timing. Many girls will keep their princess hair for days if allowed, so ponder if you’d like her to enjoy it all week, or save it for the end so that earlier than that she can literally and figuratively let her hair down.
• Bring along comfortable-but-pretty shoes or dressy socks, because most of the shoes are not comfortable (Jasmine’s were the best, comfort-wise, that we saw). We met one family who’d purchased gorgeous, glittery sneakers to go along with the princess outfits, a great compromise.
• Some have heard that you need to bring your own brush, but that’s not true. In fact, the comb, make up, and nail polish are tucked into a little goody bag that the girls will take with them when they leave.
• Bring your own dress if you’d like to save money or if your child has an absolute favorite that she’s had her eye on. Choices at the boutique are lovely but limited.
• Disney photographers are on hand to capture every important moment, so if you’re planning to purchase photos later, relax and skip taking pictures yourself.
• Waiting is crowded and boring, so it’s a good idea to split up. Suggest to the princess-to-be that it would be fun to surprise Daddy/Big Sister/Little Brother and shoo them away immediately. Ask the fairy godmother to alert you when the “big reveal” moment is coming so that you can call them and summon them back to the salon in time.

Okay, I feel better today than yesterday. So thank you. Anyway. . .

I’m finally getting around to telling you about our visit to the New York Public Library. Way back before Disney, we went down to New York City from a family wedding. When we arrived, we had an hour or two to kill before we met up with everyone, and I practically begged my family to let us please-please-please go to the downtown public library for a quick visit.

Mostly, it was nostalgia. Yes, I’m a total geek, and the library was a home away from home back when I was in grad school. But it’s also a beautiful building. If you’re walking along Fifth Avenue and you see the big ol’ lions and you point them out and keep walking. . . DON’T DO THAT!  Because, really, it’s gorgeous inside. Go take a look.

We went in and I showed the girls how you ask for books, and then we spent quite a bit of time in the super-cool gift shop. J was quite camped out there:

Then we headed downstairs and out toward Bryant Park, and we stumbled onto a room that wasn’t there back when I was in grad school: a Kids’ Room! Yay!

With kid-sized furniture and some lovely artwork, and Something. Even. Better.

Okay, if you look in that picture above, over to the left, there’s like this weird little room-within-the-room? Here’s what’s inside!

The original stuffed animals that inspired A. A. Milne’s stories for Christopher Robin! I know, right? So we had a new bonus feature I hadn’t even anticipated, all conveniently located next to a bathroom! Woo, hoo!

After that, we headed out to Bryant Park, where I was delighted yet again with a small al fresco outpost of the kids’ library, with plenty of books (ignored) and piles and piles of dusty pebbles (quite popular with kids, but I didn’t want to focus photos with random children–that would be creepy).

I’d always liked Bryant Park, but this is so awesome and cute. Of course, my girls are suckers for a fountain: mysterious but true.

It was a lovely little visit. Sigh: I love that library.

Okay, this whole Disney trip is quite a bit to process, really. We were there a full week and we did a good two-thirds, at least, of each of the four major parks. One thing that most of us didn’t do was go to Downtown Disney. You know I’m not a shopper, and any pre-departure urges for a date were vanquished by sheer exhaustion, so the oh-so-appealing sounding clubs were more than I could handle. Ssshhhh. Don’t tell me that I should have gone. It’s too late. I’m back to our snow-forecasted reality.

M pushes a cousin at the Magic Kingdom

So, the basics?

We stayed at the Caribbean Beach Resort, which worked out well for us. This is a big, spread-out resort, and I think, depending on exactly where you’re placed and when you’re there, it could be a bad place to stay. We were fortunately quite close to Old Port Royale, where the restaurants, fancier pool, and concierge are located. I can imagine that the shuttle buses here would be quite time-consuming in the busy season, but in mid-October that wasn’t a problem. The room was absolutely fine, although they had no Wifi and you had to pay $10 to plug yourself in for 24 hours, which is why I neglected the blog.  It’s really a beach-like setting, with sandy spots with hammocks where you’re not supposed to swim. But honestly? The kids loved the little beach. The pool was super-fun, with two water slides, a zero-entry area, and a water park-ish pirate ship for the toddler-preschool set. We allowed the girls to walk around the resort, and they appreciated that freedom, so that was also a perk.

M & J enjoy some down time at the resort

We did the Disney Dining Plan. Many of our “Table Service” meals were very yummy, and the “Quick Service” meals were fast food. If you eat fast food regularly, you’d be quite happy. We don’t eat fast food much at all, so that was difficult, and the dining plan was smart budgeting, but it sometimes made for challenging choices. All the various meals deserve their own post, really, so we’ll come back to that.

Anyway, I spent much of my writing time today working on a review of the  Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, but that’s not at all presentable for you at this time. Instead, I thought that I’d give you a list about our favorite and least favorite rides.

My princessed-up daughters wait while their cousin gets her hair done at Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique

Individual Winners:

• Katie’s favorite rides: Expedition Everest at Animal Kingdom & Twilight Zone Tower of Terror at Hollywood Studios
• Cute W’s favorite rides: Toy Story Midway Mania! and Star Tours at Hollywood Studios (Prior to leaving for our trip, Cute W thought that we might not want to bother going to Hollywood Studios. Thank goodness I went into my guidebook frenzy and prevailed upon him to reconsider).
• M’s favorite rides: Splash Mountain at Magic Kingdom and Toy Story Midway Mania! (actually, these are my best guesses–M’s sleeping over at her friend’s house tonight)
• J’s favorite rides: Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and Haunted Mansion, both at Magic Kingdom

Individual Losers:

• Katie’s least favorite ride that others loved: Star Tours (ugh! the motion sickness!) and Toy Story (3D glasses + spinning + shooting at video screens=bored, queasy Katie)
• Cute W’s least favorite ride that others loved: Spaceship Earth at Epcot (the girls wanted a repeat, Cute W found it nap-inducing)
• J’s least favorite ride that others loved: Twilight Zone Tower of Terror (she loves the rollercoasters, but up & down was too scary)
• M’s least favorite ride that others loved: pretty much every rollercoaster that didn’t involve water

Group Winners & Losers:

• Single Lamest ride overall: Tomorrowland Speedway at Magic Kingdom (like a local carnival, except that the line was much longer, and the car in front of ours kept stopping from, it seemed, sheer exhaustion)
• Whole-Family Favorite at Animal Kingdom: Kilimanjaro Safari (morning=excellent views of all kinds of animals)
• Whole-Family Favorites at Magic Kingdom: Splash Mountain & Haunted Mansion (both a teensy bit scary without being actually, you know scary)
• Whole-Family Favorites at Epcot: Soarin’ (fun & lovely without inspiring nausea) & The Seas with Nemo & Friends (cute & fun with some learning snuck in)
• Whole-Family Favorite at Hollywood Studios: Toy Story Midway Mania! (part ride, part video game, so people want to do it repeatedly. And by people I mean everyone except me.)

J and I prepare for the Toy Story ride

Here’s a guest post from Sandra from Albany Kid. Thanks, Sandra!

Here’s a tip for Disney World that most tour guides won’t tell you.

It was something I learned the hard way on our first family vacation at the Happiest Place on Earth. My family had gathered in Orlando, Florida to celebrate my oldest baby sister’s wedding, which wasn’t at Disney, but near enough that a day or more in the park was a given. It also meant that we would be traipsing through the crowded amusement park with our own flotilla.

Naively, I thought that traveling with a large group ensured more adults to help with keeping watch of the kids. It never occurred to me that it was the adults who needed to be watched.

Keep in mind that this was March of 2000, long before ubiquitous smartphones. I can’t recall if we even had cellphones in those days; I suspect that we were still using those walkie talkies with a ½ mile range (which tended to fail in areas with high interference – like an amusement park.)

We were on our way to redeem our FASTPASS tickets at the 3D show, It’s Tough To Be a Bug!, a show that was guaranteed to give little kids (and their moms) the willies, when we realized that one of our party was missing.

I was wearing Baby Alex on a Bjorn carrier, my girlfriend had a good grip on the 4-year-old, and even the elder folks were doing a great job of keeping up in what was, for them, steam-room conditions.

And yet, somewhere between the group shot in front of the Tree of Life in the Animal Kingdom and Bug’s Life, the father of my children disappeared.

We were worried, and for a brief moment, panic set in. Some of us were tempted to contact park officials, but this wasn’t a completely unprecedented occurrence. My husband had already failed in his brief tenure as my dive buddy, on a never-to-be-forgotten scuba diving trip, when he was distracted by fish long enough to completely lose me.

Given that history, there was no way that we were going to give up our FASTPASS tickets to It’s Tough To Be a Bug! – who knew when we would be able to see that again? (Note – Yes, the 3D show is still going strong.)

So, we watched the show, and lo-and-behold, when we walked out of the theater, we found my husband waiting at the theater exit.

Did he purposely skip the show? We’ll never know for sure, but I can tell you that he is not fond of bugs, and spiders scare the bejeebies out of him.

More importantly, we all learned an important lesson that day. Keep an eye on the adults at amusement parks, the kids will be alright.

Sandra Foyt writes about fun and education family travel on www.AlbanyKid.com.  After living in some of the most popular destinations: Buenos Aires, the Virgin Islands, Washington, D.C., New York City, and Southern California; she now makes her home in upstate NY with a teen and tween, an outdoorsy husband, and an over-indulged Chocolate Lab.

We spent Saturday night camping at Glimmerglass State Park with folks from our church. I had never been to Glimmerglass–or Cooperstown at all, for that matter–so it was a new adventure.

I wasn’t actually psyched about it. I’m getting lazier as the summer wears on, and the prospect of packing up the car for a long ride was daunting. But we’d wimped out and skipped it last year, and I thought to myself–repeatedly–that we’d been sort of lame-o for not going. Plus the girls love to camp. So I sucked it up, bargaining that it would be fun once we got there.

And indeed it was. In fact, we didn’t even have to pack too much, because dinner was provided, so we threw the makings for s’mores, some granola and protein bars, and a few beers in the cooler and we were good to go.

We camped along the Beaver Pond Loop, which is described as “primitive camping.” What, exactly, is primitive camping? Well, this:

And, alas, these:

That’s okay. We can handle it. Other sections of the park include bathrooms and hot showers, which is pretty luxurious. For our large group, it was excellent because we were able to take over an entire area of our own. There were also two groovy warming huts which some of our friends enjoyed.

Talk about luxury camping!

These were by Beaver Pond, where there’s ice skating in the winter. For summertime, there was catch-and-release fishing. Not my cuppa, but the kids enjoyed it. Cute W decided that we absolutely must come back this winter for a tubing and skating extravaganza. I’m in.

The rest of the site was lovely, with plenty of space and the cushiest, most level grass it’s ever been my pleasure to sleep on. No, really. It was delightful.

It was a not-too-far walk over to the beach on Otsego Lake. I was too busy chitchatting in the water to take pictures, but there’s one here.  Actually, you could even bike or drive over to the lake if you were feeling super-lazy. There was plenty of space, and you’re allowed to canoe or kayak as well. There was plenty of vegetation to try to slow you down, but the arching lakeside trees made it well worth the rowing effort.

There were nature trails right from our campsite, with deer and other nature.

Orange Salamander

The group camping made life easy. After some beach swimming, we headed back to camp where our delightful leader led crafts. If you can believe it, this is the first lanyard that I’ve ever made:

There was a delightful smorgasbord, with our friend who’d shopped confessing that she’d shopped hungry, so there was a ton of food. Yummy, yummy Cedar’s Spinach Dip.  And of course, s’mores.

We even made a keen profit. The next day when I was unpacking, I found that, although we’d brought along a package of 6 Hershey Bars to contribute for s’mores, we somehow managed to come home with 11 Hershey Bars. You’ve got to love the chaos of someone trying to hide the chocolates when sugar-buzzed children are requesting thirds.

On Sunday we packed up and went to the Farmers’ Museum, which you’ll hear about later.

Oh, and while I was looking up links, I found this groovy little Camping This Weekend section, where you can type in a landmark and it will list available nearby campsites. Seemed like a perfect tool for any other procrastinating campers out there.

Hooray for a break in the weather! This afternoon we took J’s first on-the-road bike ride around the neighborhood. She did great. In fact, the whole time I was wishing that I’d taken a camera with me, because she was so cute. She’s quite the style maven, and this afternoon she was wearing zebra-print flats that we’d found at Trendy Tots and a scarf out of the dress-up collection that she put over this Justice t-shirt (although, jeepers, we did not spend $15 on it) that made her look like she was a very small-but-stylish 11-year-old. Alas, no camera.

Toward the end of our trip, we were stalled at a 3-way stop sign because J is still intimidated by going downhill, plus it was busier than most of the other roads that we’d conquered. So M, who had biked slowly and patiently for a good twenty minutes, was a bit ahead and waiting down the street. J and I stopped, and I looked up to see all the friendly neighborhood drivers stopped and waiting for us to go first. So I had to gesture “No-no-no, I insist, you go!” until they did, then I bent over J with more pep/strategy talk. I looked up again and a new crowd of drivers were waiting for us at their stop signs, including a police car. More gestures and a yell to the cop that we just weren’t quite emotionally prepared to go down the hill yet. I parked my bike and moved away from it, hoping all those nice drivers would take the hint.

Finally J negotiated the hill with great success and arrived at the driveway just in time to meet the police officer, who’d double-backed to present us with “Good Driving Tickets” for biking with our helmets: coupons for free ice cream cones at Stewart’s. Yep, it’s a lovely place to live.

Anyway, if you’re in the mood to leave town, here are a couple of suggestions:

A friend told me about Shakespeare & Company’s The Venetian Twins. The theater is in Lenox, MA, but with rave reviews like this one, I’m tempted to go myself. My friend said it was “a hoot.”

A reader passed along information about Railroads on Parade, a new model train museum in Pottersville, NY. If you’ve got a child in that train-crazy phase, it might be worth a trip.

Speaking of trains, did anyone else see that New York Times article about how the New York Transit Museum is so popular with autistic children that they’ve begun developing program specifically for kids on the spectrum? We used to love bringing kid visitors to that museum when we lived in New York City, so I’d recommend it in any case. But this just makes me like them more.

Still on vacation, and here’s another guest post, this one from Kelli. Thanks for writing and for sending along the great pictures, Kelli!

Monkey mama with baby nursing

Come on! Let's go camping!

Happy Summer, everyone!

Did you know that this Saturday is the Great American Backyard Campout? I actually wrote an article encouraging people to try a little backyard camping, and you can read it at Kids Out and About here.

Meanwhile, if you want to venture beyond your backyard, here are a few suggested campgrounds that are close (or, you know, close-ish) to the Capital District. Some of them have extra comments that I stole from a discussion from my moms’ group:

• Luzerne Campground at Fourth Lake  is wonderfully piney and cool…camping there is wonderful. The lake is small and quiet (only non-motorized boats allowed). There are horseback rides nearby.
• Thompson’s Lake is right near Thacher Nature Center. The lake is nice and has a good beach (great sand for making sand castles). They have a small play area for kids, and a canopy over picnic tables for shade. This is a busy camping spot, but it’s a good one for first-timers.
• Pine Hollow Campground in Vermont is about an hour’s drive. The kids will love the spring fed pond with a sandy beach.  There are paddle boats, shuffle board, horseshoes and fishing.
• Glimmerglass State Park near Cooperstown has swimming and fishing, and you’re allowed to use canoes and kayaks. Plenty of nature trails to explore.
• Lake Durant in the Adirondacks
• North-South Lake in the Catskills
• Rollins Pond near Saranac Lake

Do you and your family ever camp in the backyard? Do you have a favorite camping spot that I didn’t mention?

We drove down to New York on Thursday morning, checked into our hotel, and decided to go for a little walkabout. As I’ve mentioned, we’ve taken the girls into the city before, and they (mostly) didn’t have strong opinions about what to do. so we thought that we’d poke around some places that were new to us (we moved to the Capital District from Brooklyn nine years ago). We visited Chelsea Market (see fabulous cakes below)and the cool new Highline Park that’s been built on the old elevated subway. Along the way we stumbled on the Good Stuff Diner, where we refueled with a little ice cream and nachos.

Then it was on to the big attraction for the girls: the American Girl Store. Oh, man. It was way too overwhelming. So overwhelming that at one point, J just sat in the corner trying to collect herself. So overwhelming that we didn’t even make it to the third floor. The girls had brought their entire savings, but in the end they each decided to spend only half, which seemed remarkably restrained. It helped that the really colossal items weren’t stocked in the store.

We  decided to check out restaurants for dinner as we walked home and ended up at Darbar, which was deeply yummy Indian food. Plus Cute W remembered that one of the perks of eating out in the city is that you can drink to excess without driving home. Of course, we were exhausted, and these days we’re lightweights, so we only managed three drinks between us.

On Friday we decided to try out the Queens Hall of Science. We’ve already done the Met and the Museum of Natural History, and when we ended up with an East Side hotel, we figured it was worth a try. Plus there’s a zoo right there, too. As it turns out, the train ride out was one of their favorite parts of the whole trip. We were in the almost-empty first car, and the subway is above ground once you’re in Queens. I always forget how much the kids enjoy the subway.

The Hall of Science was fun, but we’ve been to many science museums, so it seemed a bit dated, honestly. I’d choose the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City over this one. If you’re considering visiting either or any science museum, you should check into the Association of Science-Technology Centers passport program, which I’ve said before. Anyway, the girls had plenty of fun. Their favorite section was sports, where they could pretend to surf, arm wrestle someone over the internet, and race with regular vs. streamlined wheelchairs.

The huge building blocks were also a big hit. J’s in pink, building, and M’s peeking out through a window of their fort.

The zoo was a short walk away. It was a bit small for the money, but the aviary was beautiful

On the subway ride home, the girls spotted their first subway rat, my whole family defied death by leaning from the platform,

and the girls examined graffiti in search of new swear words!

We spent Saturday morning visiting family, then took a nostalgic drive through Park Slope and hit the Chip Shop for lunch on our way out of town.

We’ve already got our next city trip half planned: the Statue of Liberty (this was M’s top choice, but apparently you have to reserve way ahead of time these days), a meal in Chinatown (even though we’d suggested Chinese and no one seemed interested, J became interested when we drove through), and a visit to the Tenement Museum (interesting, close to Chinatown, and Cute W theorizes it will be a reminder of how good the girls have it). Good times had by all.

Okay, hopefully the snow won’t be here too much longer, but I realized that I never passed along our ski getaway report, so here it is.

We spent two nights at Jiminy Peak in Hancock, Massachusetts, and it was such a good time that I’ve been telling everyone I know that they should go, and not just because it’s so close, an hour door-to-door from our house near Schenectady.

What we love even more are the deals for staying at the Country Inn. Downhill skiing is expensive, so when you can find something reasonable, it’s cause for celebration. Check out their website, and you’ll see that a full day of skiing (8 hours) costs $59 for an adult and $44 for kids 12 and under. That’s a painful $206 for my family of four to ski all day. Except that the going rate for a midweek stay at the Country Inn is generally $199/night and lodging  includes two adult lift tickets plus free skiing midweek for kids under 12. Yippee!

Kitchenette

Each suite has a separate bedroom and a living room with a pull-out sofa and a kitchenette. I kept discovering helpful details, like when I unearthed some much-needed dish washing soap from the pantry, or when I opened up the sofa bed to discover that it was already made with sheets and a blanket, so my kids could collapse immediately.  With a little preparation, we’d packed everything we needed to skip buying food at the lodge and restaurant entirely. Excellent, because I’m cheap. Even better, if you book a few rooms with friends, you can have an ongoing potluck party. If your kids vary in their enthusiasm for skiing, a group makes life much easier. When J lost steam, there were always a few adults taking a break who could provide  snacks and turn the tv to cartoons as necessary.  Large groups, say ten suites or more, can negotiate for a lower group rate.

Our bedroom before we had a chance to trash it.

We checked in promptly at 4 pm on a Sunday, dropped our bags, and ran outside (okay, more like ka-thumped in our ski boots) to take advantage of the night skiing. After a few runs, J was tired of skiing for the night, but she and I loved taking a ride on the Mountain Coaster that’s available on the weekends. At $7 each, this was an extra cost, but it was absolutely worth it for us. We squealed with joy all the way down, and it was the perfect way to end our evening outside on a high note after she’d gotten discouraged on the slopes.

Not me and J. We coasted in the dark and I contrived to have J still in her ski helmet just in case we flew off the rails, which seemed quite possible.

Most of the kids in our group spent a full day (9:30 am to 3:30 pm) in ski school. The cost is $102 and includes lessons, lift tickets (if they weren’t already included in lodging), and lunch. Our only complaint was that the person who took our reservations didn’t ask for the girls’ lunch order and assigned them chicken nuggets. We realized the mistake at drop-off and attempted to correct it, but they ended up with the nuggets, anyway. This was particularly comic when my 8-year-old recounted that another child had received nuggets and also didn’t want them because “she’d seen the video, too.” I realized that the Jamie Oliver video that I’d shown them had made a bigger impression than I’d thought! Apparently the other little girl was wily enough to finagle a macaroni and cheese, but my kids were stuck. However, they enjoyed ski school so much that they were ready and willing to go back the next day (we skied together instead) and they both “graduated” to the next level, which means my big girl will be a pole-wielding Fox next time (levels are designated by woodland creatures from chipmunks to coyotes).

Meanwhile, we adults took advantage of the kid-free time to ski as quickly and as much as we could for the day. We liked the variety of trails and the conditions as well as the nonexistent lift lines that midweek offered. And with hours running from 9 am to 10 pm and the convenient access to our rooms (we could pretty much ski to the doorstep of the Country Inn), it was easy to take quick breaks for lunch and dinner and head back out again and again.

The inn has an inviting lobby that’s frequently stocked with free cocoa and cookies. Last year we happened to visit during a late-January rainstorm, and the kids enjoyed playing games in the balcony while the grown-ups  listened in from below and drank wine by the fire. We felt like we had the run of the place, so it was a bit disappointing that with great snow conditions, the lobby became a bit of a mob scene. Still, the staff were friendly and helpful. We didn’t participate, but on the weekends, they have late-afternoon activities for the kids. Perfect timing to keep them entertained between ski school and dinnertime.

Also entertaining? The hot tubs and pool. Along with an indoor hot tub, the 0utdoor hot tub and heated pool beckoned many of us to hightail it through the cold to enjoy the water. Soaking in the hot tub surrounded by snow was perfect after a long day of skiing. The pool was bearably warm, but not my cup of tepid tea. The kids, however, had a blast.  Any parent knows that a hotel pool is golden, and the novelty of frolicking in the steam outside in February was thrilling for all of them, even if many of the adults supervising them preferred to chitchat in their coats.

A photogenic Jiminy family enjoying the pool. A more realistic image would be ten kids swimming like crazy while the adults huddled in the hot tub with plastic cups.

We thought Jiminy Peak was an excellent and convenient getaway, and we’ll be going again next year.