Parchment Paths

I always approach spring with mixed feelings; while I love the sunshine and flowers, I hate my seasonal allergies. We haven't had much of a spring yet,  but because of my allergies, I haven't really minded.  The warm, almost summer like weather and the fact that I had no obligations today, lured me outside, despite the flowers popping up. My dad and I took a trip to Moon Lake Park and hiked around the lake and field where the pool used to be. After our little hike, which , let's be honest was more like a walk that happened to be in a forest, we visited Hillside Farms to visit the animals and to eat some delicious ice cream.  Back at the house, I cleaned up my yard and put out the garden gnomes that have been hanging out inside for the winter. I may be looking forward to spring after all, if the allergies keep away.

Saint Patrick's Day has arrived. While I do have some Irish ancestry, I usually don't  go all out for this holiday. For one, I usually work and two, I'm not much of a green beer drinker. Today though, I found myself off work, so I visited my favorite local ice cream parlor, Ballyhoo. I ordered a Paddy Shake, and did some writing. The place was all decked out for the holiday and I got to sit in newer, larger  room, which was nice. After my milkshake, I took a nice walk around town past a beautiful old church.   It was a pretty wonderful day. 

I've just started reading The Story Girl by L.M. Montgomery and it's inspired me to share one of my mom's stories. My mom grew up in rural Southern Pennsylvania in a small home with a large backyard. In that backyard was an outhouse. I don't remember if that outhouse was in use at the time of this story, or if it was just waiting to be town down. Regardless, the outhouse was strictly off limits as a play area. As the eldest child, my mom knew this, as did her sister Donna. For reason, Mom could not recall, they both decided to play in the outhouse one day as their mom did laundry in the basement.Maybe, it was knowing they would not get caught that inspired them. They found some old boards and covered the holes that made up the seats in the outhouse and called  it a stage, where my aunt sang and danced for the audience, my mom. The louder my mom clapped the more exuberantly my aunt danced until the board slipped away from the hole and my aunt fell in. Horrified, my...

2018 is only a few weeks old and it’s already brought some changes. After owning the same car for twelve years, I purchased a new car. When I say new, I mean newer than my last car, which as a 2005 and the replacement is a 2015.   While I’ll miss my old car, and am not looking forward to making monthly payments again, it’s great having a newer, more reliable car.  I was able to see the Star Wars: The Last Jedi with my dad and was pleasantly surprised to find the theater remodeled with comfy, armchair styled seating.   The movie was pretty good as well, which was a good thing, had I been bored, I might have fallen asleep in those seats.             After seeing The Last Jedi, I’ve been on a bit of a Star Wars kick, in fact my dad and I rang in the New Year with a Star Wars marathon.   I’ve also begun reading The Annotated Peter Pan, which has some interesting insights into the author and his story....

Our fourth day ended up being a bit of a surprise; we had considered opting out of Hollywood Studios, but we ended up changing our minds that morning and going. I am so glad that we did. Aside from all the Star Wars things, the Christmas decorations were my favorite out of all the parks.  Because of the old time Hollywood theme, the decorations were all very vintage looking.  They even decorated the giant dinosaur and her little lagoon.        While, I did miss The Great Movie Ride, we still found plenty to do. We saw the Beauty and the Beast stage show, the Star Wars show and the Indiana Jones stunt show.  We also saw Fantasmic, which I highly recommend to anyone who loves fireworks and classic Disney movies.  We rode Toy Story Midway Mania and Star Tours before enjoying the new Christmas projection show on the Tower of Terror. It was beautiful, especially when it began to snow.  I also was able to pin trade for the first time...

        Our third park was EPCOT, and while it seemed to be the least decorated of the parks, it still had some awesome decorations. Aside from the enormous tree at the entrance to the World Showcase, the American Pavilion had an equally enormous and beautiful tree. Most of the countries had some pretty wreaths over buildings and on lampposts. The EPCOT tree The American Tree Christmas Tea in the U.K.  While they were pretty, we didn’t only focus on the decorations. We rode Test Track, and Journey into Imagination. We even go to see the new Muppet show as we left Spaceship Earth. had a lovely dinner at the Rose and Crown and rode the Frozen ride in Norway. Norway Mexico    Our last day in the parks was spent revisiting EPCOT. We explored more of the World Showcase, rode Soarin and Journey Into Imagination. We rode Frozen again and had some delicious snacks at the pastry shop nearby.  We also got to see the g...

     We spent the second day at Animal Kingdom, which had some pretty nice decorations as well, but we didn’t take too much notice of them at first as we were anxious to get in line for the Flight of Passage ride in Pandora.  Though a long wait, the ride was wonderful, and we enjoyed looking around the floating mountains and the shops. We also rode the River Journey, which was beautiful and peaceful, but rather short. We noticed some neat decorations on our way to the safari and on our way to lunch at Pizzafari, but my favorite decorations were around Dinosaur.  There were kitschy in a very awesome way, the Santa dinosaur in the one gift shop being my favorite.          After seeing Finding Nemo the musical, listening to a harpist, and exploring Pandora by night, we saw the light show on the Tree of Life and headed out for the night.