Walt Disney Studio - The Princess and the Frog

Walt Disney Studio's in Burbank opened their doors for the first time in a long time to premier the movie, The Princess and the Frog. It was so cool to walk around the lot and see all the different things and to see the new movie! We even got a chance to meet all the Disney Princess...It was a great fun!

Ron in front of the famous water tower. It can hold 150,000 gallons of water.

Princess Tiana and I!

Outside of the Theater. It was old school theater...BIG seats, curtains, etc...It was nice to see that kinda of theater still is around.

Vegas Baby!!

Ron and I were suppose to leave Nov 7 for DFW for a few days. On Nov 6 @ 9:00PM Ron came down with some sort of sickness (we think Food Poison) and was sick until early Sunday morning. Since he was not able to fly, Texas was out of the picture. Instead of letting that mess up our vacation, we packed up the SUV and went to Las Vegas for 4 days! This was our first time to Vegas and it was our first "road trip" since we have been married! Hey, we lived in Hawaii for 6 years and can't take to many road trips there...lol.

First Night: Minus 5 @ Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino- This was the COOLEST and COLDEST bar we have ever been too! The entire bar was made out of ice, yes ICE! The chairs, tables, cups, walls, etc...it was so cold in there, but it was so much fun. All their drinks are made with Vodka, so if you are a vodka drinker, this is the place for you!! If you get a chance to go to one of these bars, it is a MUST DO!! The only one in the US is in Vegas, so have fun!! It is kinda expensive so be prepared, but it is so worth every dime we paid to be there!!

Here we are @ Minus 5 Bar!!

After Minus 5 we headed down the strip to check out the fountains @ the Bellagio hotel. I loved the fountain show and we sat there and watched several shows of it.


Day 2: On the second day, we headed to the Paris Hotel and Casino. My mother suggested eating breakfast at the buffet there. We got there around 10:40AM and started to eat breakfast. They start serving lunch @ 11:00AM, so we got to sample a little of that while we were there since they start to put it out at that time. After breakfast/lunch, we went and took a ride in the Eiffel Town. It is exactly half the size of the original in Paris. It reminded me a lot of the red town at Six Flags over Texas, but it was fun to do.

We also ventured to The Venetian Hotel were Ron won $55 on the $0.01 slot machines. After winning BIG (lol) we headed into the hotel to take a ride on the Gondola's. We decided to have a Gondola all to ourselves and enjoy the atmosphere.

After a long day of walking around and doing all the tourist things, we headed back to the hotel to get ready to see a show. We got tickets to see Zumanity, the sensual side of Cirque du Soleil. This show was not what I expected it to be...lol. I understood it was going to be the "sensual side" of the Cirque, but the lady behind us said it best...This is the Naked Cirque. If you are not comfortable with seeing half dressed men and especially women, don't go and see this show. The show had action, comedy and topless women. Overall, it was a good show. The best part of the entire show is the Drag Queen Hostess and the twins...They were so funny!!

Earlier in the day, we walked past Caesar Palace and saw Serendipity 3. Serendipity 3 was originally only in New York City. I have heard about this place for YEARS and have always wanted to go to NYC and try it. So, you can only guess how surprised I was to see it in Vegas on the strip. As soon as I saw it, I told Ron I wanted to try it out. So, after Zumanity we walked down to Caesar's Palace and tried it out. It was better than I could of every imagined!! If you get to NYC or Vegas, try the Frozen Hot Chocolate. We actually had the Peanut Butter Frozen Hot Chocolate with Kahlua in it...It was AMAZING!!

YUM!

Day 3: One day three we were planning on going home, but decided to stay an extra day. We headed over to the MGM hotel to check out the Lions. We did spend some time there because it was fun to watch. The picture of the Lion below has funny story. This particular Lion was very playful and causing all kinds of trouble for the other Lions in the area. She would come up and bit them, kick them, etc...Here she successfully stole the bone of another Lion and ran to the corner to enjoy it. She was very entertaining to watch.

We also waited in line to take our picture with the baby cub Rey Rey below. Ron said it might be the only time we actually get to touch a baby cub. She was so cute!!

What we learned: They only allow girl cubs to come in and take the pictures with the guests. The cost of the picture goes 100% to support the baby cubs. The Lions work shifts and they never work back-to-back days. They live on this big wildlife ranch outside of town and take turns working at MGM and they only work 3-4 hours a day. The glass is sound proof, so they can't hear all the people in the casino. They can see us, but that is about all.

Us with baby Rey Rey!
Lion that kept causing all kinds of trouble!

Kooza

This past weekend Ron and I headed to Santa Monica Pier for Cirque du Solei, Kooza. It was really, really good! It is a traveling Cirque du Solei, so they have a big top tent they set up at each location. It was the first time we have been to a traveling Cirque du Solei. I don't believe their was a bad seat in the entire place. If it comes to a city near you, GO!

Point Dume

Ron and I went on a day trip to Malibu this past weekend. Malibu is just 15 minutes from our house, but it has so many things you can do that you can take day trips every once in a while.

We started off by having lunch at Malibu Seafood. Ron had the fish/fries and I had the shrimp/fries. It was YUMMY! I would even go as far as saying this place is better than Neptune Net!!

After lunch, we went to Point Dume. There are tidepools there and it has purple starfish. We arrived in the early afternoon and didn't realize we would have to hike a good distance to get to the tide pools. Normally, this wouldn't be such a big deal, however, every Saturday we go powerhiking in the Santa Monica mountains and we were already sore for that hike and ended up hiking 2 more hours!!

Got to the tidepool and it was high tide...laughing! We didn't get to see any of the starfish.

This is where the tidepools are when it is low tide.

Ron after we had been hiking for about an hour.

Point Dume is known for being in several scenes on TV shows and movies. It was in the O.C., Iron Man, Planet of the Aps, and many more.

Halloween Time/CHOC Walk in the Park

This past weekend, mom came to visit me and we went to Disneyland Halloween Time. It was a fun filled weekend:

-Mickey Trick-or-Treat Party on Friday.
-Happiest Haunt Tour on Saturday.
-CHOC (Children's Hospital of Orange County) Walk in the Park on Sunday.

Friday, we went into Disneyland Park for a little while to hang out and enjoy the atmosphere until Mickey's Trick-or-Treat Party @ California Adventure that night.

Fantasyland: Mom and I spend most of our time @ Disney in Fantasyland riding all the "Mom Friendly" rides...lol. She really enjoyed the Tea Cups.


Friday Night - Mickey's Party: Mom and I are no beginners to this party, so we knew exactly what to do the make the most use of our time. First stop...Mickey and Minnie! The lines for these two get REALLY, REALLY long...So, the best thing is to go to them first stop and then enjoy the rest of the park.

Funny Story: DCA (Disney California Adventure) lets everyone into the parks a little early and then there are ropes that you wait behind. So, we were waiting to powerwalk to Mickey and Minnie for our picture. This entire family was in front of us...When the ropes dropped they took off running and I was think...Wow, they will get to Mickey fast. They ran right to the HOT DOG Stand and started jumping up and down b/c they were the first in line for that. I had to stop for a moment and just look at them...It was funny!



Saturday - Happiest Haunt Tour: Each year Disney seems to be adding stuff to their Halloween schedule. This year, they had the Happiest Haunt Tour. It was so much fun! They guide you in DCA and Disneyland. They tell you the different Halloween stories about both parks. They also give you front of line to Space Mountain, Tower of Terror, Big Thunder Mountain and Haunted Mansion. The front of line for these rides this time of year is worth the cost of the tour. But the BIG part is the seating for the Halloween Fireworks Show...They were GREAT seats.

If you are not a annual pass holder and want to enjoy Disneyland during Halloween time and see DCA - this is the tour! You get to walk in some of DCA and you also get to go into Disneyland...The tour ends around 8PM and then rest of the night you are free to roam Disneyland. Once you leave, that is it...You can't get back in. It was a good price to pay for a evening there...Cheaper than the normal tickets and you get front of line access to the rides.

Justin our "Ghost" tour guide!

Mom's first time on Tower of Terror!

Sunday - CHOC Walk in the Park: Mom and I raised money to do a Walk for the Children's Hospital of Orange County. It was such a different walk than anything we have ever done before! Overall, there was 12,000 walkers who raised $1.1M for CHOC.

Disneyland Half Marathon - 2009

This past weekend Ron and I headed down to Disneyland for me to take part in the Disneyland Half Marathon. We arrived on Saturday and headed straight to the expo to pick up my bib and check out all the cool sports stuff they had for sale. After a few hours of walking, we went to the movie and watch Gamer. Since the race was the next morning and we had to get up at 4:00AM, we decided to make it an early night and just relax in the room.

Got up bright and early on Sunday morning and headed to the race!! Last year I was in the very last Corral and it was not that great! This year, I was in Corral D which was a much better section to be in. At around 6:15AM we started the race and all the fun!!

Start of the Race - Mile .25

Running into Disneyland - Mile 2.5

Running in Downtown Disney - Mile 2.25

Running to the finish line - Mile 13

My finish time was 2:55, not be best race or training time, but a 12 minute improvement from Disneyland Half last year.

Happy it is over!!

I was also eligible for the Coast-to-Coast Challenge medal since I ran the Disney World Princess Half Marathon in March. So, I was super excited to get two medals!!

2009 Disney Medals

Nancy, Debbie and I after the race

Debbie and I with Mickey

On Monday, Ron and I headed into California Adventure to checkout all the new stuff they have going on over there. The characters at that park are much more interactive than at Disneyland. There is also a Talk with Crush section on Hollywood Blvd that is worth checking out...It was super fun!

Mickey's New Make-Over

Monsters Inc.

Garden

This past weekend we went out and got some plants and stuff to make the backyard more enjoyable since we will be here another couple of years. The entire family spent the day outside doing yard work!! The picture above was the end product and we are so excited to have a cute little flower area to enjoy!!

Victoria rolling in the dirt!

Izzy and Kehau!

Ron did all the digging!!

July 4

This July 4th Ron, Michelle, Phil, Bradley and I all headed over to Port Hueneme to check out the fireworks. We had perfect seats for the show!! They are nothing like Disneyland Fireworks, but they lasted about 30 minutes and everyone had a great time.

For all my Texas friends/family...Yes, we are all covered up in July!! It was like 50 degrees outside this night and the wind was blowing off the ocean...it was FREEZING!

Hawaii 2009

Got back last week from a week long trip back to Hawaii!! Ron's ship pulled in for a couple of weeks and he invited me to join him there for some much needed vacation time!! I jumped on the idea of going back to paradise for a week.

We stayed at the JW Marriott Ihilani Resort. It is one of my favorite places on the island because of the lagoons they have.

The first full day there we headed to the North Shore!! We spend the day just hanging out on the beach (picture below). Then we went to have Ron's favorite thing on the island, Shrimp Truck!! After that we headed to my favorite place on North Shore, Dole Plantation for a Dole Whip. Now, back in the day when we lived there, this place was small and you could find everything Pineapple here. They had several different flavors of Dole Whip and it was not that crowded. This time, man...This place was PACKED!! They didn't have hardly any of the things they had before, but at least we got a whip!!

North Shore Beach

Shrimp Truck!
Ron @ North Shore

That night we headed down to the pool and had a drink, LAVA FLOW, before we headed at to the beach to watch the sunset!!

Waiting for the Sunset

Enjoying my Lava Flow in a Pineapple. We got some really good sunset pictures!!

The rest of the vacation we spend just lounging around the lagoons. I took some floats so that we could just float around the lagoon all day!! It was so relaxing and nice the entire time we were there. We also got a chance to go and visit some friends of ours, Jen and Louis. It was nice to catch up with them and hang out.

Lagoon we spend most of our time at.

Our last night there!

Ellen - No Doubt

On May 18, Jennifer, Michelle, Nikki and I went to WB studios to watch the taping of the Ellen show. It was her Backlot Bash and No Doubt was going to perform a mini concert for every. We left Point Mugu @ 8:30AM and got to the WB lot around 10AM. We parked the car and got into line. We wait 4.5 hours in a parking garage before we headed over to the venue when we started getting into the party mood! We danced, we sang, we took pictures, we had a BLAST!! It was way cool and we were so freaking close to No Doubt it was amazing!! Ellen danced right by us during her dance portion of the show, so if you get a chance to view the show again look for us!

Total number of people who got tickets to the show, 5000!! Total number of people that got in, not sure...That had to turn people away because there was to many!! The show was so worth waiting all day for it.

All pictures were taken with camera phones since we didn't think we would be allowed to have camera's at the show. Next year, we will know better!!

Jen, Michelle, Nikki and I.

This was the walk from the parking garage to the venue.

Nikki and I so excited to see No Doubt.
Nikki, Michelle and Jen waiting for the show to start!

Here comes Ellen our way!!

OMGoodness!! It is No Doubt right in front of me!!