Neighborhood

When I was a small child I lived in Queens in a small apartment above a store.

It was just like this.

I wasn't there long though because apparently Queens isn't an idyllic place to raise a family.  So we packed up and moved to Queens Village.

Obviously it is very cool to live in the Queen's Village as the name implies. Under the watchful eye of royalty. In the shadow of a castle.

Okay Queens Village isn't like that at all. There are a lot of houses only separated by a driveway and a perfectly manicured lawn of 10'x10'.

That isn't to say it didn't have it's perks.

Two words: BLOCK PARTY!!

The whole street would shut down for a day and everyone would come out and talk to the neighbors. There would be Police barriers at the end of the street so kids could ride their bikes or skate their skates (my preferred mode of transportation in those days.) without concern of being flattened.

There were unsafe carnival rides that would arrive on the back of trucks run by x felons with questionable  people skills. We would eat and eat and eat until it wasn't a matter of if a child was going to vomit on the "round up" but when.

To a small child it was better than Disney World.

Jump to the present. 

Triple S and I moved into a nice neighborhood where people wave to each other every morning. Where kids ride around on bikes and play basketball in driveways.

Then they started a ladies night. One night a month all the women of the community gather in the clubhouse to chit chat about kids, decorating and guns (it is the South after all).

That was awesome but they didn't stop there. Oh no! Because we go big or go home here!

THEY PLANNED A BLOCK PARTY!!

The little Long Island girl inside of me jumped for joy. There weren't any pony rides or dangerously unsafe roller coasters but there was more food than 150 people could eat.

Those are grown men about to hulu hoop. bet you wish you lived here too.

There was a hula hoop contest and a pulled pork cook off. There was an eggs toss and croquet and cornhole. (I know that doesn't sound family friendly but trust me, it is.)

Please note Triple S' perfect form during the egg toss.

It was awesome.

So I can live with ridiculous rules about wheeled carts for garden hoses (yeah we have a rule for that) and garbage cans visible from the street (I'm not storing that smelly thing in my garage).

I'm okay with arguing about the color of my door. I'm good with all of this because my neighbors are making the pro column of living in a planned community out weight the con column but a huge margin.