Jolly Well!

I'm going to tell you one of my biggest secrets...I love the British Royals - always have!  Yep it's true, me the tom-boy am totally obsessed.  Now if you knew me in elementary school this would come as no surprise.  Here are a few more secrets that I trust you will not hold against me:  In elementary my best friend, Lori, and I would pretend we were Princesses.  We walked around the school yard talking in British accents and practicing our waves (twist from the wrist!)  I'm pretty sure we even demanded people address us as such.  Now I would like to point out that we had friends in school and we've both grown into well-adjusted adults.

I've been thinking about why I love them so and thinking about it has brought back some great memories.  I don't remember Princess Diana's wedding, I was only 4.  However, images of her wedding have always enthralled me.  My Gramma liked Princess Diana too and starting with her first trip to Canada my Gramma and I collected news-paper articles about her and pasted them in an artist's sketch book.  I still have that book!  My Gramma bought me the "official" Prince William book when he was born and I spent a lot of my allowance on "Majesty" magazine. 

When I went wedding dress shopping I wanted a huge puffy ball-gown, I think this was why!

I remember being disappointed when I heard Charles and Diana were divorcing, but I was actually heart-broken when I heard he had never actually loved her, and had only married her for the "look of it all." 

Today I read they were the first couple to kiss publicly.  The only reason it happened is because Diana forced it.  Apparently Charles said something to the effect of "They want us to kiss, I'm not going along with that charade."  She asked, "Why not?" and leaned in.  She was a 19-year old in love, unfortunately with someone who didn't love her back.

I was genuinely sad and angry when she died.  Admittedly nothing worth swooning over has really happened in the British Royal Family over the last 14-ish years so my obsession has taken a bit of a back-seat to growing up, getting married and having baby's of my own...Until today!

THE DRESS

LOVE IT!  Oh wow, so not what I expected at all but so much better than I hoped for.  Designed by Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen, it was perfect for a fairy-tale wedding.  I loved the neck-line and sleeves, the skirt was much "puffier" than I thought it would be, which I think is perfect for a princess.

THE TIARA

All that glitters...I think this tiara was a perfect choice for her.  Not too over-whelming and just sparkly enough.  The tiara was created in 1936 by Cartier.  The Queen's father bought it as a gift for the Queen Mum, and it was given to Queen Elizabeth on her 18th birthday.  The earrings were a gift to Kate from her parents. I love them too!  Described as, "stylized oak leaves with a pear shaped diamond set drop and a pave set diamond acorn suspended in the centre."  The earrings were a inspired by the new Middleton coat of arms.

THE MAID OF HONOUR

How to be nice to your maid-of-honour?  Let her wear a dress almost as beautiful as yours!  I actually gasped when Pippa stepped out in her dress.  It was closer to what I envisioned Kate wearing.  The form-fitting column with a cowl neck was also designed by Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen and looked perfect on her!

THE GROOM

Not to be out-done, William looked "dashing" in his uniform.  Although William is an active search and rescue helicopter pilot with the Royal Air Force in Wales his position as Colonel with the Irish Guards is the highest military position he holds (not to mention the best looking uniform) making this uniform the obvious choice.  Plus it has 3-leaf clovers on the collar - how cool is that?!

THE KISS

Congrats!

Deal or No Deal?

So I've been focusing a lot on budgeting lately.  I really really want us to get out of debt - I'm old and need to save for my retirement ya know?!

I've been watching Extreme Couponing lately.  Canada is awesome for all the obvious reasons, but I gotta say the States have us on this!  One woman went to Safeway and bought over $1800.00 worth of groceries, when all her coupons were applied she paid $103.00.  How is this possible?  Well, in the States they have "Double Coupon" days.  If you have a coupon for $2.00 off of something then you get $4.00 off.  Now here's the catch:  if the item only cost $3.00 to begin with you get it for free AND you get to take the leftover $1.00 and put it towards your bill!!  Unfortunately this just doesn't happen in Canada.  I don't know if it's against the law or retailers are just smarter here, either way it kinda sucks for us.

Well instead of being sad about it I decided to at least do what I can.  So I studied all the flyers for all the grocery stores in Airdrie and made columns in a notebook comparing the prices of all our usual staples.  I also checked the cost of items at Costco to see if buying the big bulk items is really worth it.  I ended up going to 3 stores to get our groceries this week, but I have to drive past all these places on a daily basis so the whole "you gotta take your gas into account" argument doesn't apply.

I figured I could share some of the deals I found on my hunt:

DEALS

Kinder Surprise Maxi $8.99 at NoFrills

NO DEAL: $10.00 at Shoppers!!  Don't fall for the convenience of a Shopper's on every corner!

DEAL

4L Purex laundry soap $6.97 at No Frills in this weeks flyer

*We couldn't find any HE bottles of this, so may not be a deal for you front-loaders.

NO DEAL: Sunlight laundry soap 4L on sale at SuperStore for $9.97

6 pack SpongeTowels (yes I know this is a 4 pack in the pic) for $6.97 at No Frills

NO DEAL: No Name brand paper-towels Phil bought last week.  The two-ply towels would come apart into two tiny one-ply towels when you ripped them off the roll.  The wouldn't soak up anything!  Sometimes paying more is worth it people!

Other Deals vs. No Deals

• 1 lb chocolate bunny: Wal-Mart $1.98 vs. No Frills $3.00
• grapes Superstore $1.27/lb vs. Wal-Mart $1.47/lb
• KD Wal-Mart $0.77 vs. No Frills $1.57
• Quaker Instant Oatmeal SuperStore $1.98 vs. Wal-Mart $2.47



AND THIS JUST IN:

Spend $250.00 at SuperStore and get a free turkey

*The above news flash provided by Mr. Cheap AKA Phil....

More Day 4 Fun

Avery just couldn't stay at DL any longer so Phil took her back to the hotel for a nap.  I felt so bad for her, so did mom.  While they went to rest we hung out in California Adventure.

The "Princess Emma" Action Figure now available!

The two best drivers in the family!

After Avery's nap she came back for a bit and tried some rides too.



Character Lunch

Day 4 - Part 2

After the makeovers we headed over to Ariel's Grotto for our Character Lunch.  By this time Avery was turning pretty red in the cheeks and was talking about her ear bugging her.  Before we got to the restaurant she asked to go back to the hotel.  A kid asking to leave Disneyland?  This was not going to end well.  

We convinced her to stay and try some lunch.  The lunch was amazing, we had delicious pasta, tri-tip steak, macaroni and grilled chicken.  Avery ate several grapes and asked again to leave.  Then the princesses showed up and she perked up a little.

That shell is made of white chocolate..mmmmm

The Bibbity Bobbity Boutique

Day 4 - Part 1

Before heading to the Magical Kingdom the girls decided they wanted to go to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique for a Princess make-over.  Avery was having a tough time keeping up on this morning and I figured she was catching a cold.  I found out later she was sporting a 103 degree fever at this point...I'd say she looked pretty cute for being so sick.

The "before" picture

Emma's Fairy Godmother in training

Choosing her hair jewels

Avery's Fairy Godmother in training

Hair and Makeup all done

Avery went with the Pop-Star Princess look

Disney Surprise!

Day 3

For some reason I don't have a lot of pictures from this day.  Not sure why, must've been too surprised and excited to take many.

We went to the park early and picked up where we'd left off.  We tried for Parent of the Year a second day in a row and made Avery go on Indiana Jones.  Pretty much the same reaction as Space Mountain only this time Phil got to experience it too. 

We went to New Orleans Square and took a train ride around the entire park.  Avery really enjoyed that and we commented several times how fun it would be if Carly, Dan, Elijah and Micah could be there too, we thought they'd really like the train.  When we got back to New Orleans we had the girls profile picture drawn in pastels which gave us some down-time.  We ate lunch under the trees in the shade.  We went to Frontierland where mom and I went on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and headed back to the front of Adventureland for Dole Whip...mmmmm Dole Whip.  Avery insisted we go in the Tiki Room, which is a running joke in our family anyway.  My Gramma used to LOVE the Tiki Room and always made everyone go in it.  We all think it's super lame but go whenever we're there anyway.  Avery absolutely LOVED it too, she talked about it non-stop!  While we were waiting for the show to start my mom's cell phone rang and it was my sister.  She laughed when we told her we were in the Tiki Room.  She told us she missed us, I missed her too. 

We went back to the hotel after this and the girls got on their bathing suits.  Phil said he had to go to the vending machine to get water, seemed weird but whatever.  He was gone quite a while and I was starting to wonder what the heck he was doing.  Suddenly Emma says, "There's someone outside talking to dad....I think it's Auntie Carly."  Mom and I opened the hotel room doors and sure enough there was my sister, Dan, Micah and Elijah!  They had come to California to surprise us.  Mom cried, I cried, everyone else laughed.

The girls swam for a while, the boys napped and we headed back to the park.  We met up with the Penner's at King Arthur's Carousel in Fantasyland.  We had just gotten on the ride when they walked by so I grabbed Elijah over the fence and sat him on a horse.  His first lesson in budging the line!

That night we wanted to go to the fireworks but as always MainStreet filled up fast and we weren't sure how to keep everyone entertained.  We decided to just stay in Fantasyland and watch them from there.  It was pretty cool because some of the fireworks go off from Sleeping Beauty's castle, which was right in front of us, and some go off from Toon Town which was right behind us.  It was like watching a tennis match of fireworks.  Tinkerbell did her high wire fly-by right over us.  Elijah is in love with Tinkerbell (to clarify he does not want to BE Tinkerbell, he's in love with Tinkerbell.)  When Tink flew over he had the best look on his face.





Day Two

Day Two

My birthday is at the end of this month, Emma's is in May, Avery's is in June and Phil's in August.  My mom is great at giving "experiences" as gifts instead of "things".  I love it because experiences are what memories are made of.  This year our gifts were tickets to Disney's new water and light show "World of Colour" along with a picnic and a Character Lunch at Ariel's Grotto (she also picked up the tab for the awesome shuttle ride)  Our first day at Disney was capped off with World of Colour, which I would recommend to anyone going to Disney any time soon.

In bid for "Parent of the Year Award" we went from this ride to Space Mountain.  Avery almost died.  3 seconds into it she was screaming and crying and begging us to get off of it.  When we asked her what the best and worst parts of the day were she said this rocket ride was the best, the worst was Space Mountain.  Ooops.

It IS a small world after all...

This is the line that never ends...it goes on and on my friends..(seriously longest line ever!  I got the worst sunburn on my chest, shoulders and neck from standing here for an hour +)

Better have been the best Dumbo ride ever after that wait!

Heading back to the park for our picnic and World of Colour

The Pier at California Adventure looks awesome at night.

World of Colour.  Music and light show with images projected onto sheets of water!  Very cool.

Mickey and Surprises and Doctors...oh my!

Day One

On Sunday our adventure began.  My mom took a connecting flight from Abbotsford and we met up at US Customs to all take the same flight to LA.  We were heading to Disneyland for 5 days of fun!  The stand-by loads were tight so I was a bit concerned but we all got on and we were on our way.

Yay!  We're on the plane!

We took a ride to our hotel.  I used the Super Shuttle because they were the cheapest van service.  I liked the idea of the van service over the bus shuttle because you only shared the ride with one other group so it cuts down on the amount of stops.  We had an interesting driver named Vinnie - or so his ID tag stated.  He managed to do the entire trip without saying a single word.  Welcome to America.  We arrived at our hotel, the Quality Inn on South Manchester.  The people at the check-in were super nice.  The hotel was old and a little run-down but it was ok. After getting settled in we headed to Downtown Disney to walk around.  Avery was acting a little out of sorts and asked Phil to take her out of a store and kept complaining how cold she was.  We chalked it up to a long travel day.

A Chip N Dale Hat - LOL

The Minnie Mouse Club

The Doors to the LEGO store

LEGO Woody

A two-storey LEGO giraffe!



"His smile is like watching a baby bunny sniff a tiny flower." - Tina Fey

So here we are stuck in a -25 celsius deep freeze and my children have 10 days off school...year-round school seems like such a good idea in theory: vacations when everyone else is at school, shorter summer = less whining about being bored but this vacation gets us every year!  February is typically a "poor" month around the McNeil house so there's not alot to do.  Today I decided to take the girls to the Justin Bieber movie.  They were eternally grateful even before we went because they know that every time one of his videos comes on family channel or a song on the radio I roll my eyes and walk away mumbling under my breath. (Speaking of poor - 2 Child Admissions, 1 Adult Admission, 2 Kids Combos, a regular popcorn and regular pop = $71.85!!!  But that's another rant for another day).  So you are now subjected to my review of the movie and the singer...



I was pleased to learn this little international sensation is from a town fairly close to where my family and Phil's family are from.  You know how Canadians are, "Hey my gramma lives 3 blocks down from Justin Bieber's grand-parents!  No kidding eh?"  Very cool to see that even though his mom was a teen mom she had a lot of support from her parents but also took on parenting very seriously.  I also found it pretty intersting that he was a "sensation" long before being signed to a label or making a record; all due to You Tube - amazing how social media has changed the world. 

A couple of things worry me though.  There was one 10 second clip in the entire movie that showed him sitting at a table with a bio and chem text book.  This kid's 16 years old and he's making a huge movie being shown to kids all over the world - I would have liked to see a bit more focus on his education.  I'm not even sure my girls caught the clip and am pretty sure they're seeing his life as sans-school and pretty awesome right about now.

Something else that bugged me the whole way through is that every single person surrounding this kid is an adult!  There was one scene where he returns home to Stratford and sees a couple of his friends but it sounded like that's not a very common occurance.  On this last North American Tour he did 86 some-odd shows and other than Will Smith's kid in New York there was not another kid anywhere.  That worries me.  How can a kid be a kid when he is surrounded by adults all the time?  There are scenes in the movie where he ends up walking into a group of girls, he gets totally mobbed and falls down.  I can't imagine how scared he was but it's either that or be totally segregated from society.  Is it really a good plan to put a child into this kind of situation - no matter how entertaining he is?  Then I see this:



Excuse me?!  For a second there I'm channeling Tina Fey in the SNL skit ("He's like a dreamy Christmas Elf.") and it's kind of funny but once again I have some sobering thoughts...HE'S A KID!!  I'm ok with "Teen" and "Tiger Beat" (yes those mags are still around!!) splashing him all over the front and quizzes inside to determine if the Tween/Teen reading is "..his perfect girlfriend." but this magazine is made for and marketed to women my age!   

 Now I know all my friends are shaking their heads at me considering my love for Taylor Lautner but when this cover shot of the Biebs was taken he had just turned 16.  The pictures are clearly composed to be somewhat seductive and again, this is a magazine directed at women intelligent enough to want to read an article on Warren Buffet and the Wikileaks scandal. 

I am reminded of something my husband said to me a while ago about Taylor Lautner, "If I was swooning over a girl that age I'd be considered a perv, and possibly sent to jail." at the time I blew him off and laughed about gender equality not being all it's cracked up to be.  Today I really got to thinking about it.  No one in their right mind would have a 16 year old girl on the cover of Maxim, and if someone were that silly there would be huge public outrage.  Why is it different when it's a 16 year-old boy on the cover of a women's magazine?  And why is his marketing machine ok with this?

I worry about these kid stars.  I realize no one let's their kid go into an entertainment career with hopes of becoming thisLindsay Lohan, or even worse: Corey Haim.  But what are they doing to stop it?  Show me a child-star that hasn't ended up in disaster.  Heck, even Miley and Billy-Ray aren't talking to one another anymore! I hope someone's got this kids back, cuz it sorta feels like watching a train-wreck a la Britney Spears.  Good luck little man!

On a side note, I'm sure mom's of Tween and Teen boys everywhere were happy for this little development:  Good-bye bangs!



More Creativity

We're leaving for Disneyland in 30 days!  I am attempting to see exactly how cheap I can do this visit to the Magical (money-sucking) Kingdom.  I remembered when we were there last time (Emma was 6) she loved her autograph book.  We bought a book there that the characters would sign on one side of the page and there was a little piece of plastic on the other side that you could slip a pic of the child and character into.  6 years ago the books were $15.00, who knows how much they are now!  So I decided my girls would be taking custom autographs with them.  Here's what I came up with:

Avery's book

Autographps

I mean Autographs...yep there's a spelling mistake there...sigh.

scrapbook page protectors cut to fit - perfect size for a 4x6 photo

Place for Character to sign

Back cover

Emma's front cover - at least it's spelled right!

Emma's back cover

Now I just have to get them bound together.  Shelley lent me her coil binder but neither of us were too sure how to use it.  That'll be my project for my next day off!