Disney Love

This year for Christmas we decided to focus (there's my One Little Word!) more on experience gifts and less on adding more stuff to our house. My sister Kristen and I cooked up a plan to surprise our kids with a trip to Disneyland over New Years. One thing that made it extra special was that my sister's kids had never been there before. I was so excited to share one of our favorite places with them.

On New Years Eve we packed everyone up and drove six hours over to Anaheim. We arrived in time for dinner and decided to wander around Downtown Disney to find something to eat. After dinner we explored the Logo store and the World of Disney store for quite a while. Disneyland did a huge fireworks show at 9:00 p.m. and we found a great spot in Downtown Disney to watch. Perfect way to bring in the new year!

We were in bed by 10:30 pm which I think is a first for me on New Year's Eve, but we had an early morning ahead, so we wanted as much sleep as possible. We spent the first day at Disneyland. The morning crowds were low and we were able to get on a bunch of rides. Indiana Jones broke while we were on it and we sat for about 30 minutes before they had us walk off of the ride. The good news was that they gave us passes good to get on three different rides without waiting. Sweet. 

We had lunch reservations in New Orleans square where we shared a few Monte Cristo Sandwiches and garlic fries. It's been a tradition to eat there, but I must say that the sandwich is a little too much fried dough and I'm probably finished with it. I'll just stick with Mickey shaped beignets for my fried food while at Disneyland!

We loved going on all of the main rides and really packed so much in that day. We had dinner reservations at Big Thunder BBQ which was one of the highlights of the day and we plan to do that every time we go to Disneyland. The food was really good, it was all you can eat and it even included drinks. We all orderer hot chocolate to attempt to warm up while we ate at watched a musical show.

After 15+ hours in the park, we called it a day and walked back to our hotel.

We spent day two at California Adventure where we had another fun filled day. We headed straight to the Carsland ride and while our group was in line, I grabbed Fast Passes to use later that day. Fast Passes and one of the best ideas ever and really help make the whole experience more enjoyable. The only down side of the day was when we scared a few of the kids on Tower of Terror, but they all survived. 

I'm so thankful that our family got to have this fun adventure!

Hello Project Life 2014!

There was a short moment when I considered taking this year off from adding to our Project Life album. But when I thought about the little stories and pictures that wouldn't be documented, I decided to keep it going another year.

I've decided to simplify the process this year by not doing a spread every week. Sometimes the weekly spread just felt like too much work and not enough fun. My main goal in doing this is to preserve our family memories, but it should be a fun process, right? So I'm thinking that this album will be about two spreads a month which is half of what my previous two years have been. There's still plenty of space to document all of the highlights.

Here's a look at my first spread for January that covers for the first week and a half of the month.

We packed a lot into the first couple weeks of the year and I'm happy to have a glimpse of what we were up to documented.

At CHA with some of the Scrapbook Circle Team /// Park + Bike Riding with the Kids /// Snow in Flagstaff /// Welcoming a Sweet New Cousin 

CHA Disneyland Night /// Together in Flagstaff /// Neighborhood Bike Ride /// Messy Jewelry Box

Going to roughly two spreads a month makes me excited again about this project again. A little pile has already collected for the first week of February and I'm looking forward to documenting 2014.  

I feel so thankful for all of the blessings in my life and this is a nice way to document and reflect on how grateful I am. 

Round and Round

I don't know about you, but as I'm getting older, my head and stomach are much less tolerant of amusement park rides. It's kind of a bummer, but at least I can enjoy watching my kids.

When we were at Disneyland last month during fall break with our friends, all 6 kids want to go on the teacups. I didn't even consider stepping foot on that ride! Instead I enjoyed taking pictures from the sideline.

It was one of the last rides we went on for the day, so of course, it was very dark. The photos I took were all blurry and a bit too dark, but I think it's actually fitting since the dark + blurred photo is how I would feel if I had ridden on the ride!

I had fun mixing a bunch of bits and pieces from the November Home Sweet Home Kit plus the My Happy Place add-on.  My favorite thing in the add-on is the exclusive Scrapbook Circle triangle stencil. I used it on this layout by misting it with gold mist behind the photo. I hoping it use it on more projects very soon.

Oh, and I used a couple of the new SC digital cut files. The geotags and thankful cards make an appearance on this page. Loving these new digi cuts!

Hope your Wednesday is fantastic!