Found this waiting for me on Facebook this morning. How did I miss this the rest of the week? Amazon is running a special promotion on line each day. There are 15 “deals of the day” offered at significantly reduced prices – each for only an hour. You can only purchase the item during the assigned hour, and you can’t see what’s coming up next. That didn’t stop me from finding a few things today. The promotion is called the golden toy box and is available on their website. Deals change at the top of the hour.

Note: As of today (12/4), you can look ahead and see what deals are coming up. You just can’t see a photo of the item until it’s listed during it’s time slot. Today seems to feature several musical items over the day.

Update: 12/4 – As an aside, the website is also featuring a day long deal of 60% of cashmere sweaters sold by & shipped from Amazon. If you spend $25 on qualifying items, you can get free shipping. All of the daily deals, and most of the sweaters listed qualify for this shipping deal. Happy Shopping!!

Many is the summer I spent with Aunt Sally growing up. Today’s her birthday … so… Happy Birthday, Aunt Sally.

Dad and Aunt Sally

Dad and Aunt Sally living in Indiana, many moons ago.

Well, vacation finally arrived and … then it was gone. Here is a sampling of our vacation fun. This was our first trip to Duck, NC and we enjoyed trying all the new things that entailed. I think my favorite two things were the quiet morning walks into Duck before things were really hopping, and the day trip we took to the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. The National Seashore was amazing and well worth the drive and the day trip. I’d have to say a close third place would be the trip into Manteo, NC. That is a very unique town and we all thoroughly enjoyed our lunch at the Full Moon Cafe . Awesome food!!

Watch the news clip on the local CN2 broadcast and see a glmpse of Sophie at camp on Wednesday. The footage was shot during the visit from a white siberian tiger cub from the local rescue center (Tiger World). The kids have had a great week as Camp Canaan this week. Below are a few other photos I took, at the camp’s request, on Wednesday.

White Siberian Tiger Cub about 6 weeks old

Lots of questions to ask ...

Lots of empty shoes too ...

Today was a hot one. According to a reported sighting in Pineville, NC … the town’s clock/thermometer was showing 152 degrees. Though I think it was a “little” off, it was HOT here today. We opted for traditional summertime heat relief efforts: Making Silly Faces, a trip to the airconditioned GoodWill in the swanky part of town, lunch at a nearby airconditioned ChickFilA, playtime in the sprinkler outside (while some small people napped), Little People in the airconditioned basement and of course, … more tea parties.

Well, today we had *record breaking* heat and yucky air quality. Boo. So we were in the market for fun indoor things to do today. We had art time, and the girls made pictures for Wilson as “get well pictures”. He’s at Grandma’s & Grandpa’s and not feeling well. The girls put on a ballet for me after lunch, and there was a play … “The Prince and the Piper”. I enjoyed the play so much, I forgot to take pictures of it. Piper was the Princess and Sophie dressed as a knight. There was lots of free time playing too … Little People, Toy Story, Barbie Princesses, Dance Party, Woody’s Roundup Concert, and tea party. All in all… a good day.

Day one activities at Camp Chloe: Toy Story books and interactive shows, ballet, dress ups, water park, picnic at the pool, quiet time, Woody’s Roundup Dance Party, Water themed Library Time, Sea Creature Silly Bands, and Make a Rainbow Fish.