Beth Blair

Archive for the ‘Fun Stuff’ Category

Last month my husband and two children took one of our whimsical family road trips through the East Coast. We drove through Chicago and ventured up to Buffalo and Niagara Falls, Lake Placid, Hershey and several other towns and cities. One of our stops was Philadelphia. As a PBS Sprout Expert, I’ve written for the site, and as a Band of Bloggers member, we were invited to stop in the Comcast building, the tallest building in the city, to see the PBS Spout office and studio. I was hoping  for a quick hello to the staff, but we were offered more than that. We had the chance of a lifetime – especially for my young children.

We had met the sweet host of the PBS Sprout Sunny Side Up Show Dennisha Pratt and her puppet friend Chica during a live filming!

While my son’s spinning wheels tried to figure out the logistics of the set and Chica, my daughter was completely enthralled with the experience and said meeting Chica was the best part of the trip.

Even my husband and I were intrigued by the visit. We discovered the Sunny Side Up Show is show is extremely cost-effective and while the show is produced in Philadelphia it is transmitted from the Comcast Media Center in Denver. Our biggest surprise was how incredibly small the set was, especially because it looks so much more spacious on TV. It was quite an event seeing the show in the works and seeing the cheery and colorful PBS Sprout office.

Before our departure we had a fun photo op, we sat in the former Good Night Show chair (see photo) and already have the picture in a frame at home.

Thank you PBS Sprout for inviting us to meet Dennisha and Chica and see your magical world. What a wonderful memory it was for our family!

After “National Lampoon’s Vacation” Clark Griswold became an American road trip icon dad while the Wagon Queen Family Truckster (aka the Griswold station wagon) represented the the 80′s popular mode of transportation (the Swagger Wagon of yesteryear). It’s special to me because my parents drove a very similar station wagon. My folks would pile us five kids in our own wood-panel wagon and drive us through the byways of Louisiana and Mississippi or to the Alabama and Florida beaches. Those trips are what inspired me to pursue travel as a career.

More recently though, you might remember the HomeAway Super Bowl advertising campaign featuring Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo. Well, the Wagon Queen Family Truckster featured in the commercial is on the road this summer from Memorial Day to Labor Day promoting HomeAway vacation rentals.  The wagon is stopping at destinations across America and this past weekend it came though the Twin Cities. The timing was perfect because it was the weekend of the Minnesota Red Bull Flugtag (homemade flying contraption competition) and there was an entry called Team Griswold, aka Team 20. The Family Truckster Team designed the green station wagon with wings!  We attended the event and even saw Team Griswold “fly.” It looked great and even came in 3rd place (the world record was broken by the 1st place winner). After that we headed over to Minneapolis restaurant Joe’s Garage where the Truckster was parked.

HomeAway had asked me if I’d like to be part of their promotion and ride in the Truckster as one of their bloggers this summer. I had to decline but my friend Jennifer Miner is going to be representing The Vacation Gals on a stretch of the trip departing from Seattle this weekend. She’ll have a great time.

While I didn’t get to ride in the Truckster my family did snap some photos with this famous station wagon. If you do the same as it comes through your town, be sure to enter the contest on Facebook. HomeAway is giving away a few vacations this summer.

A couple of weeks ago I met up with some fabulous ladies from The Blog Pantry (a Twin Cities, Minnesota blog/networking site). This group of bloggers meet every so often for various social, fundraising and networking events. The blogging topics range from culinary to health to PR to parenting and everything in between. Local businesses frequently sponsor the events, including this particular gathering. Mom’s Best Naturals offered samples and cereal boxes to take home and France 44 supplied the delicious wine, goat cheese and crackers. Photographer Elissa Bean Kadue kindly opened up her colorful Little Bean Photography studio for our event and was extremely generous to offer every blogger a fresh, professional headshot (see my photo on the left). Most of the ladies, like me, were using random photos for their social media avatars, but now I’m seeing the other ladies’ black and white shots popping up on Twitter and Facebook. They all turned out gorgeous. I’ve updated my Gravatar and other social media sites with this new photograph so you will be seeing my new photo around too.

If you live in Minnesota and are thinking about family photos, I’d highly recommend Elissa, so give her a call. She makes the process painless and if you’d like to see her work, check out her amazing online portfolio. She has a sure talent for working with kids.

A big thank you to Elissa and the other sponsors for their generosity.

If you’d like to see what the The Blog Pantry ladies are up to – follow Twitter hashtag: #MNBlogPantry.