Scrappy Saturday

Just posting to share another layout that I made for Shimelle's crop weekend last week! I love her sketches, and the freedom they give for interpretation! I am scrapping Disney photos (at least some of them!) while it's still fresh in my mind, and this was one of those moments that I did not want to forget! I followed a prompt for June over at Disneyscrappers, "All Spaced Out", for this page about Spaceship Earth:

 A little peek at the "Hidden Mickey" on my page:

The supplies for this page came almost entirely from my June Counterfeit Kit, and I painted the DIY Thickers with silver Distress paint, which I was also going to use the chevron mask to apply to the navy patterned paper, but it bled all under the stencil, so I just smeared it all over the navy constellation paper and rubbed off the excess with a paper towel. I added all sorts of little bits of washi tape, mist droplets, stickers from the sticker book, brads, star studs, and little punched stars to cover my stamping mistakes (p.s. don't try to stamp without a stamping block unless you want a messed up stamping look!LOL!).  The journaling says: "Natalie was my little "ride buddy" for most of the rides. As we settled into our seats on Spaceship Earth, she exclaimed, "It's a time machine, Mommy!" Isn't that cool?!"
I just thought that was the cutest thing for her to say, so I had to record it!
The sketch that (sort-of) inspired this page:

Saying Goodbye to an Old Friend

*Edited to add the link to 2Peas Cookbook HERE -hope you all enjoy these recipes as much as I have!
At 1:30 pm yesterday, I saw that Two Peas In a Bucket would be closing down. Two Peas has been so much more than a scrapbook store for me! It was one of the main reasons that I talked my husband into getting the internet in our home many years ago, because I had read about this great site in Creating Keepsakes magazine, and I wanted to visit it and be a part of this community. Even though I never really posted as much as some people, or used the site as a stepping stone to become a famous scrapbooker like some, it was a sight that I have always visited daily! I have learned so much from the Peas about scrapbooking, and life in general. Here is a glimpse of my profile at 2Peas:

If you would like to look at my pages on 2Peas, you can see them HERE , at least as long as they are available there. The first page I ever posted on 2Peas was this one:

I was so proud of this page, mostly because I loved the photo. I see many "mistakes", but the start of so many treasured memories as well! I am reminded by looking at it how I started out as an 8 1/2 x 11 scrapper, mostly so I could share my layouts via scanner to 2peas. I see a sweet little girl that is a sophomore in high school now, and that makes me want to cry. I see the beginnings of a hobby and many friendships that mean so much to me. And I still see things about this page that I love. I love the textured photo mat tied with raffia.  I love the fact that I used my own handwriting, too! But oh, how far my skills in scrapbooking and photography have come since then, and how technology has changed since then!
My most recently shared page, using a selfie from my iphone:

Still handwritten journaling! Much more layering, 12x12, and so much lovely product is available to me now-back then, I had one little clear plastic box of supplies that I kept under my bed. Now, I am working on putting a scrapbook room full of supplies together. Which, of course, I was so looking forward to sharing on 2Peas. But I will, of course, share my progression on my room here.

So, I guess this post is to say thank you, more than anything. Thank you, 2Peas for the many late nights of inspiration, hours spent reading "Pea Soup", and and perusing beautiful layouts when I couldn't sleep. Thank you, 2Peas, for inspiring me to be a better scrapbooker myself. Thank you, 2Peas, for all of the wonderful people I met through challenges, the message boards, CHA chats, and the friendships that I have developed because of them. Thank you, 2Peas for the inspiration to develop my photography skills, and the wonderful people on the Photography board that helped me to learn my camera, and taught me how to "see the light" through my lens. Thank you, 2Peas, for the NSBR board, where I got so much life news for a while, where I got so many recipes (several recipe books worth!), and where I learned about Flylady and the Pioneer Woman (my family thanks you for these!). Thank you, 2Peas, for the Swap board, where I swapped many times over a few years, made lovely friends, and learned to make lovely layered embellishments (I still have many beautiful goodies from these swaps in my stash, and a couple more recipe books from these swaps as well!). Thank you, 2Peas, for the General Scrappin board, where my heart stayed throughout- I was challenged and inspired many ways. To buy a Cricut, to start a blog, to start Project Life, far too many to name. Thank you 2Peas, for all of the wonderful weekly classes. I learned so much from Glitter Girl, Jill Sprott, and all of the others. The videos have been my friends as I cleaned and folded laundry, or just whenever I wanted to be inspired. So to sum it all up, THANK YOU Two Peas In A Bucket! For all of the memories, for everything! You have given me so much more than I have given you, and I will ever be grateful. You have made my life richer!

CKCB Members Blog Hop

Welcome to the CKCB Members blog hop, where we all get to show off what we did this month with our Counterfeit Kit Challenge kits! This month, I pulled a fun, colorful kit together from my stash:

I had great plans and intentions to use it all month in all sorts of crafty endeavors, but I made this page of my nephew and me, using a Scrapbook Circle Sketch:

and then, my kit sat in my scrap basket mostly untouched for the rest of the month.
The sketch I used:

When I heard that Shimelle was having a crop this past weekend, I knew it would be just the boost in my creativity that I needed!

I have a huge stack of Disney photos to scrap, so I figured I would work on them for a while. I combined the CKC Tone On Tone challenge  with this fantastic sketch from Shimelle:

And I came up with this page:

I still have to journal on it, but, plan to write about meeting the princesses after midnight, and how funny Rapunzel was. I loved her interaction with the girls!

I also used a "Spaced Out" challenge from Disney Scrappers and combined it with this sketch from Shimelle's blog:

To make this page:

So, tons of scrappy fun this past weekend! What have you done with your kits? On all of my Disney pages, I am adding "Hidden Mickey's", some with a punch, some with brads or enamel dots, since my kids took an interest in finding the hidden Mickeys at the parks and hotel.

If you would like to see what the other CKCB members were up to this month, here is the list- take a few minutes, and you are sure to be inspired!

CKCB    http://www.counterfeitkitchallenge.blogspot.com
Jemma  http://just-jimjams.blogspot.co.uk
Tina       http://tinasscrapcorner.blogspot.com
Margie   http://scrappinmargie.blogspot.com  * You Are Here
Lesley   http://ohblogitifyoucantbeatthem.blogspot.co.uk  *Go Here Next
Virginia  http://celtichouse.blogspot.co.uk
Cindy    http://www.cindyscreations-cinmfoster.blogspot.com
Lisa       http://lisahausmann.blogspot.de

Bathrooms, Disney Style

Sharing a quick photo of the "Tangled" tower:

If I hadn't told you, would you believe that it's a bathroom?

June Stash Kit

I always take a peek at the CKC blog to see what they have to inspire us, and I love the bright, happy colors that they used this month, so I got to work and pulled a kit together from my stash:

Papers only:

The hardest part of kit making for me? Editing down to a managable size! I love big, full kits, but if I put too much stuff in it, it overwhelms me and I don't use it.

Check Out This New Collection...

By Webster's Pages:

See the full collection on Webster's Pages' blog, here:
 http://websterspages.com/blog/Introducing_ocean_melody_by_adrienne_looman/#.U5i5kCigpDw

I must have it all! It is perfect for scrapping my photos from the beach!

#RockYourDisneySide 24-Hour Party, Part 2

We did watch Wishes (the Magic Kingdom fireworks show) from Frontierland, and Caitlin videotaped part of it, but I didn't get any photos of it, because I left my tripod that I had been lugging for hours on one of the rides (oh well, it was cheap and I didn't like it anyway!). After quite a few rides, it was getting late, and I really wanted to see the Villians "It's Good To Be Bad" Pre-Parade Show:

(Photo from ThrillGeek)

 

(Photos from Inside The Magic)

My cell phone snaps(not nearly as good):

I loved it! So much fun to be on the front row of this one! Evan snuck in a ten minute nap sitting up, and I saw a couple of marraige proposals, all while we were waiting for this to start! So cool!

After the parade, I got a quick shot of the castle and partners statue:

There was no chance of getting a shot with out people, it was just sooo busy!

We rode a few more rides, and took a nap in The Hall Of Presidents:

flickr

It was so nice and cold in there, and had comfortable seats...I don't remember any of the show...

Caitlin and I chased down the Evil Stepmother (Lady Tremaine) from Cinderella to get a photo with her-she was very good, and so funny! I said, "we'd like to get our picture made with you", she replied, "I know, so would I!" And goes on to ask Caitlin, "Aren't you going to tell me how skinny I look?"

After this fun encounter, Caitlin wanted to meet all of the characters!

#RockYourDisneySide 24-Hour Party, Part 1

I was thrilled, excited, and a little worried when I found out that our first day in Walt Disney World just happened to fall on the 24-hour #RockYourDisneySide summer kick-off party! I knew that there would be all kinds of fun things to do and see, but would it be a good idea to start our vacation off exhausted? We knew that it would be tough, but we also knew we had some beach days at the end of our vacation to "recuperate", and we knew we wouldn't arrive at Magic Kingdom until 4 or 5 pm, so we decided to go for it, and just see how long the kids would last. Guests were invited to "show their Disney side", and dress as their favorite hero or villian, and I have to say that I say saw some AH-MAY-Zing costumes, so good that I wasn't quite sure if it was a park character or someone dressed up. I saw a dead ringer for Cinderella, and one for Jasmine, as well. I had a red polka dot dress, so I decided just to go for it and dress as Minnie Mouse.

It was lots of fun, and even though I felt a little silly at first, I am glad I did! I saw lots of Minnies in the park!

This is our first view of the Castle, as we walked down Main Street, USA:

 

Beautiful, and with an extremely crowded park. Despite the crowds, we were able to ride lots and lots of rides with no more than a 25 minute wait for anything, thanks to the fast passes that I had prescheduled. At this point, the kids weren't interested in meeting the characters, they just wanted to ride the rides! So, after a few castle shots, and one of Caitlin and I by the Mickey clock,

we headed to Adventureland.

We "got spit on" by the camel:

(Which felt really good-it was 98 degrees out still!)

And we headed to the Pirates Of The Caribbean for our first fast pass:

As soon as Eric saw how many people we were able to bypass with the fast pass, he was hooked! Pirates is a really dark ride (and cool, so that felt great!), so pictures inside were next to impossible, but here are a few from our phones:

Eric and Cecilia tried out the "pirate look":

After which we headed to Tortuga Tavern for dinner, quick-service style.

I had the taco salad:

 

I have to say, this was my least favorite meal at Disney World. I must be spoiled by all of the excellent choices for Mexican food that we have here at home, because I was a little disappointed by this meal. The toppings bar was fun, and it was great to choose how much lettuce, cheese, and tomatoes I wanted, but, the meat and shell weren't hot enough for me (I like hot food piping hot, and this was far from that). And I would have liked the option of guacamole on the toppings bar. But all in all, it was still pretty good, and we were starving after the seven hour drive from Atlanta, so this definitely filled me up and refreshed me for the rest of the night.

While we were eating, we made the decision to tackle as much of Adventureland and Frontierland the first night, and save the majority of Fantasyland and Tomorrowland for our second day at Magic Kingdom. We saw the Swiss Family Robinson's Treehouse ( I remember seeing it when I was ten, so I was excited to go through it again to see if it was how I remembered it-it wasn't scary at all this time ;-)  ):

And we did a couple of the "mountain" rides: 

Splash Mountain:

(Hello goofiest picture ever! Can you tell Eric hates getting wet on rides?I just didn't want my ears to fly off)

And Big Thunder Mountain (no ride camera, but a few shots I took as we were walking up to the ride):

And I think this is where I will leave our Disney story for now, since this is getting to be a rather long post already.

Dinner at The Derby (Hollywood Brown Derby)

During our 5 days at Disney, we only did one table service meal (there are so many fantastic snacks, and who really wants to sit around eating for a couple of hours while you're at Disney world, anyway?) I have to say that this was a fantastic meal, though- everything I tried was excellent! We tried out one of the signature restaurants in Disney's Hollywood Studios, The Hollywood Brown Derby.

The Hollywood Brown Derby Dining Room:

(photo from the My Disney Experience website)

I loved the light fixtures and caricatures on the walls:

Instead of ordering entrees for the adults- we ordered several appetizers and desserts, so that we could try a variety of things. 

I ordered the "Portsmouth Lobster Bisque

with a Lobster Fritter and Jalapeño Oil":

 

  

and the 

Blue Lump Crab Spring Rolls

Snow Crab Claw, and an Asian Slaw with spicy Miso Aïoli:

The spring rolls were the best spring rolls I have ever had, and the soup was so yummy I almost forgot to take a picture!

Eric ordered the famous Cobb Salad (the Cobb Salad was made famous by the original Hollywood Brown Derby in California)

with Finely Chopped Greens, Turkey Breast, Bacon, Egg, Tomatoes, Crumbled Blue Cheese, Avocado, Chives, and Cobb Dressing:

 (photo source)

I thought it was very good, except for the blue cheese-not a big fan of that!

And he ordered the

Andouille-crusted Prawn

over Black Diamond Cheddar Grits, Wilded Greens, and Ancho Oil:

 Also very good-especially the grits for this southern girl! If you try them, it will totally change your opinion of grits! Creamy perfection!

Even the kids' fish and chips were great!Caitlin had a Cobb salad too, but she wished she had left off the blue cheese-she thought it tasted like perfume.

My favorite part of any meal is dessert, so we ordered a couple of Dessert Trios:

The desserts we chose:

Chocolate Sphere with Hazelnut Praline Chocolate and Orange-White Chocolate Mousse,

Milk Chocolate Crémeux with Mojito Concoction on Almond Rocher, Amaretto Flan and Opalys White Chocolate Whip with an Almond Cookie; Brown Derby Original! Mini Grapefruit Cake, Double Vanilla Bean Crème Brûlée, and the Warm Blueberry Cobbler with Crème Fraîche and Orange Blossom Honey.

This was the most popular dessert with the kids:

 

And, while I agree that it was very good, my favorite was the Warm Blueberry Cobbler-so yummy!

Or, maybe, it was the Mango Margarita-so refreshing on a 97+ degree day!

Have you done table service meals at any of the Disney parks? What were your favorites? I would love to know!