Carsland Meetup for Disneyland

You all know my thoughts and feelings about Meetups at Disneyland.  Love Them! Dislike the people who run them.  Today's thoughts for the day are in regards to the Disneyland Cars Land Meetup that the Disney Blog posted yesterday.


While I am disappointed that I was not selected, I am still hopeful to earn some sort of spot for the AP Previews.  I really wish that the person who runs the blog was more forthcoming with rules though.


The Blog states "I will give an update at the top of this post when capacity has been reached. Please note the event is subject to change or cancellation without notice."    and to me this means that it is a first come first serve sort of situation.

I don't believe this is how people were selected though, as no one I know that submitted in the first 5 minutes was selected as a participant.  

This does not diminish my excitement for Carsland, but it is diminishes my excitement for the Disney Blog.  Why call it a Meetup if you are only inviting 33 people? It's more of a contest at that point.  A meetup to me is usually a much larger crowd, and has been labeled as such by Disney in the Past.  Also, it's kind of a lame meetup, as you don't get to ride the rides, or experience anything in Carsland, and you can't even take pictures!  No Cell Phones, Pictures or recording devices period.   If Disney was trying to create an anti-hype, they sure succeeded as there are already HUNDREDS if not THOUSANDS of photos of Carsland available on the internet.  

Regardless of all of this though, I will be at the Parks this Sunday for Bat's Day in the Fun Park.  A REALLY fun day at Disneyland where Goths of all kinds come together for some fun at the parks.  Follow Bat's Day on Twitter @batsday for more info.  

I have also booked us a hotel room for June 14.  So that we can be at the parks EARLY on the 15th (you know it's going to be an INSANE day with all the new stuff opening!).  I am excited to have hundreds of new photo opportunities this summer, and encourage you to attend Disneyland June 16th or later (I'm going on the 15th, stay out of my lines!!! hehe).

After the last 2 events that I've been unable to attend through the blog, I am not sure I will continue to read or try to go to the meetup's anymore.  It's been disappointing to say the least, and I was less than impressed with the previous 2 I did attend.  The manager of social media, print is really sucking the life and fun out of Disneyland Meetups.    The last thing I really enjoyed was the AP Night at the parks in October 2011.  That was a truly great evening!  I really hope they do stuff like that again, as these meetups on the blog are just getting worse.

GiveAway: Skeleton Fairy

Giving Away 1 of my Handmade Skeleton Fairy's.  I sell them for $10 each on Etsy,  and the winner will be able to choose 1 - Blue, Green or Red.  Just use the Rafflecopter entry system on this blog post to enter!  You get points for Following me on Twitter, Facebook, and Tweeting! It's that simple!  Contest goes until 5/31/12.  Winner will be selected at Random from Entries Received!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

PhotoBlog: Balboa Park Botanical and Rose Gardens

Birthday at Disneyland

Grown up Day at the Park!

One of my Favorite Kinds of Days.  We do this often because we all need to feel like a kid again!

One of my friends recently posted about how she felt like a grown-up, and posed the question at what point in your life do you feel 'grown up"? My simple response?  NEVER!  Never stop believing in the Power of Magic, never stop taking the time to feel and act like a kid again.

So you ask, What do you do during grown up day at the park to accomplish this?
First we ride Splash Mountain.

This might be one of my favorite pictures from the mountain, and you can't even see me in it (I am the 4th person back btw).  You can tell from my friend in the front that we had already gottten super wet, even before the big drop.  Soaking wet.  After the fall we then splashed each other with even more water.  Having fun, doing kid things.

 Photo ops for this sign are always high on my list.  It's so pretty.

My SIL and my BFF's GF, both pretty wet from Splash.

 Since we were already wet, we decided to head over Grizzly River Rapids in DCA.  This was Fun.  More fun than I had imagined.  I got zero water on me!  My two friends in the front of the splash picture however got the short end on every single drop, every bit of water.  There are no pictures to prove this, so you'll have to trust me!

Then we hopped on Screamin'.  The park seemed busy at this point, but the lines moved very fast.

Waiting in Line for Toy Story Midway Mania, I decided to snap a few photos.

These two are my favorites.

I clearly beat my SIL, but darnit, my BFF got 169100 - highest in car.

We head towards Tower of Terror.  The line for this is always weird.  It's not so long outside in the lobby, but takes FOREVER once you've watched the video.  I had plenty of time to snap some incredible photos of the 'basement'.

Silliness aside, the pictures for this ride always turn out very nice.  Ok, so maybe not nice, but funny is certainly a term I can use right?

At this point we are done with DCA for the day and head back to Disneyland.  How many rides can we ride in 6 hours?  On a Sunday?  First up... Captain EO.  Wait - 12 minutes.  Since we are right there, Space Mountain is afterwards.

Disneyland seems to be getting busier by the minute, but I love people Watching.  It's after this that we witness our 2nd Security perimeter of the day.  It's the 2nd time in 3 hours that Security has found an abandoned backpack.  20-30 foot radius around the bag while police are called in.  Basically shutting down Rancho Del Zocalo (where we had planned to eat dinner) because the backpack is left 10 feet from the entrance.  Word of Advice to those travelling to the Parks.  Please do not leave your valuables alone, as Disney does NOT mess around.  You will not be able to come back for your bags in a few minutes.  

I love photos of big Thunder in the evening hours.  My new camera really knows how to pick up all the colors, and I snapped a lot of fantastic ones.

Finally we end the day with my favorite ride ever. The Haunted Mansion.  One Ride.  I snapped 100 photos.  95 were blurry (my own fault for having the settings wrong on the camera), but I did get this one.  My New Desktop Photo.  I took 1 photo during the Stretching Room Elevator.  It captured not only my favorite Painting (Tight Rope) but a shot I've been trying to get for YEARS with other cameras.

If you'd like the originals of any of these photos, please send me a message.  I'll gladly share.  Enjoy your Day!