more Disney love

I knew when I went to scrap the photos in this first layout I wanted some fun bright papers with reds, blues & yellows. Enter October Afternoon. I think they work well with the whole 'learning' theme of playhouse Disney.

Whenever we go to Disney we love to check out the new characters. This time we got to see a few, one of them was Special Agent Oso & another was Lotso Huggin' Bear...and he looooves to give hugs :)

Since Lotso is very big (seriously, my kids kept saying 'look how huge he is!!') and very pink I didn't want the color of the photos to overtake my layout. So I used one larger photo along with a strip of smaller ones on the side.

 

 I just had to include more than one photo of Lotso giving my kids big hugs :)

we love pizza planet

I created these layouts a while back & realized that I never photographed them or shared them on my blog. For shame!

So while I'm out of town for the weekend enjoying some much needed scrappy girl time I thought I'd share a few of those. And hopefully I'm finishing up my Disney scrapping at my retreat!

Since we have a few Disney trips under our belt I now prefer to create layouts based more on park/character favorites rather than all of the 'traditional' events that happen. Not that I won't scrap those, they just take more of a back seat.

Oh how we love Pizza Planet. Their pizza is super yummy (but shhh...don't tell the kids they had the same pizza over at the resort!) Still, it's good pizza. And the side ceasar salad that came with it totally cured my salad cravings that I was having that week!

I cut the round border from the patterned paper (I believe it is My Little Shoebox?) & added a different center that matched my photos better. The yellow space needed something so I added some punched clouds. 

Simple layout but cute. Just how I like 'em!

those silly chipmunks

I just received the latest Noel Mignon kit in the mail on Monday. And despite the fact that I'm leaving in 2 days for a scrapbook retreat I still had to pull it out & make at least one layout before packing it away with all of my other stuff for the weekend.

The bright papers along with the fun embellishments that Noel always packs in her kits just make me smile every month :)

Everything from this layout is from the Delightfully Domestic kit (sold out) except for the red OA alphas & OA buttons.

I'm trying to catch up on scrapping our Disney trip before it gets too far away & I can't remember all of the little details. A helpful hint about scrapping vacations - keep a journal. I usually try and jot down little things here and there during a trip that I don't want to forget. Because as much as we think we won't we all forget!

And now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go clean up the scrappy mess I just made before the 2nd appraiser comes to my house today. Somehow I don't think he'll have the same appreciation for fine papers & embellishments like I do ;)

having fun at Animal Kingdom!

I shared this layout a few weeks back over on the Noel Mignon blog but I don't think I shared it here.

Noel Mignon's Very Virginia kit used for this layout

During our Disney trip last month we spent about a day and a half over at the Animal Kingdom. The kids rode Expedition Everest multiple times (it quickly became one of their faves!) along with catching some shows, riding rides, seeing the  Jammin' Jungle parade and a special VIP safari & dinner (I'll share that one later...it was awesome).

For me it's really hard to pick a favorite park at Disney because I love them all for different reasons. But we definitely love Animal Kingdom!

a big hug for Pooh

Before I share any other Disney photos with you, I had to share these ones (and a layout). Winnie the Pooh has been my daughter's favorite character since she was very little. It was so sweet to see my just turned 9 yr old still be so happy to see her favorite buddy!

They hugged for what seemed like forever. It was pure joy for her.

My sweet Olivia, I have no doubt that you will never lose the magic. That wonderful ability you have to enjoy all of the little things in life. Never stop dreaming. I know your dreams will take you far!

And I just finished this layout for Noel Mignon. I used bits and pieces from 2 kits - Very Virginia (only 2 left!) and Sunkissed (last year's kit - sold out).

I also had a Winnie the Pooh book that I purchased a while back (probably at a garage sale or thrift market) for this purpose. I used a page for a background & then cut strips and used a border punch for the flower. 

You might also remember I used pages from this book as a drawer liner for my foyer dresser.


This layout is going in my daughter's scrapbook rather than our Disney scrapbook. I usually try to scrapbook one layout of an event or trip that is just about that specific child to put in their album. I also talked about that here.


I have many Disney photos to share (and scrap) but I'm still going through some of them. When I got home I downloaded 940 pics! Of course, some are duplicates and some are no good. But I'm thinking I may do a post on each park to break it up a bit so look for that soon :)

Well, as Pooh's friend Tigger would say, "TTFN! Ta Ta for now!"
 

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!!!

I hope you're having a wonderful start to the new year. As for myself, I'm looking forward to a new year with a whole new set of possibilies. Last year was filled with heartbreak and wonderful blessings. So we thought it'd be fun to start this year off with a trip to Disney!


My family loves Disney. We're crazy about it. All the magic, the fun, the excitement. There's nothing like it.

I've had people (not many, but some) ask why we always take our family vacation there. Why? Because it's the happiest place on earth!! And I'm taking advantage of the magic while my kids are still young. Don't get me wrong, it's magical at any age. But it's a special kind of magic for kids. 

There will be plenty of time when they're older to do all the 'other' kinds of family trips. And I'm so excited that one day I'll get to hear those little child squeals of delight in seeing a favorite Disney character...just one more time :) But that won't be for several years...


Anyway, I thought I'd share a few goodies I made for this trip. Of course, the kids always wear their Disney gear when we go. We took a trip up to Atlanta with my friend Kellie & her kids (who are also going with us to Disney) to the Disney store last week so we could stock up. I had hoped to make some appliqued shirts but I just simply ran out of time. Thank goodness my friend Christie made a couple for me!!


I also made a camera strap slipcover for the occasion...

I'm really happy with how it turned out! Btw, I'll have one of these up in the shop once I get back :)


I also make my kids' autograph books. They love having their very own books so I'm happy to do it. I'll share pics of those when we get back. You can check out the ones I made for our last trip here.

I'll leave you with one last photo...the reason I take my kids to Disney. For moments like this:

Disney autograph books - revisiting old posts

I've received more comments/questions along the way about some Disney autograph books I've made in the past. And since I didn't know hot to get a hold of some of you, I thought it'd be easiest to just do a post about it.

Whenever we go to Disney (usually every 2 yrs) I make my kids their own autograph books. I started doing this several years ago and my kids love it. In fact, when we start talking about a Disney trip one of the first questions they ask is 'are you going to make our autograph books again??!" The ones that are sold at the parks are, well, BORing. Making your own books makes them your own, personalized, and you can make them whatever size you want.

So these are the ones that I made for our trip back in January

I did not put pictures in this book. They were simply for autographs (although we could've saved some pages to put pics on later). You can see more pics here. This was only a 4 day trip so I didn't worry about having pics in the books. The pages were 4x6 and the outer chipboard cover is a bit larger than that (I think 5x7) and I used my Bind-It-All to hold it all together. I believe I put about 20 pgs in each book which would leave 40 pgs (front and back) for autographs. We get a lot of character autographs :) But again, that's the beauty of making your own book...you can put as many pages in it as you want.

These are the albums I made for our trip a few years back

I made these out of 7Gypsies albums. Now, if I made these today I would use my notebook punch and put the patterned paper all the way to the edge of the book. But anyway... my daughter's book actually had a few pockets that we put receipts, show times, etc in. We did put photos in these books so when we got character autographs we made sure to leave one side empty so we could go back and add photos when we got back. Click here to see more pics.

One final bit of advice ~ keep embellishments to a minimum. At least until you get home. Our books go in and out of our bags constantly at the parks and the more stuff you have on the front, i.e. buttons, brads, flowers, etc, the more likely stuff is going to fall off. And use really good adhesive. You'll be glad you did! I really like Elmer's extra strength glue sticks. This last trip I used their spray adhesive and it didn't hold up. I had to fix them when I got home. But their glue stick almost never fails. I hope this helps!!

favorite Disney moments

So, even though we were only at Disney for 4 days and at the parks for 3, I still managed to take a ton of photos. Around 600 to be exact. God I love my new camera!! But rather than bore you with all of them I thought I'd share some of my favorite moments from our trip :) 


The Mad Hatter kept staring at Ben and made a comment to Olivia "why does he keep staring at me like that??!!" When Ben looked away he yelled "I win!!!" That Mad Hatter, he was quite funny!

(1900 Park Fare character breakfast ~ Grand Floridian)

Fireworks at the Magic Kingdom. Need I say more??

I tried to take pics of the top half of the castle because some idiots people kept standing while everyone around them was sitting. Don't they realize that if everyone is sitting on the ground everyone gets a good view??? Some people... 

(Have I said how much I love my new camera?? Imagine how good I could be once I actually know what I'm doing!! ha!)


Watching my almost 6 yr old son play it cool around some pretty fairies like Tinkerbell, Silvermist & Rosetta. So cute to watch!

Dancing with Flik at Animal Kingdom

And the safari, always so much fun

We've done this safari during 3 different trips to Disney and this one was the best by far, and all because of the driver. At one point we went over a bridge that "almost collapsed" and the driver yelled "Lean to the right!! Save the driver!! Lean to the right!! Oh, I mean, is everyone ok??" hehe, he was great!

During a parade one of the army guys from Toy Story yelled out to Olivia "hey there Minnie!" Olivia pointed to herself as if to say "who me??" He said "yeah you, get up and dance!" So she proceeded to get up and shake it and as they were passing by he said "Now that girl knows how to party!!" hehe, it was great!

(Hollywood Studios Block Party Bash)

Disney rice krispie treats....mmmm....

Ok, that might not be one of my "favorite Disney moments" but they sure were good!!

Fun times. Oh how I love Disney for it's magic. That wonderful magic that takes you to a place that you don't ever want to leave!

 

coming down from the Disney high

After a trip to Disney there seems to be about a week of gloominess. You're happy to tell everyone about your wonderful, magical trip to Disney but at the same time sad because that wonderful trip is all over. For us, we felt that even more because this wasn't one of our "big" trips, only a long weekend trip. 3 days at the parks, not really time to do everything we wanted but enough time to have lots of fun. My son got sick on Monday morning so he wasn't feeling too good for 2 of the 3 days at the parks (except when the Tylenol kicked in!). 


My surprise to the kids went off without a hitch. They had no idea we were headed to Disney. In fact, they thought we were going to Atlanta.

Olivia was given a letter to read

It said "We're not really going to Atlanta. But don't be sad, open the envelope to find out where we're really going!"

Opening the envelopes....

Surprise!!!

SO happy to be going to Disney!!!

The resort was absolutely beautiful. I did not want to leave it behind yesterday!

I mean seriously, look at this lobby!!

A couple ducks that decided to go for a swim!

Like I said, I did not want to leave. I'm already dreaming of my next Disney trip...


(Not sure why some of my pictures uploaded weird. I tried to do this post a couple times and it kept happening. I think blogger is being a bit testy today.)