Recently in Movies Category

I love Hayao Miyazaki movies, Spirited Away is one of my all time favorite movies. So you can imagine my excitement when Ponyo came out so I can share it with my tots. We made a whole day out of it - we had lunch and I even promised she can have popcorn and Coke! We got all settled in and the movie begins with the beautiful imagery Miyazaki is known for, it is truly art. I was so happy and I turned to look at my daughter expecting to see a great big smile but instead, her hands were held over her mouth and she had the look of sheer terror in her eyes. We were only 10 minutes in! I held her on my lap and asked if she can give it another chance but I can tell she was really terrified so we left =( I did research and watched all the trailers beforehand, too, and nothing tipped me off as anything other than a sweet story about a fish and a boy. Now thinking about it, Miyazaki movies do have a dark cast to the theme and the bad guys are always eerily evil. The general mood of the movie jars your sense just a tad with the strange visuals and creatures, which makes you on edge and slightly uncomfortable. Maybe that was it because Ponyo, the goldfish with a real face, is totally adorable and the boy is the sweetest ever. Either way I am disappointed I didn't get to finish the movie and will now probably have to wait for DVD. If your tot is easily unnerved, I would probably skip this and save it for date night. The good news is, the theater manager gave me passes for us to go back for another movie.

Easter has a lot of fun craft and cute trinkets but instead of throw away toys and sugary treats, here are some goodies that will be nice to keep around long after the hunt is over.

This Whimsical Felt House, $72, is a sweet dollhouse for little friends or fill it with toys to bring on the road.

Not much needs to be said about little girls and their bags, this Bunny Face Goody Bag, $10, will be her favorite accessory all season.

The Bunnyville Egg Hunt pop-up book, $15, is my favorite of the bunch here. It's super cute and everyone enjoys the excitement of a pop up book!

My 3 1/2 year old daughter loves Sleeping Beauty - the character that is. I was really excited to get the special release of Sleeping Beauty, the movie, that came out recently, only to find that this movies scares the bejesus out of her. I do admit she is a bit more squeamish than most but this movie is very dark and ominous. There is way too much of Malificent, as famous as she is for being the most popular of Disney's villains, she is definitely not cute and the scenes with her in it depict a hellish sort of environment. And then she turns into a dragon and it was all over at that point. Well, it was over way before that for my daughter but for me it was the last straw as well. Who makes movies like this for kids? And even as a movie for an adult (me), the story telling is not the kind of narrative we are used to with contemporary animation. This was more of a read-out-loud story with a slide show. Although I do appreciate the animation itself, this was totally remastered and restored to show the amazing hand drawn images, it has a very odd feel and mood that borders on morose. If you are a Disney fan, I don't need to tell you whether to get this movie or not, but if you have a happy, bright eyed 3 year old, do not ruin her day with this. Or worse, she now won't wear her Sleeping Beauty costume for Halloween because of this trauma so I have to get her another costume!