Triangle Mamas

The New Playground in Town: Bad Name, Great Park

by Melissa

When I first moved to Raleigh a couple years ago, I learned pretty quickly how many great city parks there were in town.

 

That’s why when a new park opened near my house this summer, I had to check it out.  It’s quickly become our go-to park. It has a GREAT playground, some actual shade structures and some nice walking and biking trails. 

 

The only problem? The name...

 

Landfill District Park

 

Ok, I’ve been in marketing for over 10 years. I’ve named golf clubs, checking accounts and smaller things like newsletters. So I’m having a hard time figuring out why on Earth the park namers (marketers or not) decided that using the word “landfill” in the name of a park where kids play was smart. I mean, it’s LITERAL I guess but marketing isn’t about being literal.

 

Truthfully the name isn’t the only thing that might scare people away. When you drive in, you’re greeted with a chain link fence and these...

 

 

Yes, tires. Then you actually drive AROUND THE LANDFILL. Maybe it should be obvious from the name that there was a landfill at the park. But I naively thought that maybe it USED to be a landfill or something. I didn’t expect to drive around a huge mound covered in grass to get to the park.

 

Before you click away from this page and say “Gee, Mel, way to sell me on this new park!”... let me show you these:

 

 

A new modern (and CLEAN) bathroom, complete with shade structure and benches.

 

A “little kid” play structure and a couple of baby swings.

 

And a cool rock climbing thing, a rope tower and a play structure for the bigger kids. 

 

Now, isn’t that better? There’s also a few walking and biking trails.

The kids don't seem to mind the name. Big Roo would have only flinched if the name had Doody or Toot in it (ah, boys).

  

 

If you can get past the name (and the fact that it’s behind the landfill), then this is your park. In fact, the dreaded name must not be scaring away all that many people. It seems to be relatively busy anytime I’ve been there. 

 

I’ll go there. A lot, in fact. Just if someone ever asks me what park I like to take my kids to, I’ll have to always follow the name Landfill District Park with a rambling explanation of how, no really, it’s a great park!

If you ever want to join me, here's more info about the park.

When Melissa isn't critiquing the names of otherwise great parks, she's blogging about motherhood, the outdoors and marketing at Adventuroo.com.

Friday Roundup, and yes, I'm aware that it's Monday

When you are headed to a blogging conference, the last thing on your mind apparently, is blogging. I completely forgot to do our Friday Roundup last week, but since Abby actually posted (her words, not mine), I've decided Monday is in fact, not too late.

Don't take it personally - you know, the fact that I forgot about this blog last Friday. I also forgot to take all of my pants to the conference. Except for one pair of unopened leggings from Kohls. The package said large, but unfortunately, the leggings in the package were a small. I, in case you have not seen me lately, am NOT small. It made for an interesting dilemma in dressing myself.

We had a wonderful time at Type A Mom in Asheville this past weekend, even though we didn't get to play Rockband this year. That was a smidge disappointing, but we are going to plan better for next year. Having Sunday be the second full day sort of threw off my whole footing. I don't know why, but I wasn't expecting that.

So last week, here is what we were talking about:

Melissa is continuing her fabulous MomComm Mondays where she gives out tips on social media. Last week she had some great ideas for Twitter. Check out 9 Things to Tweet About from Adventuroo.

Make sure you have a chance to meet Sue's little Queen B. She is such a cutie, I can hardly stand it!

Over at Tales from a Marketing Mama, Erin is contemplating the effects of the addition of another baby to their family. She is due with number two, and feeling a little nervous about it. I can totally relate.

Andrea's getting sentimental about The Price Is Right and completely cracking me up. I love it too, by the way, Andrea.

Ilina's time volunteering at her sons' school inspired her to write a post in praise of teachers.

"You don't slap your own ass in pilates." If that doesn't make you want to go read Cyndi's post on the pole dancing class she tried through a coupon on Living Social, then I don't know what will.

I was delighted to see that Abby posted her guide to painting furniture this week. I was getting ready to paint the furniture for Christopher and Colin's new room, and the only guides I could find on the internet were ridiculously involved. I KNEW my friend Abby had a better way, so I called her to ask. The resulting conversation had me in stitches. Click on over to see her incredibly efficient, effective, and hilarious guide to painting furniture.

And me? Well, I opened my big mouth about the Katy Perry skit that Sesame Street released on the internet this past week. It was a little song she did with Elmo where she was playing dress up in a very adult costume. I wasn't alone in that opinion. Enough parents complained that Sesame Street won't be airing that clip in the new season, but Mel on BlogHer thinks it was a big to-do about nothing. 

So that's what we have been up to. What's new in your world? Oh, and do you live around here? We would love to add you as a contributor. The pay stinks, but the community is lovely. Let me know.

Dirt and Noise: Raymond Cook Makes Me Sick

by Ilina

I’ve been sick. I missed my birthday festivities and didn’t even have any cake. And you know how much I love cake. While I was in the middle of my pity party, I saw some news.

You might remember when I wrote about a careless drunk doctor who slammed into an innocent ballet dancer and took her life. About a year ago, Raymond Cook took to the wheel after several too many cocktails. He was driving at speeds that only hubris and a ne’er care less attitude could fuel. Some people at a local tavern tried to stop him, but didn’t want to get punched in the face or something so they let the doc go. I don’t know exactly what transpired that night, but there were accounts of people trying to stop Raymond Cook from driving. I’ve worked in bars and have taken a patron’s keys and called a cab on more than one occasion. Sure, I got cussed out but I didn’t care. All I know about the night Raymond Cook drove off from a local bar’s parking lot is this:

20-year old Elena Shapiro died.

42-year old Raymond Cook walked away unscathed.

Click here to read the rest of Ilina's post at Dirt and Noise and leave a comment.

Friday Roundup 2

It may have been quiet around here this week, but our bloggers have been busy at their own sites. I hope you have a moment to click through and check out what they have been up to!

Remember Abby's no-good-terrible-awful run of refrigerator luck? Yeah. That didn't really end. It wasn't enough to just spoil TWO rounds of food and meals, it had to go and beat her up too.

Cyndi celebrated her ninth anniversary with her wonderful husband this week. She spent some time considering naming conventions; who takes whose name, what happens when you take each other's names, and what do the kids do with all of those names later on in life?

Erin is proving her talents in marketing by renaming the hilariously ill-named new double stroller from Bugaboo. Let's just say that they might should check our her resume before they launch any new products. Also, maternity overalls. With hooker heels. Oh my.

Many congratulations to Andrea for her first post as a regular contributor to WRAL's GO Ask Mom! blog as their faith blogger. She had a guest post earlier this summer, and they obviously liked it since they've invited her to come on for a monthly column. GO check it out!

I love it when Ilina dons her cape and takes on the world. Especially the food industry world. And most especially the disgusting bastardization of the Bento lunches that can be so incredibly cute (and no, that link isn't to a Triangle blogger, but could you just DIE from the cuteness of those healthy lunches?). She's on it, peeps, and you should take a listen.

Just how many bags do you have in use right this very moment? Mel's are taking over her home and car. I have to admit, since I pledged never to carry another bag that wasn't made by Holly Aiken or myself, I have gotten a pretty good handle on my bag issues.

Sue has questions. I know you have answers. Hop on over to Motherhood and Me to leave a comment about how you balance your online life in your real life. I haven't left a comment, because has I've demonstrated this year, I suck at it. If my real life gets busy, I just ditch the internet completely. *Ahem* poor neglected Triangle Mamas blog *Ahem*

And me? Well, I finally got my piano moved into our new studio space. That may sound kind of boring, but I assure you, you WANT to click over and see the pictures of the incredibly GIANT man in black who shouldered the main weight of my 900 pound piano up a flight of stairs. It was amazing. Terrifying, and amazing. 

The most wonderful news we have is that Kelly had a beautiful baby girl. Welcome to the world, Stella Quinn. We are so happy you are here.

How about you? What have you been up to this week?

Friday Roundup

You might have noticed that Triangle Mamas has some spurts of silence. That would be because we are all volunteers, and we all have other blogs that we are maintaining. Or, if you are me, you might just be entirely too wrapped up in the delicious baby in your arms to bother with the computer.

In case you are just following Triangle Mamas and not all of its fabulous bloggers individually, we are going to start offering a Friday Roundup which will highlight our bloggers in their other spaces over the week. I hope you will enjoy the links!

Abby is recovering from a truly craptastic month. I hope, at the very least, that the firefighters were really cute and shirtless. 

Cyndi has been pondering the odd things that come out of her mouth as a mama. I never say anything odd like, "Don't paint your penis."

Sue has been traveling. And traveling. And traveling. In her travels, she managed to take my most favorite picture of a cow EVER. It's the first one in the post, and I'm going to ask her if I can have a copy. Oh, and her kids had a great time at the South Mountain Creamery too. But that cow is adorable.

Ilina has been speaking up for all of the children in our community. Poverty is not a choice, and the list of things children living in poverty don't have is endless. 

Melissa wrote a hilarious letter to her sleep fighting baby, but I'm linking up to this great picture of her oldest son and his jedi, Burt.

Andrea has been contemplating diversity within her own life and her home in a transitional neighborhood.

Technically, this is from last week, but Erin has NEWS! Congratulations, Erin!

And me? Well, I've been doing the Facebook purge. It felt great, by the way.

Happy reading! Hope you have a great weekend!

A Mudcats Comedy of Errors

This past Sunday, we planned a family outing to see a minor league baseball game -- sounds like the perfect summer evening, right? I mean, what could possibly go wrong at a Mudcats game?

Well, where do I start?

Maybe with the rain, that ruined the first game we tried to see three weeks ago. After driving through a few light showers on our way out to Five County Stadium (Groupon in hand, of course), we discovered that the afternoon game was cancelled.

But as annoying as that trip was, it was only the beginning of our Mudcats mishaps. Here's a snapshot of all the things that went wrong when we tried again this past Sunday night:

• There was the parking attendant who tried to keep our change for the parking pass.
• Then we got the second parking attendant who told us we'd parked badly (even though we'd done just fine).
• And in case that wasn't enough, we met the third parking attendant (sent to track us down by the second parking attendant) who took my husband back to the car and made him move it back 18 inches.
• Once inside, the people sitting in our reserved seats furnished tickets with the exact same seat numbers on them, although he cleverly held his finger over the date on the tickets. Then my sweet husband went down to the box office, asked for four new tickets and declined to have the other people thrown out -- sadly the seats weren't as good and it took us a walk around the entire park to find them.
• They only sell hot dogs at certain concession areas, not all. Which seems ridiculous, since I go to baseball games specifically for hot dogs (not pizza or chicken sandwiches). After waiting in a very long line (made even longer because they didn't seem prepared to actually serve any hot dogs at the end of the 2nd inning) and handing over every single dollar in our pockets (because they only took cash and over-charged for every item), the hot dogs tasted more microwave than grill. Average at best and very disappointing.
• Did I mention that the rather active smoking area was parked beside the food line we were standing in? 
• After walking around the entire park, arms filled with food, drinks and children, we finally arrived at our new seats. Which were filled. Again. Thankfully there was an usher there this time to shoo the offenders back into their own seats. Which they were quite annoyed about.
• As we filed into our row near 3rd base, exhausted by the effort, we looked down to see the floor littered with peanuts and peanut shells crunching under the feet of our peanut-allergic son.

At this point, I looked at my husband with a desperate attempt at a smile and said, "I'm telling you now. If I get hit with a foul ball, it's over. We will be on national television, and I better get paid well for my 15 minutes of fame."

Thankfully, we left without further incident at the 7th inning stretch and made it safely home in time to tuck the kids in bed and fall out on the couch.

In defense of the Mudcats operation, everyone on staff inside the park was very courteous and helpful. But sadly it wasn't enough to make me want to go back any time soon. Guess it's just as well that the season is over -- gives me time to recover before spring training.

Cross-posted from My Convertible Life, where Cyndi writes about surviving all of life's craziness with the top down and two car seats in the back. For a more concise version of Cyndi, follow her on Twitter @convertiblelife.