Category Archives: Read To Me Dad

Book, Disney, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Review, Vlog

Read to me, Dad – Some Disney Books -Frozen, Palace Pets

Playing nicely
Photo-A-Day #4233

Occasionally I receive books from Disney Press, Disney Hyperion and Disney Book Group. What follows is some information about each of the books that I received and my honest opinion.

The first book is the Frozen Adventure Guide (aff link) which is for the older child of 8-12 years. It goes for $12.99 and is in hardcover. This is for Frozen Northern Lights. Disney Channel did some Frozen Northern Lights shorts this Summer with LEGO the books are starting to appear now. However, the books are not LEGO based. This notebook looks like it was re-purposed from Oaken, the trader. It was his book of inventions and has since become a book of adventures of Elsa, Anna, and Kristoff on their journey to the Northern Lights.

I also got four books about Disney Palace Pets. These are great for the younger kids. Two of them: Sultan’s Triumphs and Petite’s Great Feats are books with puzzles and a mini Palace Pets toy. Sultan’s Triumphs (aff link) is about Princess Jasmine’s pet, Sultan the tiger. The other book, Petite’s Great Feats (aff link) is about Princess Belle’s pony. The other two books: Ms. Featherbon and the Holiday Helpers: Read Along Storybook and CD (aff link), and Berry’s Halloween Costume Trouble: Read Along Storybook and CD (aff link). Both books are $6.99 and they are already out in stores. The whole Disney Palace Pets thing is cute and great for the younger kids. Eva liked them for a while but has outgrown them. They’ll either make their way to my niece and nephew or to Christmas is for Kids.

The last book is called Queen Dog (aff link). I got an advanced copy of this that was unbound. The newest one that I got is complete and it is hardcover. This is a cute little story that is going to be released on January 3, 2017 for $16.99. I read this a few times to Andrew and he liked it very much. You can see all the books in the video below.

Book, Disney, Food, LEGO, Movie, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Skylanders, Toys, Video Game, Vlog

National Pancake Day and Super Secret News

Skylanders Coloring With Andrew
Photo-A-Day #4184

Exciting things are happening here. After coming home coloring a big Skylanders coloring page with Andrew and then taking him to school I was able to get about an hour and a half of sleep. When I picked him up from school I took him over to Morin’s for Breakfast for lunch. Today is National Pancake Day and I was craving a short stack. I prepared it the way that Bosch does in the Amazon series, Bosch. He puts the syrup on the plate and then puts the pancakes on top of that. It is a good way to enjoy them.

We got home and cleaned up the backyard a bit. Some weeding, cleaning up and removing some fallen branches.

After the cleanup we came inside and opened a couple of LEGO Dimensions Funk Packs that I had purchased. We opened Emmet from The LEGO Movie and Slimer from Ghostbusters.

Tonight I got some great news which I’ll share with you very soon. All I can say right now is that I am so excited about it!

I also received a beautiful new Disney Book today. It is Disney Frozen: A Pop-Up Adventure by Matthew Reinhart. This was sent to me for free and I’m giving my honest opinion on it in the video below.

Book, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Vlog

Book Delivery: Moana Books and a New Mo Willems Book

Book Delivery: Moana Books and a New Mo Willems Book
Photo-A-Day #4177

Today I received five new books in the mail. These were from Disney-Hyperion and I received them for free. I’ll be doing an actual review of them close to when the movie, Moana is released. I wouldn’t want to spoil it for anyone.

Four of the books were for the movie Moana and the fifth book is a new one from Mo Willems. We love Mo Willems in this house. The new book, Nanette’s Baguette (affiliate link) is a funny story about a young girl off to buy her first baguette on her own. This will be out in stores on October 25th for $17.99. I love this little blurb about the book.

“Set in a meticulously handcrafted-paper-modeled French village, the uniquely vibrant laugh-out-loud world of Nanette’s Baguette may be Mo’s best creation yet. Get set to krack into an irresistible tale you won’t soon forget!“

The other four books are related to the movie Moana. There is a beautiful children’s picture book, a coloring book, a story book with a CD and a young adult novelization of the movie. These are all beautiful books and they make me even more excited for the movie to be released on November 23, 2016. One of the books, The Story of Moana: A Tale of Courage and Adventure (affiliate link), is something that I know Eva is going to want to read. I want to read it as well but I want to be surprised by the movie.

Family, Food, Friends, Movie, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Vlog

Eva is Discovering Harry Potter

About to watch Harry Potter
Photo-A-Day #4162

Today was a great day not to be at work. Well, actually any day not at work is a great day, but today worked out so well. A while back a friend of mine, Sarah, had invited the whole family to a party at her house. I automatically said that I can’t go because it was on a weekend. That is my usual response. However, I took today off because tomorrow we are going to King Richard’s Faire. So, when I saw something about the party come up on my Facebook feed, I checked with Allison and we decided to go. It was even better that the drive to Sarah’s house takes less time than it does for Andrew to buckle himself in. I can’t believe how close she lives. The party was great. Everything was so laid back. We just brought our chairs and our bathing suits and ourselves. Sarah took care of everything else.

Cake Time

Andrew started off shy but then he was all about his personality and he was up and down the inflatable waterslide over and over. Then he was jamming out to the live band that they had. The band was called “Last Call” and they were a lot of fun, doing great covers. Food was plentiful and a couple more of my friends from college were there. My friend Laurie and her boys and my friend Meg and her son and husband. It was great to see them. I had not seen them in forever. Here is our photo together.

Saint Anselm Friends

Continue reading Eva is Discovering Harry Potter →

Book, Disney, LEGO, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Review, Toys, Video Game, Vlog

3D Animals, A Very Fluffy Kitty and Aquaman!

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LEGO Dimensions Aquaman Fun Pack
Photo-A-Day #4159

Andrew and I started off our morning by playing some LEGO Dimensions. We played through a couple of the levels together and then we got to a point where we needed Aquaman. I had purchased that Fun Pack a little while ago and I told him. Andrew wanted to go and get it right away so I figured, what the heck, let him open it up and build it. He’d love it. Andrew did a great job building the figure and the vehicle.

When Eva came home we worked on a review for The EXTRAORDINAIRES. She did a great job on it. I will be posting that up separately but you can see the video review for The EXTRAORDINAIRES on YouTube.

We also took out the 3D-Motokits to build them today. I helped Andrew build the Dinosaur (Easy) and Eva built the Elephant (Hard). Eva was done faster than I was. I did have Andrew with me. He decided that he would punch out all the pieces first. Of course, when you are following the directions you need to know which pieces are the ones to use. I installed the motor incorrectly and then had to take it apart. Eva did the same but I was able to pop it out and put it back easily. I was very impressed with how well Eva worked on the 3D-Motokit. The kits are $4.99 each and we received them for free to give an honest review. Continue reading 3D Animals, A Very Fluffy Kitty and Aquaman! →

Family, Movie, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Video Game, Vlog

Eating Less, Decluttering and Disney’s Haunted Mansion

Mini Sliders with Wickles and sriracha Mustard
Photo-A-Day #4104

We’ve been trying to cut down our portions and eat better. Today’s photo is of some mini sliders that we made for dinner tonight. A cheeseburger with wickles, a pickle and some sriracha mustard. Then a nice salad and some milk. And I even packed things for snacks at work. All help from the dietician and Allison.

It was a good day for decluttering the house. I worked on packing up the DVDs and old games that we were selling to decluttr. This is an online service where you scan in all of your DVDs, CDs, Games and other item, box them up and send them for free to decluttr. They then pay you for the items. You know what they will pay for each item when you scan them. Suffice to say they don’t pay much but that isn’t the overall objective. The overall objective is to declutter our house. These movies and games haven’t been touched in years. They are just taking up space and won’t be missed. It is finding out what to do with the rest of the ones that do not qualify for decluttr that is the issue. Some games can’t be scanned to be sold because they are part of a set. Others go with items like Guitars from Guitar Hero. I may keep that just because the kids might enjoy that when they get a little older. I sent three large boxes to decluttr.

While I was doing the DVDs and video games Allison was tackling the bookshelf and we have a huge donation for the library. I’ve got to go through the books too and that will clear out a bunch more. I hope the library will still be collecting donations.

When I went to the UPS Store to drop off the boxes for decluttr I went to the comic book store to pick up my comics. I am so behind on reading them at this point. I’ve got to start taking some time to go through all the ones I’ve gotten and read them all. Then read the ones I’ve been picking up for Eva so that she can read them with me.

In addition to comics books I need to read I also received two new books from Disney Press. I got them for free and am under no obligation to do anything particular with them. However, I highlight them in today’s vlog and will tell you about them below. These are books pertaining to Disney’s The Haunted Mansion. One is an illustrated book with the lyrics to the classic song “Grim Grinning Ghosts” the song that plays while you are on the ride. The illustrations are beautiful and it comes with a CD featuring the song “Grim Grinning Ghosts” and this is one of the first of the Disney Parks Presents picture books. A must have for any Disney Parks obsessed fan. This book is on sale now for $14.99 and is for ages 3-5, or that Disney kid who never grew up.

The second book is a short novel called “Tales from the Haunted Mansion: Volume 1: The Fearsome Foursome”. This is the first book in a series that will highlight one of the 999 ghosts from the Haunted Mansion. If anyone has 999 stories to tell it would be Disney. The book is for ages 8-12 and has some spooky fun. The book centers around The Fearsome Foursome – four kids who look to out-scare each other. However, they may be the ones completely scared when they find out what Amicus Arcane the librarian and host, Ghost Host, has to tell them. This book goes on sale July, 19 for $14.99.

Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Toys, Vlog

Attleboro Library Summer Reading Kickoff

Super Sized Marble Run
Photo-A-Day #4083

On the last Friday of the school year Andrew and I had an active and fun day. We started rather lazy at home where we played some Splatoon and also watching some Phineas and Ferb. Those are two things that he enjoys so much. We hung around home till around 1pm because we were going to a fun event at a local park to kick off Summer Reading. We had learned about it from our last day of Playgroup.

There are a lot of good programs for kids and families in my city. I’m really appreciative of the programs and they have been very beneficial to our kids. Both Eva and Andrew have attended the free playgroups. I’ve enjoyed the past few years taking Andrew to Playgroup. He’s made some nice friends and I’ve met some nice people to talk with. We saw a bunch of our friends at this free event. There were all sorts of things to do like Face Painting, the High School Band led a parade, some obstacle courses and even giveaways. I signed the kids up for the reading challenge and renewed my library cards. I even signed myself up for the Adult Summer Book reading.

We had a fun time which also included a trip to Tex Barry’s for our lunch. When it was over we headed home and Andrew was exhausted and if I had taken the long way home I’m sure he would have slept but his face was covered in face paint and I didn’t really want him getting his sheets covered in it. So I took him home and he wanted me to wash his face paint off right away, glad we waited in line for 25 minutes. Then we went up to my bed and watched some Netflix. I tried to sleep but that didn’t happen. I did have some time with my eyes closed so that is something.

Book, Disney, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Travel, Vlog

Returning Home to a Magical Delivery of Disney Books

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May the 4th be with You!
Photo-A-Day #4041

I travelled home from California today. I didn’t vlog anything until I was home. The whole trip back I was watching shows and reading comics and sleeping. It is a long trek back and forth to California. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the trip. It is the getting there that is tough.

When I got home there were a few packages waiting for me and one that I didn’t recognize as coming but it was from Disney Publishing. So many great books were inside, too. I show you them in the video below.

Book, Comic Book, Disney, Movie, Photo-A-Day, Read To Me Dad, Toys, Vlog

Deadpool, Batman, Superman and Mii

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Captain Ameri-Pool and Phonics Killer Iron-Deadpool
Photo-A-Day #3935

I bought the above Deadpools Assemble Minimates back in the Summer but haven’t opened them up as of yet. However, with the Deadpool movie coming out I wanted to open up the set so that I could display them, play with them and take a bunch of photos of them. The set is pretty great too, so many fun accessories. I love the accessory that looks like Thor’s hammer spinning around. That was a a nice touch.

Our surprise shipment from Disney Publishing of the Zootopia Books was great. The kids loved the books and I enjoyed reading them to the kids. I didn’t realize that the read-a-long would be the whole movie, sure there are some parts left out but I know the whole plot now. I don’t think that it would have been a major surprise otherwise but it does have some fun twists. I now think of it as a sort of Disney version of 48 Hours, the Nick Nolte/ Eddie Murphy movie in that Judy Hopps has 48 hours to solve a crime. That and she is teamed up with a less than trustworthy character in Nick Wilde. It should be a very funny movie overall. I can’t wait to take the kids to see it and also to get to play the Disney Infinity 3.0 figures of Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde. More in the vlog including what I thought of many Batman and Superman animated movies.

Read To Me Dad, Review

Reading Rainbow DVD and Skybrary

Reading Rainbow DVD

We received a copy of the new Reading Rainbow DVD, “Reading Rainbow: Animal Café” to watch and review. We also received a trial membership to the all new Skybrary. Opinions are 100% my own. This is something I was truly excited to get a chance to work with this brand because Reading Rainbow was an amazing series and I am glad that it is available online for my kids to experience. Both of the kids love reading and Eva is already a high level reader at 7 1/2 years old. She’s reading chapter books like they are going out of style. Andrew has expressed a bunch of interest in reading and is making huge progress. Having two readers in the family is excellent especially since Allison and I love reading so much that a floor to ceiling bookshelf was one of the major reasons why we bought the house that we did.

The DVD was a fun introduction to Reading Rainbow for the kids. I liked looking back through the years to New York City. I think we will have many fun conversations around the hair and clothing styles from the past decades. Seeing the books come to life and being read by many famous people was also fun. I look forward to discovering so much more through Skybrary.

Here is some information about the new Reading Rainbow DVD as well as Skybrary. Continue reading Reading Rainbow DVD and Skybrary →