It’s time for the Disney Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop hosted by Focused on the Magic!  Stop by Deb’s blog and check out all the other great posts.  But first, what better way to celebrate a virtual birthday party than with a little digital entertainment?

Grab your virtual noise-makers and blow-up those digital balloons because it’s birthday week here at Rays of Disneyland!  That’s right, Friday marks a not-so-virtual, milestone birthday for me, and while I’m not exactly looking forward to turning *ahem* well, another year older, I am excited about throwing myself a little blog birthday party, and all of you are invited!

So, check back each day this week, as I relive the last few decades of living the life of a Disney fan(atic)!

Thanks again to Sarah at Magical Days with the Mouse for hosting this week’s Flashback Friday!

This week’s Flashback Friday is a quick and irreverent look at one of the quirkiest bands ever to grace Disneyland.  I came across this photo when looking through old albums.  I remember thinking these guys were really funny but I had no memory of why there was a band walking through Frontierland with armadillos on their heads.  Thanks to the power of Google, I found this blog that has a short write-up all about the Armadillo Band, including a fun memento handed out by band members during the 35th Anniversary Party Gras celebration.

Thanks again to Deb at Focused on the Magic for hosting today’s Disney Wordless Wednesday!  This week’s theme is characters and these stylized versions that were added to It’s a Small World are some of my favorites.  I know that the addition of these figures was highly controversial within the Disney fan community, but I really like the way these iconic characters blend classic Disney with Mary Blair’s unique Small World style.

It’s time for another Flashback Friday hosted by Magical Days with the Mouse!

Last week I introduced the idea of Flashback Friday and what that would look like here at Rays of Disneyland.  I also shared a sneak peek at one of my Disney firsts… my first character, B’rer Fox.  I hope to continue to explore a lot of my Disneyland firsts and share both pictures and videos.  So, this week I want to share a few memories from my very first attraction… Autopia.

Getting to Disneyland for the first time proved to be a bit challenging for my family, as we waited for hours in the old Denver airport for a giant snowstorm to pass, then we waited for what seemed like hours more while they de-iced our plane.  If you have never traveled into or out of a cold climate in the winter, you might not know about the joys of a good de-icing, but basically you just sit in the plane, on the runway, while they spray a substance similar to anti-freeze all over the plane to keep the mechanisms from icing over in-flight.  Yep, if you’re thinking it sounds like there is still a possibility that your plane could freeze over, you would be thinking exactly what I am thinking every time it happens.  It was also exactly what I was thinking when we were sitting there waiting to take off.  The only other time I had been in an airplane before this was when I was a baby, so I was quite nervous for the flight, and the longer we waited, the worse I felt.  It’s no wonder, then, that I experienced a not-so-fun combination of stomach butterflies and motion sickness once our plane got going.  Unfortunately, the feeling didn’t subside once we got off our plane, and I ended up having a rough evening before our big day in the Park.

So, after our “Early-bird” breakfast, offered to Walt Disney Travel Company customers, my stomach was feeling more than a little upset.  Thankfully, my mom knew just how to take care of me when I was sick, so after breakfast we headed off in the direction of Autopia, with the hope that a cool morning breeze in my face would help quell the storm brewing in my belly.  Not only was she right, but Autopia endeared itself in my heart forever as something special for just my mom and me.

It’s funny because I don’t remember a lot of other things that happened when I was eight, but I vividly remember waiting in line for Autopia, climbing in that car for the first time, and taking off around the track.  I know that my mom would have been trying to make me laugh to keep my mind of the possibility of throwing up, and I know that I would have been giggling uncontrollably at her antics.

Before we left for this trip the Disneyland 35th Anniversary Special with “Special Host” Tony Danza was on, and it played a large part in shaping my opinion of what I would experience at Disneyland.  So, I remember being shocked that there was a little bar in the middle of the Autopia track that kept our car from driving around wildly like Ernest (played by Jim Varney) did in the TV special. 😀  I also remember being relieved that there weren’t live snakes on the Jungle Cruise, as was also shown in the special… but that’s another story for another day.

The picture at the top, is of my mom and me as we were pulling back into the “station” after our Autopia ride… the weirdness of my hand position is due to my uncontrollable waving at my grandma who was standing by, taking pictures and video. 🙂  Below is a video I found on YouTube of Ernest’s wild ride on Disneyland’s Autopia.

Be sure and check out the other Flashback Friday participants by following the link above or by clicking on the logo in the sidebar, and tell them that Rays of Disneyland sent you!

This has been such an amazing summer of Disney adventures and also a great summer of Disney blogging!  I’ve linked up with some amazing Disney blogs that are doing some great things for the Disney blogging community.  One such blog is Babes in Disneyland by Lisa Robertson of The Three Disneyland Moms fame.  Today her weekly blog hop is focusing on sharing your favorite Disney memories from the summer, and I’m pleased to hop along and share my own summer memories.  Thanks Lisa!

Any summer that includes not one, but two, Disney vacations is already a step above any other summer!  From one coast to the other, I had the amazing opportunity to visit both Disney World and Disneyland… with a bonus stop at the D23 Expo.  These kind of moments are the ones I truly treasure, as I am so far from the Magic, it feels like I miss out on a lot of special Disney treats.  But, seeing both parks during their peak seasons – when they are full of every event, every character, and every variety of entertainment – was truly a dream come true.  Yes, it’s more crowded and much more hot, but it’s still something that I love.  My fellow Disney fan(atics) will understand that aching feeling when you hear about a special event, or a special parade, or a special *insert everything you’ve missed here*, that you know you won’t have the opportunity to attend.  But, for me, this was my summer to celebrate all of the anniversary-ish, soundsational, Expo-riffic Disney magic that I could soak in!

The Highlights

• Checking one off my bucket list in the form of going to Disney World with my friends and their girls was phenomenal.  I still hope that one day I would be able to take my own children to the parks, but until that day comes, this was a big goal for me.  I just wanted to experience Disney through the eyes of a child and soak in all of the joy and excitement that they were feeling with each new experience.  Thanks Megan for letting me bask in the rays of your precious girls as they fell in love with the Magic for the first time.
• Star Wars Weekends at Disney Hollywood Studios are not something I would have ever thought I would be first in line for, but as it turned out, when this crept into the top of our travel considerations for Disney World, I started to get excited.  When the moment finally arrived, it didn’t disappoint, and I was left with a new found love and appreciation for all things Star Wars… like I needed another obsession! 😉  Plus, I got to experience the re-imagineered Star Tours in it’s inaugural year at WDW and at Disneyland!
• I had been craving some time at Epcot for quite some time now (probably since the last time I was there!), so getting to spend one full day just strolling through the countries in World Showcase and take away a special memory from each was quite a treat.
  • We took a relaxing boat ride through one of my favorite WDW rides… Gran Fiesta Tour with The Three Caballeros in Mexico.
  • We spent a quiet breakfast watching the world pass us by while eating delicious pastries in Norway.
  • I bought one of my most memorable, if not utterly frivolous, souvenirs in China – a tiny golden Chinese dress for my little doggie.
  • I finally got a taste of what everyone was talking about at the Karamell Küche in Germany.
  • I watched gorgeous Italian men serve drinks while imbibing in an amazing Peach Bellini in Italy. 😀
  • We took in all of hustle and bustle of Mitsukoshi in Japan.
  • We wandered the intricate streets of Morocco looking for the perfect souvenir for someone back home.
  • I breathed in the Parisian air in France while dreaming of days spent exploring the little treasures of the real thing.
  • I was probably the most excited for the United Kingdom, and it held up its end of the deal, unfolding its perfect British charm at the Rose and Crown Pub for lunch, as well as the little shops filled with special treasures and gorgeous gardens in the courtyards.
• I don’t even know where to begin in sharing how good it felt to be a part of Disneyland’s Soundsational Summer… it was Disney Magic at its finest.  I touched on lots of special things in my 2-part trip report, but the joy in my heart, the Magic that permeated my soul and lingered there like a soft summer breeze, is hard to actually put into words.
  • Mickey’s Soundsational Parade was phenomenal… it took me back to a nostalgic place where Disney characters were real and the possibility of finding a prince and becoming a princess was alive and well in my world.  It was such a touching moment for me that I cried during nearly the entire parade!  Shocking, I know… 😉
  • I got to ride the Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Undersea Adventure attraction!  I was so excited for this opportunity and I must say, I approve of this one. 😀
  • There were countless other small moments that touched my heart during this trip… riding Toy Story Mania again, resuming our chase for the perfect Vinylmation trade, sipping Mint Juleps while watching the Royal Street Bachelors perform, and countless others, I know.
• While I did have my fair share of complaints about this year’s D23 Expo, I still wouldn’t have traded this fan experience for anything.  Seeing my favorite princesses perform or watching Dick Van Dyke sing some of my favorite songs from the Disney Cannon, are experiences I couldn’t have had anywhere else on earth, I am so blessed to have had them.

Well, there you have it, the Disney version of “What I did during my summer vacation.”  Not too shabby if you ask me… I’m sure all the other kids would have been so jealous. 😉

With the end of Disney California Adventures “remodel” finally in site, I wanted to take a look at some of my favorite images from the Blue Sky Cellar over the past couple of years. *click on the images for a larger version*

Thanks again to Deb at Focused on the Magic for hosting the Disney Wordless Wednesday Bloghop!

While the majority of the rest of my Disneyland 2011 trip was spent traipsing through the D23 Expo, we did have one additional evening and a little over a half day in the Park… it definitely didn’t seem like enough time, but it was still wonderful, and I’m glad we had at least a little extra time.

On Saturday evening we finally had to surrender to the chaos at the Expo and head over to Disneyland, however, as is to be expected on a Saturday night, in the middle of the summer, the Park wasn’t without chaos either.  However, we ended up having a very relaxing evening, even if we were too tired to last long. 🙂

I was really excited for the new Mary Blair exhibit at The Disney Gallery, so we made the Gallery our first stop of the evening.  I’m so glad we were able to make it in there because the original art was amazing and there were even a few pieces I had never seen before.  Not to mention the assortment of other fabulous prints and art pieces that the Gallery always has on hand.  After the requisite trip through The Disneyland Story, with a nod to Walt’s Bench, we were on our way to wander through the stores on Main Street and make our way into Fantasyland.

We had slightly unforunate timing in our trek back to Fantasyland, as Mickey’s Soundsational Parade was just making it’s way through the park, but we were happy for the opportunity to see more bits and pieces of the parade, and we even managed to make it back to It’s a Small World – in honor of our Mary Blair gallery viewing – in time to see the clock count off a new hour and with a very small line.  I know that Small World has the reputation of being, perhaps, the most annoying Disney attraction, but time after time, year after year, I find it to be a charming glance into the innocence of youth.  Heck, I even have a soft spot for the most catchy song in the Disney Songbook! 😀

Our evening in the Park was a quick one, as we were exhausted from a crazy day at the Expo, but I could definitely get used to hopping over to Disneyland for a few hours on a warm Saturday evening.

Our last Expo day didn’t bring any Park time for us, but we did have an amazing Character Breakfast at the Storyteller’s Cafe in the Grand Californian, and a fun night in Downtown Disney.  In fact, it was at breakfast that morning that we saw both Roshon Fegan from Disney Channel’s Shake it Up and Camp Rock, as well as, the incomparable John Lasseter.  It was interesting to see Lasseter come in with his entourage, including his personal secret services, complete with black suit and discreet earpiece.  It was also enchanting to watch the Storyteller’s resident park ranger possibly get his shot at his dreams, as he entertained Lasseter with his best joke-telling, plastic fish-flinging antics.

On our last day in California, we were able to spend the morning and nearly the entire afternoon in the Park, taking in everything we possibly could and making sure we hit all of our must-sees.  In the limited amount of time we had, we managed to get a Mickey Waffle at the Carnation Cafe, make it on Peter Pan’s Flight, Alice in Wonderland, and Buzz Lightyear, grab a Dole Whip and catch a show in the Tiki Room, and even take a flight to Tatooine and the Death Star on Star Tours.  It was a really great day – despite a run-in with some very un-magical guests on Star Tours – and we got in everything we had hoped to see.  So, it was with heavy hearts that we got in a shuttle to take us back to the Orange County airport that afternoon and said good-bye to our Happy Place for another year.

Sarah over at Magical Days with the Mouse has come up with a great way for the Disney blogging community to share some of their favorite Disney memories… Flashback Friday. It’s a great bloghop that I have been following for some time, so I am super excited to start a series of vintage blogs each Friday and link up with others in the community doing the same.

I recently ingested all of my home video onto my computer from my early trips to Disneyland (20+ years ago) and I’m so excited to share video clips and pictures through the Flashback Friday forum.

For my inaugural post I just wanted to share a quick picture of my very first character encounter in Disneyland. In March of 1990, my Mom, my Grandma, and I traveled to Disneyland for their 35th Anniversary and my first ever Disney vacation. I have amazingly vivid memories of this trip given that I was only eight, but when I was watching back the video, I was surprised to see that the very first Disney character I ever met “in person” was none other than… B’rer Fox! So strange, I think! These days, it’s not terribly common to see any of the Song of the South characters roaming the parks, but at a Walt Disney Travel exclusive “Early Bird Breakfast” with the characters, the first one I ran into was, in fact, B’rer Fox. And, I was apparently quite the hugger (as I still am, I suppose 😉 ) because as soon as I saw him, I engulfed B’rer Fox in a big bear hug. It was a fun moment for me to reflect on now, although I can’t say as if it particularly stood out to me then, as I definitely didn’t remember it.

Thanks for visiting Rays of Disneyland for my very first Flashback Friday! Be sure to come back next week as I share more of my earliest Disneyland memories.