Why I Oughta...

Over the weekend, I posted some photos from my visit to Tokyo DisneySea t hat showed off the Easter decorations and a bunch of the Easter-related merchandise available in the stores at both DisneySea and Tokyo Disneyland .  I bought a bunch of that Easter stuff, but I also picked up some other items including, of course, some pins. I ended up getting a pin for Tokyo DisneySea the park itself as one of them.  You can see that pin above.  Once we get our pin boards out, this will join its brethren in the 'places' section that mostly features Resorts/hotels like the Contemporary pin in posted at the beginning of April  or the holiday-themed resort pins we picked up on our 2015 Christmas trip .  This might be the first park-specific pin that we've bought, although I believe we've traded for some park-specific pins over time. You can see the full post archives of various Disney pins here on the blog and once we get the pin boards and full pin sets out of storage, I&

This is the third in a series of posts showing off the foster-care plants that we planted in Nat's Mom's garden over the past few years that she has helped care for while we've been without a yard of our own.  First was the post and photo of the giant hosta that came up for the second year .  Then, yesterday, I posted about the peonies that look to be re-established after a rough first year. Today, you'll have to look hard at the photo above, but the green shoots sticking out amongst the scattered, dried Bald Cypress leaves/needles, are from our Hosta Venusta .   Last year, at the Elmhurst Garden Club Plant Sale, I picked up a fern and this miniature hosta .  It is billed as being one of the very few miniature hosta varieties that can actually be planted directly in the ground and come back each year.  I've had other miniature hostas before and they've never survived year-over-year - either in the ground or even in a pot that I brought inside our (unheated

Yesterday, I posted a photo of our foster-care hosta out in Naperville , but it isn't the only plant we have in my in-laws yard.  There are a few others including an Ostrich Fern, a miniature hosta and this peony plant above.  This peony plant was given to Nat by her Aunt from Tennessee, I believe and has it's roots in one of their Great Aunt's gardens from years ago.  Back in 2010, I posted this piece about these very ferns and their origin story . I've covered Nat's peonies over the years here on the blog.   You can see the full peony archive here . These are being fostered by Nat's mom and after being transplanted late in the summer in 2015, had a pretty rough year last year. Nat's mom is a pretty good gardener and thanks to her, we had these beauties survive.  We brought them over in the middle-of-summer heat (that's when we moved out!), and she got them in the ground and kept them wet as they tried to establish themselves.  I wasn't that

Spring time always brings some anticipation of watching our perennials breaking through the ground and beginning to show themselves.  Starting last year, that was occurring both at Equation Boy/Man's house (where we are living) and Nat's folk's house (where we had placed our orphan'd plants). I chronicled our orphaned hosta last year starting with their emergence and then followed up with a full glory photo later in the season. Recently, we were out in Naperville and I went to check out the fosters.  Sure enough:  they're coming back in year two.  Above, you can see the buds of the giant hosta emerging in the middle of the photo.   The smaller hostas as well as the ferns and peony plants are all coming up and I'll post about those soon. But, now the question becomes:  when do we move them?   This post indicates that there's 2 shots per year: early Spring and later in the Fall.  It looks like we'll miss the Spring window, but should we try in

As I posted yesterday, Easter is a (surprising, at least to me) big deal at Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea .  Lots of displays around the parks, but the stores are loaded with Easter-related items.  It wouldn't be a trip to a Disney Park without buying stuff you don't really need, right?  And holiday-related items for my kids?  Couldn't pass some of this stuff up. Here's a look at some of the displays in the stores including "Grand Emporium" at Tokyo Disneyland (which is the big store on their version of MainStreet USA) and the Emporio - the version at DisneySea. They have a big display of towels in different sizes featuring Mickey and Minnie in their Easter best. Pay attention to those outfits.  More on that down below. They also have these pretty awesome eggs in a package.  Inside of each of those are little candies.  You can see the display in the bottom left of the photo. There's a bunch of pins and post-it notes that are all egg-

One of the things that I was surprised by was how prominent the Easter holiday was present at the Disney Parks in Tokyo.   Based on this story from 2015, the idea of celebrating Easter is fairly new to Japan  and brands were just starting to package their products with special Easter packaging.  Fast forward two years and you'll see that they've totally embraced Easter at the Disney Parks! From J apanInfo.com from 2015 : With Japan easily getting interested in foreign holidays, and celebrating them in their own unique way, it is surprising to notice, that Easter has so far not being targeted by brands and companies as one would suggest it might do. DisneySea went all-in on Easter.  And they did a really spectacular job! Most of the Easter-related displays were in the part of the park called American Waterfront, so perhaps having most of this stuff displayed there was purposeful?  They also had this big display at the entrance to the park, for all to see. He

As I mentioned yesterday in a post , I spent a few days recently in Tokyo.  Part of that trip included an escape to see both Disney parks located there of course.  Yeah...I went to Tokyo.  And I went to their two Disney parks.  The first park I visited was Tokyo DisneySea.  Pretty incredible place and unlike any other Disney Park I've ever been to.  Over a bunch of posts, I'll share more of that experience including some of the things I saw and rode.  But for now?  Take a look at their Carousel.  It is back in the far corner of the park in the Arabian Coast land that features the Agrabah Marketplace and flying carpets from Aladdin. But that carousel?  First, it is two stories tall.  And then they've built this beautiful building around it.  Just magnificent. Here's the ride listing from the official Tokyo DisneySea site .  They list both the ride duration (2.5 minutes), the capacity (190 persons) and the number of mounts (126).  That's something that the d