Color Run 2014

This past Sunday was The Color Run in South Portland!  Eliot, Elissa and I were joined by all of our BBQ friends!  For most of us, it was our first color run.    

We'd been planning to do the race together for a few months now.  My best friend Katie approached me with the idea to form a team, and I came up with a team name: Colors of the Wind.  (I'm a Disney minded creative genius!)  We're Disney fans, so it only seemed appropriate to go with it.  Shortly after naming and creating our team, I designed a team t-shirt concept.  I came up with the slogan "Paint Me All the Colors of the Wind."

We really got into the Pocahontas themed spirit!  Katie and Jenn wore awesome feather earrings and Katie, Jenn and Kathleen cut the sleeves of their shirts to look like fringe and they braided their hair!  We made sure to take a team photo pre-race.

While waiting for the race to begin, a few members of our group joined the Zumba warm up routine.  We posed for a few Pocahontas themed photos.  (We're pretending to shoot arrows if you're confused.)  We also took some photos with the "runicorn" mascot of The Color Run.  I also took some photos of the crowds of people in white shirts everywhere!

We made our way over to the start line around 8:30.  The race started at 9:00 so we spent a few minutes hanging out in the shade under some trees.  Part of our team decided to do a human knot.  Then we headed over to the start line shoot.

While waiting in the shoot, we passed the time taking "selfies" pre-race and still clean. 

Before we knew it, our corral was at the front of the shoot and we counted down for the group in front of us!  We watched the "runicorn" dancing around and a few minutes later, it was our turn... 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... and we're off!!!

The race itself was so much fun!  Katie, BJ and Eliot wanted to run it, while the rest of us girls decided to walk the 5K route.  We got a lot more color than they did since we walked through the 4 color stations.  I didn't get too much green, but the little boy at the end of the yellow section pelted the back of my neck as I passed him.  I tried to even out my color when I passed through pink on the right side and purple on the left.  As the race progressed, we gradually got more coated in it.

Sooner than expected, we were already at the finish area.  (We later found out that the course was actually only 2.5 miles.)  Eliot, Katie, BJ, Dani and my parents greeted Jenn, Katie, Elissa, Kathleen and me.  We were also given some extra colored powder!

We took a lot of colorful post-race photos.  We did our own powder toss in the field next to the post-race party area.

We took some colorful selfies.

BJ and I decided we were both turning into the Wicked Witches of the West.  I dubbed him Zeleno when I saw how green his face was turning.  (It really reminded me of Zelena from Once Upon A Time.)

We didn't spend much time at the post race party, but it was fun to watch all of the colored powder being tossed into the air!

Eventually, it was time to head home from our colorful morning fun!  Katie and I had a good laugh when we saw Elissa and Eliot trying to keep their powder off of Katie's car.

The Color Run was a lot of fun and it is a great way to train for our runDisney events.  I can't wait to do it again next year!  I wish every run as as fun at this one!  °o°

Note: Most of these photos are ones I took myself.  But I would like to say a special thank you to Dani, Katie and Kathleen for the photos that I stole from your Facebook pages.  Thank you ladies!!!  ;-)

Disney Side BBQ Party

As you all know, this past Saturday was our "Show Your Disney Side" BBQ Party!!!

Saturday morning we were busy making final preparations: buying the food, decorating, setting up and preparing the food!  Thankfully, my parents came down for the weekend to help us out!  Eliot, Elissa, Mom, Dad and I divided and conquered.  

Eliot and Dad ran errands while Mom, Elissa and I bought the food.  Mom and I started the cooking and food prep.  Meanwhile, Elissa decorated the house with streamers and made the cupcakes.  Before we knew it, we were ready for the party to begin!

I was so excited to finally have the party with all of our friends!  The food was delicious. We had hamburgers and hot dogs from the grill.  (Thank you to BJ for manning the grill!) We also had my pasta salad, Mom's potato salad and a delicious summer salad that Katie made.  We had plenty of snacks, crackers, veggies and fruits set out in my Mickey Mouse bowls.  (That's the best way to serve food to Disney fans, right?)

For dessert, we had the Mickey and Minnie Mouse cupcakes that Elissa made.  (The frosting and food coloring didn't play nice with us.  The frosting was as red as we could get it.)  We found the white pearls in the baking section of Wal-Mart and they were delicious.  We had planned to make chocolate covered Mickey oreos, but we ran out of time.  But we're going to try to make them sometime over the next few weeks instead!

We went to the dollar store for all of the serving supplies.  The only thing we didn't get there were the yellow plastic cups.  We found those at Wal-Mart.  The dollar store only had black and red serving items and we wanted to have some yellow!  We used Mickey Mouse glasses from the Disney Store to hold the silverware and napkins.  (Ha, I just noticed that the plates and bowls form a hidden Mickey.  That was not intentional.)

We all enjoyed the food on our deck while talking about our favorite Disney rides and memories.  We were having such a good time laughing and having fun that I completely forgot to take photos.  (It's probably just as well; it was nice to be in the moment and not feel like I was missing out being too busy taking photos!)

After talking and relaxing for a bit, we decided to play with some of our games.  We had set up our volleyball net and some toss games to play.  We took turns playing badminton since we only have two racquets.  Eliot and I played with the bean bag toss for a bit.  Eliot and Elissa made the Mickey bean bag toss for our party.  We ran out of time to paint it, but we're planning to do it once they finish the second one!

After badminton, we decided to play a game of volleyball.  I was on a team with Elissa and Dani.  Eliot and BJ were playing against us while Katie and Jenn were the line judges.  Kathleen and my Dad kept score and cheered us on.  (Daddy also took some photos for us.) It was pretty lopsided since all three of us girls played, or are currently playing, volleyball in high school.  We played two sets to 25 and Team Girls won both of them.  But the guys put in a great effort considering they never played volleyball.  And we all got a few good laughs in at some of our not-so-smooth moves.

The party started to wind down after that since it was getting later in the evening and the (party crasher) mosquitoes started to come out.  Plus, we were all going to the Color Run early the next morning and we needed some sleep!  But before everyone left, we took a group photo of all of us Showing Our Disney Side!

We also made sure that our guests all took some party favors home with them!  I made extra Mickey parts soap when I was working on that order for Eliot while he was away.

After our guests headed home, Eliot, Elissa and I took everything down pretty quickly. We knew we had another busy day ahead of us with the Color Run on Sunday! Although we were exhausted, it was definitely a great day with our friends and my parents! 

In fact, it was so much fun that we're already planning on having another "Show Your Disney Side" BBQ Party next year!  Maybe we'll make it an annual event!!!  °o°

Elissa's First Week in Maine

Well, it's been another crazy week here at the Cady residence!

Eliot had a great birthday last week.  We enjoyed our quick trip to Boston before Elissa arrived last Wednesday morning.  We got home and had a few hours of sleep before we were off to Bar Harbor.  Thursday, my family went to my Grammie's burial service.

After the service, we went out to an early dinner with my aunts and cousin.  Then, all of us "kids" went to play mini-golf at Pirates Cove!  We all love mini-golf, and who doesn't like pirates?  Visiting Pirates Cove is definitely one of my favorite parts of summer!

While we were home, we also went walking the Carriage Paths in Acadia National Park. Elissa and I saw 2 turtles, lots of fish, tadpoles, 3 frogs, a snake and a beautiful butterfly!

On Father's Day, we drove to the top of Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park.  (We even got Nana up there!  Yay Nana!!!)  There was a cruise ship in town so it was fun to see it from up above the town.  

Eeyore, Olaf and Duffy also had a good time on the mountain.

Eeyore got a picture with "Grandpa" since they both had Red Sox shirts on.  (Daddy was having way too much fun propping Eeyore up in the front window of the car and making him wave to little kids in the parking lot.)

Eeyore even took a Cadillac Mountain "selfie."

Then, we went into Bar Harbor to have some ice cream down on the pier.  Eeyore sat in the car with Olaf and Duffy while the rest of us watched the cruise ship pull out of the harbor. Finally, Sunday evening we headed back to Southern Maine.

This past week, Elissa and I have kept ourselves busy cleaning the house and preparing for our DisneySide BBQ party this weekend!  We've also been shopping for supplies at a few of our local craft stores.  I'm pretty sure Eliot isn't going to let Elissa and I go shopping alone anymore... he he.  ;-)

Photo Source: UCreate Pinterest

Wednesday, Elissa and I went to our Zentangle class at JoAnn's.  It was so much fun!  I really couldn't wait for this class.  We learned a lot of new drawing and shading techniques.  We even both drew Zentangle inspired pictures with our favorite mouse!

Now it's back to party preparations!  This is going to be so much fun!!!  °o°

The (Not So) Top Secret Party

Well, I think it's time for the big reveal.  Remember the "top secret" party I've referred to a few times during my blog and Disney goal updates?

Now, I can make it official!  We're hosting our own at Home Disney Side Party!

No, we didn't receive an "official" kit like a lot of other bloggers.  (I was a bit late to that party.)  But I absolutely love Disney's newest slogan to "show your Disney Side."  As you guys know, my "Disney Side" is pretty much my only side.  There's Disney all over our house, in every direction you look.  I'm always planning my "next" vacation there. And we love it so much we got married in Walt Disney World.  So, of course we wanted to be in on this whole party concept!

The reason I'm finally spilling the beans, is that we had a special guest who we wanted to surprise.  We'd been doing pretty good planning the party through a private Facebook message.  However, we realized there was no way we'd be able to hide it from her once she got here.  Instead, we had Eliot's sister Elissa open her party invitation via Skype- so we could see her reaction.  Now that she knows about the party, everyone can know!

Elissa finally got her invitation Monday night of last week- just in time before she left to visit us here in Maine!  Here's her reaction upon opening the envelope.  (Eliot's screen shots didn't work so we had to take a picture instead.)

We are having a barbecue at our house this Saturday for some of our closest friends. Eliot and I have been dying to have a barbecue since we moved in over a year ago; we just never got around to having everyone over.  Now- we set a date, invited everyone, and decided to decorate and give it a Mickey and Minnie Mouse theme!

I'll be sure to post updates from our party planning.  Hopefully we'll have a few tutorial worthy projects completed by the time the party rolls around!

This is going to be way too much fun!!!  I can't wait!!!  °o°

Happy Birthday Eliot

Happy Birthday to my Disney loving, engineering minded, Eeyore loving, Candy Crush addicted, running, soap making, San Jose Shark fan, and partner in crime!!!

I'd like to wish my handsome husband Eliot a very Happy Birthday!

He shares his birthday with none other than Donald Duck!  Happy 80th Birthday Donald!

Now for the big birthday plans: we're actually not doing much tonight.  We'll probably go out to a quick dinner.  Tomorrow night, we're going down to Boston so we can pick Elissa up at the airport first thing on Wednesday.

The plus sides- we can go out to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory to celebrate Eliot's birthday tomorrow!  (I really wish we had Cheesecake Factories in Maine!!!) And... there's a pool at the hotel so we can go swimming!  Woo-hoo!

Later this week we'll be going to visit my parents.  (My grandmother's burial ceremony is on Thursday and we're going to stay for the weekend to visit.)  Hopefully at some point during the weekend, we'll be able to celebrate Eliot's and my Dad's birthdays!!!  I'm certainly ok with any occasion that requires cake!!!  °o°

Fun Find: Sparkle For Your Castle

Hi Friends!  It's time for another Fun Find!  I've decided that I'm going to try to do them on Fridays at least once a month.  I'll call them Fun Find Fridays!  Sounds "fun" right?

This week's Fun Find is: Sparkle For Your Castle!

Sparkle For Your Castle is your one stop shop for any Disney inspired wreath!  There are designs for holidays, special events, and designs based off of your favorite characters!

I discovered Darlene's Etsy shop about a year and a half ago.  I don't even remember how I found it, but once I did, there was no turning back.  I was completely hooked.  I immediately fell in love with all of her amazing creations.  My regular readers have heard about my Disney holiday merchandise addiction.  This was like heaven for me!

Sparkle For Your Castle also has a Facebook page.  Dar is always posting photos of new products and ideas that she has!  It's a great interactive page too!  She asks her fans, or "Sparklers", their opinions of ideas, colors, and design concepts.  She also occasionally does wreath giveaways!

Dar has "featured" wreath themes each month.  In the past, she's done Alice in Wonderland and a "Touch of Color" (black and white with a pop of color).  For June, she's making Nightmare Before Christmas Wreaths!

One thing I'd really like to point out, is that Darlene is a sweetheart.  She's so nice and caring.  You don't always know who you're working with when you order things online. But you can rest assured that Dar creates products with integrity, love and hard work. She's very Etsy "convo" friendly if you have a certain question or custom request!

And it goes without saying that all of her wreath designs are gorgeous!  (Seriously, I want them all-one for each holiday.  And a few character wreaths, just because...)

The best part, is that her designs are very customizable!  If there's something that you can't find, you can contact her and she'll do her best to create something for you.  I hardly ever find Disney Hanukkah items, so I'm thinking about getting a wreath this year!

She's created wreath designs for customers' Disney kitchens!

As well as a wreath design inspired by the new Maleficent movie!

In fact, I ordered my first Sparkle For Your Castle wreath a little over a week ago and I'm anxiously waiting for it to arrive!  (I got confirmation that it shipped out and I can't wait to see it!)  I've admired this pool themed wreath for so long.  I decided it was time to get it before Dar ran out of the cute little plush on it!  And it's also time for another confession... we don't even have a pool!  But, someday we will!  And if our only "pool" this summer is a 2 foot deep kiddie pool to sit in, I will still enjoy looking at my adorable wreath!

If you're looking for some Disney decor for your house, definitely check our Dar's shop when you want to "add some Sparkle to your Castle!"  °o°

Note: All of these photos are from Sparkle For Your Castle's Etsy and Facebook pages. Dar owns the copyright on them.  Please do not use them without her permission.

Happy Birthday Dad

Happy Birthday Daddy!

I did a post for Easter and my Mom's birthday, so I thought it was only fitting to write a quick post and acknowledge my Dad's birthday as well!

Dad spent the day with Mom relaxing and going to the movies.  But hopefully we'll be able to get together and celebrate his and Eliot's (upcoming) birthdays soon!  °o°