Archives for 2009

DisneyFamily.com Travel Kit Giveaway

June 24, 2009 by Amy 59 Comments

Emma and Lexi have already learned the art of “Are we there yet?” on a trip. And it usually starts about five miles away from the house. I’m really excited to be a part of MomGenerations.com and DisneyFamily.com to give away an “On the Road With Family.com” kit to one lucky reader! The kit promises to keep children comfortably entertained during car or plane trips this summer and will put an end to the dreaded “Are we there yet?” question. Hallelujah!

The travel kit includes a plush kid size travel pillow, a copy of Dr. Seuss’s There’s a Map in My Lap, a travel game kit, notepad and pen and adorable tote bag (a $30 value).

Also, make sure to visit DisneyFamily.com Travel to help with all your vacation planning needs as the site provides a unique resource for parents providing a combination of expert reviews, parent recommendations, and age-appropriate points of interest for family-friendly destinations on any budget.

One of the many great features on the site is a list of “Cities on a Shoestring” where parents can find inexpensive or free activities to do in cities around the country. The site also includes tips for hassle free air travel, videos of popular family destinations, and safety travel tips.

To win, please share your favorite family vacation destination spot in a comment; a winner will be chosen at random.

For an bonus entry tweet the following text:

Win a Disney Travel Kit for kids from @amyjbennett at http://www.amyjbennett.com/?p=4515

The contest will run until Wednesday July 1st. Good luck!

Day of Errors

June 23, 2009 by Amy 3 Comments

I wake up this morning to find my Internet down. Fine, I’ll wait it out a bit. Sometimes this happens. I take a shower thinking I might not have time later since I have to take Emma to the dentist later. By 10, I have given up and whisk the girls out of the house with me and over to my Mom’s to work.

My laptop can’t find the wireless router there. Dad makes a few adjustments and hands me the wire. It’s faster anyway.

One good thing…Mom and Dad were working from home and ended up spending time with the kids so I was left to work uninterrupted.

We leave about 12:30 after Mom has literally stuffed some type of new casserole down all 3 of us. It really was good. The girls have gotten wet and I need to get them changed so we can get to the dentist by 1:30. I’m hoping Scott is awake from working last night and can take the girls so I can stay and work. Emma really wants me to take her but I’m thinking I’ll stay.

Scott is awake and ready after wondering why the house had been so quiet. The Internet is down still. I’m starting to feel frustrated. I decide to chuck it and go with Scott and the girls to the dentist. We leave a few minutes early so we can get gas. I didn’t want to stop on my way home. We stop to get gas. The machine won’t take my card. I text Scott who is in the store getting drinks to prepay $20. I wait at least 8.5 minutes and text him again to say we’re going to be late. 4.5 minutes later he comes back out and says they had to swipe the card at least 10 times. He tells me to check our account to make sure we only got charged once. I pump the gas and off we go. We’re 5 minutes late to the appointment but I got a root beer and it’s not so bad.

Emma gets her teeth cleaned and there are no cavities. More good news for the crazy day.

Back at home, I walk through the living room, close my eyes and chant “Internet, please work.” It’s doesn’t. I dial a few conference call numbers hoping I can remember the number since I’m 20 minutes late already and don’t want to drive anywhere so I can log in to look up the number. I fail.

I try to call the cable company to get an ETA. I accidentally hang up the phone as I often do. I gather all my computer stuff and head out the door to my Mom’s office this time, telling the girls I love them and I’ll be back. Scott tells me to be back as soon as I can as he has to leave early. My call is until 4 and he needs to leave for work at 4:15. I can do that.

I get to Mom’s shop and it takes several times to log in. I log in. I call the number and start to listen. I decide to move my computer to another desk, take my phone with me and hang up on the call with the palm of my hand.

I call back in and here I sit on the call and wondering how the rest of the day is going to go.

I’m thinking it will end at Starbucks again.

The Bachelorette: Episode 6

June 22, 2009 by Amy 3 Comments

*Spoilers*

So the foot-fetish-er leaves. I would agree with him that it wasn’t the foot fetish. I think it was apparent in his goodbye footage. He was too concentrated on Wes and not enough of Jillian. Jillian likes when the guys are openly obsessive over her and besides her feet, I don’t think Tanner fell in that category.

As for Jake, I think it spilled in his footage as well. He did everything he could do. And Jake did. He was perfectly perfect. And obviously that’s not what Jillian wants. She ate it up when Reid couldn’t quit talking about his fondue neurosis. She obviously wants a real guy…and who doesn’t?

As for the ones left.

Kiptyn – I’m telling you people unless Kiptyn has one screwed up family, he’s going to win this thing.

Jesse – He’s a close second. She really likes Jesse and seems really comfortable with him.

Reid – I really like Reid. For the record, I think he made a mistake of not wearing the glasses. I would have told him to keep the glasses on. But I think he’s super funny and real. But he really is neurotic and not sure how that will pan out long-term with Jillian.

Michael – Michael is a wreck waiting to happen. I don’t see him winning this at all. But I see that Jillian has a great time with him and he obviously is falling all over her which she is loving. If she picks him, it’d be like DeAnna picking Jesse.

Wes – Jerk. Gah, I can’t believe Tanner didn’t tell Jillian it was him before he left. He had nothing to lose at that point except a good fight on the Men Tell All episode.

Just watched the previews:

So glad Jake is going back…Mr. Perfect is doing the right thing.

I’m really really scared is Kiptyn who loses it in the fantasy suite

I think Ed comes back and proposes

The Time Traveler’s Wife

June 22, 2009 by Amy 3 Comments

I know I’m a little late on this one. I mean, the movie is coming out in August.

When I remember this novel, I’ll remember that it read like a commentary (a great one). I’ll remember the dual first-person point of view. I’ll remember the short sentences. The wit. The humor. The beauty. I’ll remember Clare’s innocent-yet-not-love for Henry. I’ll remember Henry’s frustration and yet determination to deal with the life he was given. Their lust for each other. I’ll remember the mystery. The game of it all. The science of it all. The innocence and wonder of Alba. Just the smartness of the idea and plot. The way it made you think about love and time.

I’ll remember it was a good book until the end. I really, really feel like we were jipped out of that last scene. So many times we only saw glimpses of Henry’s life and yet kept reading to find out we were given them later. For example, Clare’s 18th birthday. Such a big part of the story and yet we didn’t get it until almost the end. And Henry told us about that last scene they would have together and I was so sure we’d get to see and was so disappointed when we didn’t. It’s like watching The Notebook and never seeing them die together.

I’ll go and see the movie just because I think Rachel McAdams will be a perfect Clare and Eric Bana should do Henry justice but really? Unless they fix that last scene, I don’t know if I’ll have a good feeling walking away.

The Proposal

June 22, 2009 by Amy 4 Comments

I remember months ago being in the theater and seeing previews for The Proposal (Let me just throw in here we saw the preview for New Moon!). Always a Sandra Bullock fan (well, almost always), I knew it was going to be a must-see. Throw in some Ryan Reynolds and well, it’s no surprise I jumped at Jill’s invitation to go Saturday night on opening weekend.

I was expecting cute. And a little funny. Maybe You’ve Got Mail kind of funny. Something to make you smile once in a while. But ya’ll. This movie was SO FUNNY. I know it looked like I’d been crying for the past two hours when I walked out of the theater. And I guess I had because I laughed so hard so many times I was crying. And clapping. It was that kind of funny.

Sandra tends to play characters that are a little clumsy. She’s good at the physical comedy. In the movie she was supposed to be playing uber successful, snotty, domineering Book Editor in Chief (?). In one scene, she has to get up from a kneeling position with 4″ heels and Sandra made it funny. And maybe not quite how that character would have done it but it was still funny. So, yeah, I’m not sure if she hangs on to the character 100% the whole time but then again, her character does make a bit of transformation and her clumsy and off-the-wall antics are the only thing that make you like her outside of her general attitude.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ryan Reynolds in anything except for Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. But let me tell you, the guy is FUNNY. He delivered his sarcastic lines to perfection. Loved the line with the dog in the bathroom and also “Hence, the boat.” With the romance? Eh, not sure he’s a Richard Gere but he sure is pretty to look at and did I mention funny?

Betty White completed this movie and made it fabulous. Everyone know the caliber of actress she is. In this movie, she played a quirky but heartfelt 90 year old grandmother of Ryan’s character. And man, was she great. And funny of course.

This movie is a definite must-see. It’s going down as one of my favorite romantic comedies ever. And for those that haven’t seen the preview, here ya go. And the best part? That’s not all the funny parts.

Even better? Here are some outtakes!

Father’s Day Weekend Recap

June 22, 2009 by Amy 3 Comments

This weekend ended up being quite busy.

Early Friday evening we had a quiet night here. We had dinner and made a run to Wal-Mart. We took the kids to IL’s about 7 for them to spend the night. I headed to our church for the youth girls’ sleepover. I didn’t plan to stay all night but stayed until 12:30. We did a picture scavenger hunt around town and it turned out to be a blast. A few highlights included the kids teaching a stranger how to do the Ice Cream Dance, singing the National Anthem in front of a store, creating a pyramid in front of Starbucks, chasing down a teenage boy and claiming he was Zac Efron and getting his autograph and cramming 7 girls into a phone booth in a very busy location. I was never so happy to be old and the one taking the picture.

We came back to play a few games and then all tried to learn Miley Cyrus’ Hoedown Throwdown which was a HUGE FAIL. Even the girls that have danced for years didn’t seem to catch on quickly. I tried not to feel so old with girls that were born about the same time I started high school. The girls all played hide and seek in the dark around the church and then I was off when they started a movie.

Saturday morning I woke up and cleaned in preparation for middle/high school friends Michelle and Carmen to come eat lunch and visit. We went to a local restaurant and really had a great time catching up. It’s always so strange to me how you can go YEARS without seeing your best friends and pick up right where you left off.

Jake and Jill showed up right as Carmen and Michelle were leaving. They spent the evening with us in the pool. We had some pizza delivered and of course great conversation. Jill and I ended the evening by going to watch The Proposal. More on that in another post.

Sunday afternoon we spent Sunday dinner at Buca di Beppo’s with my dad and family. Great food as always. Yesterday we spent the afternoon in the pool before spending a nice evening at Scott’s sister’s.

To top the weekend off, I finished reading The Time Traveler’s Wife. Also saving that for another post.

Overall, a really busy but really good weekend.

Non-novel: Thoughts

June 18, 2009 by Amy 1 Comment

I feel silly writing about a book that to me is not even a book. I’ve sent it to a few people with a few disclaimers:

I know it’s bad writing. Being able to get 55K words on paper and writing are two different things. My goal was to get the story on paper and hopefully reach 50K words. I did both of those. Quality writing was never really part of the deal although at times I did try. Other times I simply got words on paper.
I didn’t re-read the beginning of the book as I was writing so there are a lot of continuity errors. A few people have different names later in the book. Their past changes. It’s all a little sketchy at times.
I don’t want to give what happens away, but sometimes I don’t agree with what the characters say and/or do. I know that sounds weird as I wrote it but at times the characters did what they wanted to do and I couldn’t do much about it. Man, I know I sound crazy but it’s true.

I thought I would feel very accomplished at the end. But the past 18 hours or so I’ve really just felt not-enough. There aren’t enough words to actually publish it, the writing stinks, no one will like it. And really, I just feel like this is a beginning. It’s sort of like a piece of clay could be formed into a cube and yet, to turn it into a house would require the actual work. Right now, I just have a clay cube, something that a lot of people could do. Few could and will actually work to turn it into a masterpiece. But as a friend said, no matter what, you wrote a novel. Good or bad, there are characters and a story and now it’s on paper.

Just a few facts:

I started this end of October/beginning of November. It’s all Melissa’s fault. It took 7-8 months to complete.
Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series gave me hope that I could do it. Something about writing in first-person did the trick.
First draft is 55K words, 99 pages printed in single-space.
I still have no idea what I’d name it.
It’s a romance. I’m clueless on specific genres after that. I say it’s a romance but it’s more about the journey a girl takes fighting through her past to love someone in her present.
I listened to Clair de Lune a lot in the beginning while writing. Other than that, I wrote in silence because I could think better.
I saw a guy at Disney that made me smile because he reminded me so much of my lead male character. I was tempted to stop and take a picture of him.
I still don’t know what the lead character looks like. I never described her.
Scott helped me a lot at the beginning of the book. I remember one night we talked for hours about it. After that, we’ve barely talked about it. He says he may or may not read it. He hates to read.
I’ve sent it to 4 or 5 people to read. I hope they are honest but not brutal in their reviews.
I did my best brainstorming just before I fell asleep. I can’t count the number of times I rolled over and typed something in my notes on my iPhone. Actually, I probably could since I still have them all.