It's just like we dreamed it

I've always been a huge fan of Disney and have been lucky enough to go the Parks in Paris, Orlando, Anaheim, and Tokyo - I'd love to visit them in Hong Kong and Shanghai too some day just to say I've been to all of them, but I guess we'll see how that pans out! I wasn't lucky enough to grow up with them, and my first trip was to Walt Disney World in Orlando when I was 7 as my dad had died and so it was supposed to be a distraction, but I hardly remember it. My next visit was to Disneyland Paris on a school trip to France and mostly involved riding Space Mountain over and over, which I'm actually really grateful for as it was the only time I got to see it as Space Mountain: De la Terre à la Lune with it's incredible steampunk Jules Verne theming. My next trip wasn't until I was 17 when I managed to rope some friends into going, and it was my first real experience of the magic and I was hooked! It took me a few years to realize I could just go by myself which was completely liberating, and I now prefer going solo as I can take everything at my own pace and don't have to worry about whether other people are having a good time. I got an annual pass and began going regularly, and after inheriting some money went to Anaheim and Tokyo which actually only reinforced how much I love the often overlooked Disneyland Paris. Maybe I'm biased, but I think Disneyland Paris is by far the prettiest park and feels much less artificial, as lets face it most of the Disney Classics are set in Europe anyway so everything feels much more at home!



I'd been only twice over the past 5 years and I hadn't really enjoyed those trips as much due to my anxiety, but I realized that if I wanted to overcome it then I'd just have to force myself and as I knew I'd be leaving Europe in 2020 I decided to make one last trip. I was there Monday to Friday which is my favorite time as it's quietest (I literally waited no more than 15 minutes for all rides) and I'd hoped that by going in the first week of November I'd hit that sweet spot of it being between the Halloween and Christmas overlays so that I could experience it more as Disney and less as a holiday.




I didn’t really meet characters on my last trip, and I think it’s why I didn’t have the best time as I’d kind of taken what makes Disney holidays unique and instead treated it like it was just a theme park. My anxiety was really high though and it felt easier to stay in my own bubble. I really wanted to push myself out of that though, so when I made my booking I added a Photopass as I knew I'd feel guilty at the cost if I didn't use it and it made the absolute world of difference to my trip! I'm also completely sold on the Photopass concept as it makes it so easy when you’re at Disney on your own.

I think I enjoy meeting the fur characters the most as I love how they communicate and it adds to the fun. Donald ended up being the first character I met, and he was just so sweet and made a fuss of me. Alice and Hatter got hysterical over my Hans coat and were worried it meant I was friends with the Queen of Hearts! I was super excited to see Olaf near the castle but realized he was just doing some promotional video and not actually meetable which was a shame as I'd of liked to have given him a warm hug as I was fully decked out in my Frozen gear.



It was my first time seeing Stars on Parade which I really loved! It had lots of neat features to the parade floats, like on the Toy Story float there were dancers/acrobats dressed as the aliens and spinning around in cages, Peter Pan and a few of the Lost Boys were swinging back and forth in a giant ship, and there were rarer characters included like Mowgli who I don't think I've ever seen before at any park.






I really loved the Sleeping Beauty section the most! Usually the princess movies all get shoved together onto one single float, so I liked that at least one of them wasn't treated as purely existing within the monolithic Disney Princess franchise. And the fact that Prince Phillip was center stage as the main character was even better as the Princes are never more than props and I loved seeing him have his moment. He was sword fighting dancers dressed as Maleficent's minions, while the float was a fire breathing dragon Maleficent that was kind of steampunk-ish in design and being operated by the spinning wheel. I just loved absolutely everything about it!! I don't understand why the Princes aren't given more of a starring role in general, surely it's a missed marketing opportunity? They could be positive role models for little boys to identify with if they were seen more as characters in their own right. Even princes that are fleshed out in their respective movies such as Aladdin and Naveen are never not seen without their princess and it's a shame.









Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs was my favorite film as a little girl, and I used to dress up as Snow White regularly and so it's still really sentimental to me. Snow White and her Prince have always been my favorite canon Disney couple and it always makes me sad how much the prince's character was cut back as he was supposed to be awesome.






The only hint of Return to Oz throughout the whole park! I'll always be sad that Disney never did more with Oz while they had the rights, especially as the made the single best movie.



Phantom Manor has always been my favorite ride. It's been entirely refurbished and they've returned the original narration by Vincent Price and it sounds awesome! I have to say though, the refurb has kind of ruined the plot line the ride had and it doesn't make much sense anymore. The plot was what made it so much better than Haunted Mansion, and now I feel like I'm not really sure what's supposed to be going on. And seeing as the narration is now partly in English whereas before it was entirely in French and yet I still understood it better back then, that's some way they've gone to over complicate it.





The arcade down Main Street USA has a mini museum for the Stature of Liberty, which I normally barely glance at but as I'd looked over Manhattan from Lady Liberty's crown just 3 months earlier it brought back all the feels. Because France built the statue it's a nice link between the theming of Main Street and Paris.

Project 365: III

15/365 - Sunday 15 September: I got my signed Playbill from Moulin Rouge! professionally framed ♥♥♥ The frame was custom made as Playbills are awkward dimensions, and it's all sealed up at the back so it's safe and sound. I'm just so, so happy with it as it's so important to me as it represents so much and was signed by one of my favorite actors, and now I can display it with pride on my shelf and take it traveling with me and know it won't ever get damaged. You can see my little New York snow globe in front of it too!

Project 365: II

10/365 - Sunday 8 September: All of the animals were out in the lane. Autumn is the time of year I'm most grateful to live in the countryside.

Project 365

I've been messing around with my domain name, I hope everything's working OK! Anyway, I've wanted to try my hand at doing a 365 project for years, and have dabbled with smaller term photo a days now and then but have never been able to commit to a full 365 as a full year has always felt too much commitment. But after coming back from New York I felt really inspired to give it a go, and I know it's not the typical time to start something like this but I also think surely there's no wrong time either? You just gotta do it when you feel like it or you never will.

I guess part of why I felt inspired to start this after coming home from New York is obviously I was documenting a lot when I was there, so it already started a bit of that habit in me. Also I feel like this is a year I'm going to want to remember, and I've learnt from looking back on the photo a day posts I have done that it's my favorite way of documenting because they're full of the smaller day to day memories, so are special as they're more personal. Also I simply want to get used to using my camera more, to get more comfortable carrying it everywhere and taking photos in public, and to also get used to taking photos on manual. I've had a DSLR for about 10 years, and I'm ashamed to say I've only ever used it on auto and still don't understand all of the different settings, so I figure it's a great chance to learn all of that. Especially as I find myself relying on my point and shoot camera more and more as that's how I use my DSLR anyway, and I'm often unimpressed with the colors and so feel a need to cover them in filters. And I just really love seeing other peoples 365s so why not do my own!


001: Friday 30 August - Sorting through my New York memories, and creating a sketchbook spread of my tickets in my sketchbook.


002: Saturday 31 August - Mum got me a bunch of my favorite flowers as I've been really ill the past few weeks. You don't often see sunflowers with the reddish purple in the middle, they were so pretty.




003: Sunday 1 September - Went out looking for conkers as they've been a few big spiders around the house and I am not about that. Conkers do genuinely work, it's not just an old wives tale.




004: Monday 2 September - My new stickers arrived for my keyboard. I've had Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night on my laptop for about 3 years, and it was getting to a point where stickers were flying off when I typed as they were losing their tack. I used the same company again as they'd lasted so long, but this time went for something a little more muted that I think suits my silver laptop well. I'm also impressed as they've upgraded the stickers slightly, and they now have little holes to make room for the bits on the keys that stick up and the for the lights on some keys. They're by Keyshorts, and I like them as they'll create stickers for any laptop and aren't exclusive to Apple like so many.


005: Tuesday 3 September - Still ill, and getting through a lot of ginger tea with honey.


006: Wednesday 4 September - Joining in an illustration hashtag prompt for this month. I'm actually thinking of doing Inktober for the first time ever, I'm usually put off as so many cheat and work on it throughout September instead of each day through October, or use it purely for marketing and it's become a great example of how capitalist systems ruin everything nice and caused it leave a bad taste in my mouth. But I'm actually quite inspired by the prompt list this year, and I intend to do it properly each day, and not get too caught up in making every prompt perfect but just do it on my own terms for my own enjoyment. It's sad that doing things for yourself seems to be a revolutionary concept nowadays, but there you go.


007: Thursday 5 September - I stopped off in Oslo on my way back from New York, and I've been finishing off the things I bought.


008: Friday 6 September - I saw It: Chapter Two! The first screening they showed as I was so excited and so determined not to have it spoiled for me. I never noticed before I took this photo that the funky carpet at the cinema is reels of film, that's pretty cool.




009: Saturday 7 September - I finished my illustration for the prompt, I'm not thrilled with how it came out but considering how ill I've been I did the best I could. And I made a tomato and mushroom pizza completely from scratch, including the base, which isn't super photogenic but I was pleased with nonetheless. It was my first time ever making pizza from scratch, and now I've done it I can't fathom why anyone spends £20 on Domino's.

A little over a week just because I started at an uneven time, but hopefully I can get these up every Saturday from now on!