Top O' The Mornin' To Ya'

Aw yeah... St Patrick's Day happened.

And while, Mr F & I are not beer drinkers,

We can throw back some serious Lucky Charms...

So, when it comes to a holiday centered around

a giant Family Sized box of sugar cereal

It is on like Donkey Kong!

 Partly, because I forgot to get a full selection of rainbow colored streamers... and had to use last years scraps... we went for a different approach from last year.  Basically the Leprechauns tossed the joint leaving rolos, green balloons, and their hats in their wake.  

This was a pretty low stress holiday prep...

Knock over the furniture and sprinkle balloons 

and chocolate on the floor.  

Even a drunk person could do it.

 The remnants of streamers were just enough to drop out of the ceiling as the "end of the rainbow" and into the pot of rolos gold.  

 The Leprechauns also worked some crazy mischievous magic on the dining room chairs (because I had green masking tape and an entire package of green balloons (why?!) in the craft closet.

They also messed with the dish towels to show that real Leprechauns are doing this stuff... right?... why would we mess up our own dish towels?  (They totally fell for it... what are they?! Children?!!)

 

Dyed the milk green.  We've been doing this long enough to have learned the hard lesson that Kid will not drink milk that has been suspiciously tempered with (actually, a positive now that I think about it... hmm... what does that say about Baby?!) So we've been working two gallons.  Pulling the old dramatic "Ha Ha, we tricked those Leprechauns... they didn't even see our secret 2nd gallon!" when I open the fridge (again, the kids totally buy into it.... this is why you really should warn your kids about strangers with bags of candy or lost puppies... geez... they will fall for ANYTHING.)

 Oh, if you are wondering about the candle... that is a piece of our birthday ring.  I love that thing, and use it for pretty much every holiday imaginable.

 She's not afraid of drinking tainted milk or wearing mismatched quadruple green.  She also ate a rolo before she sat at the table for breakfast. When I caught her, I said "Who said you could have that?"  And she said "No one said I could; no one said I couldn't." Okay, then.  Case Dismissed.

 Please note that Baby still has to get all geared up like that for school.  Single digits, people.  

But check out that sunrise... not too shabby.  

It's too bad my eye balls were freezing into ice cubes while I was standing there.

And with that, I bid you goodnight.

Although, I suspect the party's just starting for a lot of you.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Happy Thanksgiving

We're taking a short furlough from Disney to enjoy an over the top Thanksgiving spread at Mr F's best friend's pad in St Petersburg. Yummy. And there is actual vegetation... which is a much needed Disney area change up!

YES I will do a thorough Disney review next week (I know I've been promising this for years... this time I'm going to come through). And I'm glad I waited since I can now give a good onsite/offsite comparison. This is our 6th visit in as many years(shout out to my mom for sponsoring most of those) and we've stayed at a range of Disney hotels and have both done and done without the meal plan. I'm going to write up my review and include our planning tools & sites (and if you are going soon I'll be able to give you the code for booking our hotel ($105/night plus a $25 food credit... hello... room service breakfast!... free parking... no resort fees... and a totally badass kids splash zone pool and an INCREDIBLE gym). I've kept good money records on all our trips and I'll break down for you EXACTLY how much we spent. I'll also do an open Q&A and that way other Disney folks can weigh in on their tricks.

For now we're planning to kick it up a notch late night Magic Kingdom and enjoy our last couple days in Disney World. We're taking off on Saturday and heading up to Savannah for a night before heading home (Mr F is dying to take pictures... and the girls are looking forward to a carriage ride... lets hope I can Priceline something decent).

If anything horrific/laughable goes down this weekend make sure you add it into the giveaway (post below) and I'll be announcing the winner on Sunday night.

Design On A Dime

I love holiday decorating and I love making a big deal out of each special day. This year, even before the budget crisis, I had decided to stop buying holiday decorations as part of our compacting efforts. I find it is very hard not to want *new* decorations for every holiday... every single year. Places like Target do an amazing job of turning out new and improved decorations that always seem to one up the ones that they put out (and I bought) the year before. I am always fighting the strong urge to give into this marketing powerhouse. It's amazing how effective it is. Who would know that you can actually feel somewhat humiliated about your past heart shaped purchases upon spying new Valentine's Day decorations of all things? I wish I was kidding... but seriously... those marketing folks know what they're doing. And that is mostly the point behind the compacting. To sit with what you have. To enjoy what you already own without feeling that something *new* is something *better*.

And so I give you tissue paper hearts.

I cut out about 20 hearts (using every single scrap) from 2 pieces of old tissue paper. The kids hung them *artfully* with plenty of scotch tape and hung them in all of our windows.
The light shines through them like stain glass (not so much the 12 yards of scotch tape... but whatever).
And our house was instantly transformed into the most festive house on the street... both inside... and out.