Be a Fairy Godmother! Grant a wish by voting for us!

Have you ever thought about giving a Disney trip to someone, tell me I'm not the only Disney nerd who has thought about this! Let's say you can choose 3 friends who have never been. Never walked through those Walt Disney World Gates and experienced the magic of Cinderella castle. Maybe they have seen the Sleeping Beauty castle of their childhood visits, but have never laid eyes on the Tree of Life, the Tower of Terror or Spaceship Earth. Who would you choose?
I had the opportunity to choose 3 friends and do just that! RunDisney and Zappos are giving away a trip to Walt Disney World to 4 teams of women! That's 16 ladies. I chose 3 of my running buddies who weren't already signed up for the Princess Half, since me and two other friends were, and quickly texted them to see if they were even game for the idea! They all were and we are on a fast paced journey to Fantasyland, Adventureland and ready to run through that castle! Please vote for us and see who we are
My Team -
The first person I chose is one of my best friends, Brandy who I have known for about 8 years.

We taught together in school and stayed home as moms the same year. I decided to ask her to do something crazy with me, like do the Tinkerbell Half Marathon and she said yes! She's from that area and already had plans to head home that week/weekend so it worked out great! I love that we are both training for something that neither of us has done! She wasn't a runner before all this and neither was I! She has run 382 miles logged in her app so far this year and that's not all of her runs! She has worked so hard to train for the Tink and I would love to see her earn her Coast to Coast by completing this run too! She's a great friend and mommy to her two sweet boys Dylan and Brody.
My next teammate comes from faraway, ok, maybe not - she's my next door neighbor. Courtney and I have become closer friends in the last couple of years even though we've lived next door to each other for 5 or so years.

Courtney is my spur of the moment and nighttime running buddy. I love our conversations when we run and she has helped me a lot when I first started running in June of this year. She walked when I needed it and let me set the pace which I so needed at the beginning! She is so talented too - she has a crafty/art flair to her that I do not have! She can draw like an artist and has an eye for those type things, she is not a stay at home mom, but rather a hard working mom who spends every moment she can with her sweet girl. Working weekends and nights so her sweet girl Griffin, doesn't have to go to daycare. I love spending time with her and would so love to take her on her first trip to Disney!

My third teammate is Krissi. I met Krissi just this past year, almost a year ago. 

We joined the same mommy group at church and we had lots in common. From attending the same private school in elementary school to knowing a large group of mutual friends. We trained a lot together for our Ten for Texas 10 miler run together. She also has never been to Walt Disney World, so this would be her first half marathon and trip to Walt Disney World! She is such a sweet person and great mommy to her sweet little girl Rin.
About me: 
I am a Disney nerd, geek, slightly obsessed about all things Disney. I am signed up for the Tink and Princess in 2014, so I am more so trying to win this for my running mates. I have been running since June of 2013 and that was when I decided to sign up for Tink and got in! I've run 200 miles on my Nike app, which I didn't use from the get go, so I've probably logged over that by a little. I am not your typical athletic girl who played sports growing up, but rather your bookworm and musically inclined person. I love Disney and told my husband years ago that if I ever ran a half marathon it would be for a Disney run only! I can't wait to run the Tinkerbell Half Marathon in January and then the Princess Half Marathon in February. I am training hard to give myself time to take pics along the way with Mickey and friends! I love that I have these great sisterchicks to run with!
A SISTERCHICK (n.): A friend who shares the deepest wonders of your heart, loves you like a sister, and provides a reality check when you're being a brat.(I love Robin Jones Gunn)

Why we Run: 

 For our future princes and princesses

As a mom you understand the need to have alone time now and again. Going to the bathroom by yourself, grocery shopping alone or having an occasional girls night out. Everything we do all is for these guys! We do the long hours and all the hard work to make their lives happy, fun and to show them that with hard work and training you can reach your goals and dreams! We would love as moms to have this trip as a moms weekend out running trip of a lifetime! Please vote for our team and help some "Mommas running for the Crown" win big!
Thanks for Sharing the Disney Love!


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Disney's New movie - Frozen

I have a 4 yr old who is in love already with the new Disney movie - Frozen. Anytime the commercials come on she runs in the room and has me rewind it! She was Elsa for Halloween and has many of the dolls already. Anytime she earns a reward or if someone wants to buy something for her, she has her next Frozen item chosen! Her sister recently had a birthday and one of her friends got her Olaf, the snowman and a cute Elsa and Anna pj dress. They were a size 4 and she was so ecstatic that they were just her size! Ha!
    We bought the Golden Book of Frozen to familiarize ourselves with the story and characters and that has fanned the flames even more for her. I won't give away the complete story, but I will tell you it has a great story for sisters! There are some words that I know I'm not saying correctly, like fjord. But I was surprised to find out that we were saying a main characters name incorrectly. I hope I'm not the only one! We've corrected it and I still slip up and call her the wrong name, but daddy has yet to get it that her name is pronounced not how it's spelled! So which character were we saying her name wrong? ANNA! It's not Anna, rhymes with Hannah. It's Anna, rhymes with Shawna - Onna is how I would phonetically spell it.  At first when I caught her name in a preview I watched it 10 times trying to really hear it. Then I caught commercial advertising a singing doll and it was full blown where you could hear them say her name Anna, rhymes with Shawna. It makes sense that her name would be pronounced in a Norwegian style, just like Kristoff.

JCPenney now has a Disney section and they have a great selection of Frozen items. Dolls, jacket, figurines, shirts, A giant Olaf for only $500 and more! 

The items look similar to the Disney Store, but there are differences, for example the soft plush dolls are smaller than the Disney Store version, shirts have different designs and so on.

 

We also found Anna and Elsa Frozen birthday themed supplies at Party City! We have a 5th bday coming up and I'm thinking I'll be back for some of this stuff! I looked online at their website and you can find it there too.

 We found Frozen books at Sam's Club for a great price!

So for all those Frozen lovers here is the scoop and I hope you found it helpful! We can't wait to see the movie on opening day in 3-D! We got a sitter for baby sister and everything! 

Opinions are my own. I was not compensated in any way for my post. I'm just a Disney lovin mom who loves to share the Disney Love! 

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Sharing the Disney Love...Operation Christmas Child

I love to talk Disney and share my love for the Disney magic! Well this Christmas season, our family is Sharing the Disney Love by sending out Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes! We have never done this before and we attended an event at Lifeway Christian Stores and they gave us the boxes and pages for us to send. All you do is fill the box with goodies for a child. Easy! We went to the Dollar Store near us and found all kinds of goodies and some of the things we had extra at our house. 

These are the three boxes our family packed- one to represent each girl in our family. I love the idea of teaching my children to give back and to give to those who have less than we do. We paid online 
#1 to pay for the shipping that it costs to send the box $7 each.  #2 because you get to track your box to see where it's delivered to if you pay online only! and #3 to get our tax deductible form for the cost of shipping. My girls loved filling out the pages for each box that told the box recipient about them and they got to color the page to, which they loved.

 The puzzles, jump rope, art craft and comb/mirror set were from the $1 type store. The coloring book and crayons were left over from a birthday we just recently had. Everything must be new and unused. The Cinderella shirts were from The Children's Place on clearance for 1.99. I was going to have my youngest wear them next spring, but chose to pass them along and hopefully the little girl who receives them will love it!

This box was for a 3t girl. The shirt I got at Target for $2 on clearance and was planning on giving it to my daughter to wear later, but we decided to give each girl a shirt. The cup we had left over from a birthday party, but I thought they can use it to drink out of, or to hold their crayons...

* One thing I would've done differently and might still do - is place the items in a plastic shoe box with a lid. That way they can use the box to carry water or store things for a long time, etc. 

Also - you can choose boy or girl and the age group. We just chose little girls because it was in common for my girls. The links shared above have packing lists and how to drop off and all that good info! 

I would love for you to consider doing this at your home! Share the Love and make a child's day! Teach your kids about blessing others and to be a giver.

November 18-25 is the drop off time frame so make this a weekend project!

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Disney Shadow Box

I loved the idea of a shadow box from a Disney trip. I had looked on Pinterest for a few ideas and loved the idea of using a map, I liked the pin additions and really wanted to include special mementos from the trip. I had bought this fridge magnet that is flat on the back and it fit perfectly in my box.Add a Mickey head from the parade, a pin that says Walt Disney World on it, a map of the whole park and then I added some stickers and a family photo. Easy and done! I love the simplicity of it, but also that it sits out everyday and reminds me of a great vacation. I probably should add the year somewhere, in case I decide to make one for every trip! Ha!
We are headed to Disneyland in January and I plan to find a fridge magnet hopefully of Sleeping Beauty's castle and make another shadow box for that. Have you made a shadow box for a Disney trip? I'd love to see! Leave me link in the comments!

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Broken or Bruised...

First pic tow has small red spot, gate has a chip!

Scene: 4am, husband is away on business, strange noise heard hours before and confirmed strange noise with neighbors...
I have been known to have a great imagination...I don't watch intense/suspenseful/scary movies usually on purpose because when I do, on occasion with hubby, I can't get those images out of mind. I will think about scenes long after and then if I'm ever in a situation that feels like that movie I freak myself out... back to the real reason I'm posting...
I heard a strange loud noise in my backyard the night before and knew that I hadn't imagined it. I was home alone with my three kiddos, but still was able to fall asleep. Early the next morning I went upstairs to check on my babies and as I was headed back to bed I slip and fell on my petunia and slid down the last flight of my stairs. 6 steps that I slid down and then stopped myself on our baby gate that block the stairs. My butt hurt in the moment, but my foot/toe has now hurt for 2 weeks! I knew that I had hurt my foot, but wasn't sure the extent. (It's funny how now that I consider myself a runner, I would rather fall on my face than hurt my legs or feet before a race! Ha!) I put Vicks vapor rub on the sore spot immediately after, since that what my granny told me to do to minimize bruising... But I was dog tired! I went to bed even though it was hurting to just lay on my side and place slight pressure on it. I should have iced it right away - mistake #1. After a few more hours of sleep I woke up to a foot that really hurt and the bruising started to show. I also found a piece of plastic from the gate and didn't realize that I had hit it so hard I chipped the plastic! No wonder I hurt my toe!
Needless to say the bruising got worse, the pain was on and off and I was scared to run! I went to the Dr to have it checked since I had my first run ever on Sat, this happened on Monday. Here I am supposed to run 10 miles to qualify for a better corral for the Tinkerbell half marathon and now I might not even be able to finish! Long story made short the Dr thought it was broke, but after x rays, it wasn't. Just bruised. I taped my toe Thursday before my run and was able to do 5 comfortably and left it at that. On race day I used my body glide, tape and baby powder to help prevent any blisters and pain. I was in some discomfort after 7 miles and lost feeling in the last two toes the last couple of miles. The dr told me that even if I had broken it he still woould have told me to run since it was such a fun race! He completed the run that day too.

  I haven't run since Oct 14 because on that day I ran 3 miles and didn't tape the toe and my toe hurt so much worse than it did days before. So lesson to learn - ice immediately, seek medical attention especially if you are a runner (since running on a broken toe can do more damage), tape two toes together to give the hurt toe a "buddy".
Wearing flip flops kill my toe when you intially put them on and scrunch your toes to get them on. Ack! Hurts so bad still! That motion is really the motion that really hurts and here in Texas I wear flip flops all the time! We went to the Michael Buble concert and to wear heeled boots hurt too, even though I taped it! Just the pressure of the heel being elevated and crushing my toes forward. I hope it heals quickly and I will definitly be playing it safe before my half! Have you ever bruised a toe or toes? How long did your pain last?

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Disney Countdown Clipboard Tutorial

A few years ago I joined my church's mommy group. I have met some wonderful ladies and one of the fun things we do is craft every so often together. The leaders decided on the clipboard craft and then we decided what we wanted to do. Some moms made a menu board for the week, some made a countdown to Christmas, one lady made it an art holder for her daughter with her name on it. Being that I'm in my Disney prime years (Gasp - I went through a phase where it wasn't such a big thing and I never even thought about it...I don't know what happened!) I wanted to make something Disney related! I thought about making it a chalkboard countdown that I could write on daily, but then you have the logistics of the where to put the
chalk and erasing it and not being as black as it was the first time...I scrapped that idea. A couple of days before the craft day I was shopping at Hallmark for a card for a friend and came across the cutest stickers for $3! Cheap! I immediately thought magnets for my fridge, but didn't do anything with them just in case I thought of something else! So fast forward to the night before and I have a stock pile of Disney stickers and scrap booking stuff. I threw a bunch of stuff in my bag to take with me and still had no idea what I was gonna do, other than it was a countdown. I spent 1- 1/2 hours picking out my supplies (which they provided all kinds of stuff including the clipboards in a variety of sizes). Another girl had brought her Cricket machine and I knew I wanted a big DISNEY on it. So basically the first day my board looked like this. Nothing but covered in two pieces of scrapbook paper with Mod Podge. Only glue the backside lightly both board and paper get a light coat. Too much glue will make your paper wrinkle! Another lady had her laptop and was making labels, so I had her do days til on a label for me. They also had these cute little box tracers that you could make on another sheet of paper, so I did that.

The tracer for the box was where I started to "see" what I was going to do in the end...

They had these tiny Velcro sticky dots so I took some of those...not knowing how I was using them just yet! I used three rows to hold my box to my clipboard. I had to use a sewing needle to make my tiny holes to add my brads, but these were from a Disney scrapbooking kit I already had.

I had one page of black scrapbook letters/numbers and put the numbers 0-9 on the stickers. Only problem was they are sticky on the back. The entire thing, not just the face part. So I ended up putting each number on a square with a Velcro dot on the back.

They turned out pretty cute! 

 I plan to add some ribbon to the "clip" part at the top. I love the clipboard idea and that it's high enough my little ones can't mess with it, but they can see it everyday! My 4 yr old will ask what number it is and then I'll ask her what number does an 8 and a 3 make = 83 and so on. So she's seeing higher numbers and we are kinda learning from it too! I have the castle and Mickey as alternate decals for the bottom to change out. We are headed to Disneyland in January for the Tinkerbell Half Marathon, so I put Tink on it! I plan to use it over and over...if my hubby will let me keep planning trips! LOL!

 Leave a comment and let me know what ya think! 

Follow me on Twitter and Pinterest or even FB!

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Training ain't for sissies!

I'm officially in training for my first half marathon! EEK! If you know me, I'm not your average athletic person. I've done prenatal Yoga, prenatal water aerobics, Baby Boot Camp all within the last 4 years. But by no means do I see myself as a "fit" person. I've still got the trouble spots like most people...I just choose to keep most of my areas covered! I own a two piece bathing suit, but let's just say it hides it all! Ha! Tankinis and skirts are my friend at the pool. I do feel better about my body though since I've started running since May of 2013. I find that my shorts fit better and the hips seems smaller. I've only been running since May, but I signed myself up for the 10 miler run Ten for Texas. I want to be in a better corral at the Tinkerbell and Princess. Corral is where you start the race from. The front of the race is corral A and then so on... I'm currently in the last corral because I haven't ever completed a 10K or longer. So I thought - hey! sign up for the Ten for Texas, it gives you a shorter goal to train in and I won't procrastinate. Not sure if I thought out the whole heat of the summer training idea, but it's been ok so  far and I hope to have that as an advantage in the Florida heat! I'm currently using the Galloway method, which if you don't know Galloway - he is an Olympic athlete who run/walks and knows a thing or two about running. So far I have him to thank for getting me this far and without injury!

5 miles done pic

Today I ran 5 miles with a friend who is also running in the Princess Half with me and then I went on and had a goal of doing 2 more miles, but felt good enough to do 3 more! I was so proud of myself! I may not have set any records at the timing pace I was running, but after 4 months of never running ever I did 8 miles- Yippee! I truly have found my motivation by registering for these RunDisney events and I plan to earn my bling! 

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Altering a race shirt!

We got our shirts for the 10 for Texas on Thursday and I hate to wear shirts like everyone else! I wasn't even sure I wanted to wear the race shirt, but since it didn't have finisher plastered on front...Major sport faux pas to wear the race day shirt on race day- I know, but I thought it was a cute shirt! Lots of other people were wearing them too! So simmer down! Ha!  I like to be unique, different, you get the idea! So Thursday evening I get this great idea to give the race day shirt a makeover! I invited a few running friends over to do the same and we each contributed to the shirts. No shirt was the same, but rather each had slight variations, which I loved! Plus it was a nasty, humid Texas day and the sleeveless part was nice!

Here all the three shirts side by side. Yes two of us were newbies to runs and this was our first one. We moved her number to the front - you gotta have the number in the front for pics. Notice the names on the back that we added. Besides that, here's how we did it.

 I wanted a tank top, so I placed a favorite tank on top of the tshirt and just winged it when cutting the sleeves and neckline off. My friend who made the racerback shirt did the same with hers by placing a favorite tee on top to see how to cut it. It was hard making the first cut, because I was worried I was gonna mess it up! But we both liked the cut!

 Hard to tell on this shot, but we "blinged" the 10 and the eye on the armadillo. We also used red glitter glue on the "for Texas" and yellow glitter glue on the "O" and "2013" One of the girls added a bow to the armadillo and nail polish - Ha! Joann's, Hobby Lobby, Michael's Walmart all carry these little jewels for cheap.  We glued the bling on with this E-6000 glue and used a toothpick to place them. Dries fast and easy to do! 

 

 The arm sleeves took forever! We had a sewing machine and the plan was to sew the red binding tape on, but the machine was acting up. So onto plan B! I had some Steam A Steam from another project and it seemed easy but was labor intensive! If I had to skip one step to make this project super easy - it would be this step! But the clean line that it added made the shirt pop! Mine started to fall off by the end, but I can sew it on still! I wish I had had more for the neckline, but between three shirts we ran out!

The sleeve is off! I had two colored ribbons from another project that I used for the tassel I found a pin on Pinterest where she turned a man's shirt into a tank and did the little sleeve thing with left over scraps. So I used ribbon and tshirt scraps. I just cut them into strips, hand sew them together and then hand sewed them onto the top of my tank strap. 

 Adding the name to the back wasn't as easy as I thought... The letters are little screens and the paint goes on just like a screen printer. This kit was from Walmart. Note to self: remember to take off clear backing before wiping the paint...it won't go through! Ha! I did think using painters tape to keep the letters in place was a great idea and rinse them as soon as you can! We did three shirts and by the end the r was a little ragged. It was fun though and unique! I had a few runners call my name and talk since I had Trout on the back. I guess they thought it was my nickname, not my last name! The other girl's name was Looney! She's not Looney and that's not a nickname, it's her last name! Ha!

Overall the shirt took way longer than anticipated, but it was fun to hang out with friends, let the kids play, and create something. We got lots of compliments on our shirts and lots of people asked us who made our shirts, I guess we don't look like the crafty type? You gonna tray to alter a shirt? It's fun!