Weekly DDL Post

This week on the Disney Driven Life, I talk about the new plans for Pleasure Island! To read more details about Hyperion Wharf, check out my article on the Disney Driven Life!

The Wonderful World of Disney Web- November 29 to December 5

Here is your weekly schedule for the Wonderful World of Disney Web:

Monday, November 29

• 1:00 PM Eastern- Cosmic Reid's Starlight Cafe- Listen at www.magicalmouseradio.com for 90 minutes of great Disney music and AMAZING Disney interviews hosted by "Cosmic" Chris Reid! You can join his chatroom during the show as well at http://cosmicreid.com/

• 8:30 PM Eastern- Ryan Kilpatrick's TweetWatch: A Christmas Carol (Jim Carry Version) - Join the Friendfeed at http://friendfeed.com/disneyfilmproject to chat and watch the movie with lots of Disney friends!

Tuesday, November 30

• 8:00 PM Eastern- Live Recording of innermouse- Go to http://keithbarrett.com/tv/ to see and chat with the hosts of innermouse as they make this week's episode

Wednesday, December 1

• The First Day of MouseVent!- Starting today and every day until Christmas, you can download awesome exclusive Disney podcasts from http://www.mousevent.com/ to celebrate the Holidays! Each day, the podcasts will be available at Midnight UK time!

• 7:30 PM Eastern- WDW Radio NewsCast- Lou Mongello fills you in on all of the lastest Disney news live via webcam. Click Here to find out more about NewsCast and Go to http://WDWNewsCast.com to join in the NewsCast live!

Thursday, December 2

• Download your MouseVent for the day!

Friday, December 3

• What is Today's MouseVent podcast?

Saturday, December 4

• Don't forget to Download your MouseVent!

Sunday, December 5

• Yes, Another MouseVent is available, dont miss it!!

If you  know of any other events that should be on this Schedule, just contact me on twitter or send me an email at lady_aurora_yensid@hotmail.com and I will be happy to add it!

A Unique Video to Share!

Let me tell you, I just LOVE getting emails from readers who have cool stories, pictures or videos to share!  Just last week, I received an email with a video that is just too awesome not to share! Dror from Israel sent me a video that their friend and friend's brother, Huge Disney fans, made of actual underwater lip-syncing of "Part of Your World" from The Little Mermaid! This took lots of effort and the fantastic results are worth every minute of preparation!  The girl playing Ariel, Shir, is quite good at swimming like a mermaid and at the end of the film you get a glimpse of how she was able to do that.

The 4 minute film took 2 days to shoot and was shot at Eylat's Princess Beach in Tel Aviv, Israel, which looks absolutely gorgeous from this film!!

If you have any comments you would like to leave the creators of the film, the actual youtube page for the video is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0iqz2Y5qUg

Enjoy!

Mousevent: The Disney Holiday Event

I remember when I was in school, one of my favorite things to do was follow the Christmas countdown calendar my teachers had.  Whoever was the student of the day would get the little surprise hiding in the door or pocket for that day and when it was your turn, you just filled up with excitement!

Well Disney fans, get ready to have that excited feeling every single day!! Starting December 1, a new website experience will begin to celebrate the coming holiday at MouseVent.com!

Each of the 24 days leading up to Christmas, a new miniature podcast will be released featuring information that you will not hear from anywhere else! And who is making these podcasts? Only some of the BIGGEST names in the Disney community, including Jim Korkis, Disney Brit, Chef Big Fat Panda, Trapped on Vacation, WEDway Radio, From Screen to Theme, WDW News Today and so many more! To see the full list, go to http://www.mousevent.com/ and look at the sponsors list on the bottom (and check out some of their websites too if you are not familiar with them).

The way the MouseVent calendar will work is that each day, a new sound clip will be released for you to download.  If you miss a day, do not fear, all the clips that have been previously released will be available for download at any time.

How do you participate in the calendar? There are a couple ways: You can go to MouseVent.com each day and download the clips from there, or you can subscribe to MouseVent on iTunes and get each day automatically downloaded when they are released!  Follow MouseVent on Twitter at Twitter.com/MouseVent and you can even join the Facebook Group by Clicking Here!

I am very excited for this calendar and cannot wait to hear the awesome information we learn every day!! There are great people involved with this project, foreshadowing a complete success and tons of fun!

My Thankful List 2010

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! This is a list of just some of the things I am thankful for this year

I am Thankful For....

-the love of my family

-the love and support from my boyfriend, Chris

-all of my great friends

-my good health the last year

-the food and shelter I am blessed with

-the education I am lucky enough to have

-the great student teaching placement and the wonderful experiences I am sure to have there

-Walt Disney and his amazing dreams

-Twitter, for I would never have known about the large Disney community, met so many amazing friends or found my prince charming without it

Please remember those who are not lucky enough to have some, if any, of the blessings we have this year.

What are you thankful for? Leave me a comment below about what you are thankful for this holiday season!

Wishing you and yours the happiest Thanksgiving!

Get Ready for Tangled!

Tangled is out today! I thought I would post a few more images of the movie that Walt Disney Pictures has so kindly provided! These pictures seem to show more of the personality of the characters, especially the animals! Enjoy!

Maximus

Pascal

Pascal

Pascal a big bug-eyed

Pascal looking Flynn over

One really creepy guy!

Flynn and Max fighting

Flynn about to be catapulted

Close call for Flynn Rider

Smooth Criminal

Flynn admiring himself

Mother Gothel and some goons

Mother Gothel loves Rapunzel's hair

Max with Attitude

I think Maximus lost Flynn

Flynn and Rapunzel with the lanterns

Flynn and Rapunzel with the lanterns

Looking Down

Really unique image of Rapunzel sweeping

The bar is called the Snuggly Duckling.....Really?!

Max and Flynn seem to fight a lot

Tangled Movie Clips

I was looking around youtube and stumbled upon a few movie clips from Tangled and I just had to share them! Get pumped for Wednesday!!

Cars 2 Trailer

Here is a look at the awesome trailer for the Disney/Pixar movie Cars 2 coming out June 24, 2011

The Wonderful World of Disney Web- November 22 to November 28

 The schedule this week is pretty small, everyone is taking off this week for the Thanksgiving Holiday here in the USA. There are a couple things that I am aware of to report however!

Monday, November 22

• 1:00 PM Eastern- Cosmic Reid's Starlight Cafe- Listen at www.magicalmouseradio.com for 90 minutes of great Disney music and AMAZING Disney interviews hosted by "Cosmic" Chris Reid! You can join his chatroom during the show as well at http://cosmicreid.com/

Wednesday, November 24

• 7:30 PM Eastern- WDW Radio NewsCast- Lou Mongello fills you in on all of the lastest Disney news live via webcam. Click Here to find out more about NewsCast and Go to http://WDWNewsCast.com to join in the NewsCast live!

Thursday, November 25

• USA Thanksgiving! 

 This is all that I know of schedule wise for this week.  If you know of anything else and would like for me to post it on the WWDW link on the top of my blog, comment below or send me an email! Have a magical week and for all my fellow Americans, Happy Thanksgiving!

The Disucator: Mickey Writing Prompt

Since tomorrow, November 18th is what is reserved as Mickey Mouse's Birthday, I thought it would be fun to put up a prompt and template I have been working on for a bit. The idea is to take the shape of Mickey Mouse's head and use it as a template for a writing prompt.  The face part of his head would be where the children would write their letter, essay, answer to a question, or whatever the teacher poses to the students.  The ears would be for pictures; the left being a picture of the student, whether hand drawn or a photograph and the right ear would be for a drawing of what the student wrote about.

Mickey Mouse Prompt

Subject: Writing

Grade: Primary grades, but easily adaptable

For this lesson, you will need a template of the classic Mickey Mouse shape, a piece of paper (I use white, but almost any light colored paper could work), pencil, ruler and crayons or markers.

Google "Mickey Mouse Head Outline" to get a shape that you would like.  To get your outline the right size, just put the picture on a Microsoft Word document or similar application and stretch it out to the size you would like. Once you print off your template, you may want to glue it to a piece of cardboard or a manila folder so that it is sturdy, then cut it out so that it could be used as a tracer by the children.

Have the children trace the Mickey head onto the piece of paper. 

After the Mickey is traced, use the ruler to draw lines in the head part of Mickey.  Do not draw lines in the ears.  It is the teacher's discretion how many lines the children should draw depending on the age of the students and how much they are expected to write. 

Now for Mickey's Birthday, the children could write about what they would buy Mickey for his birthday, how they would throw him a surprise party, what their favorite Mickey movie is, or any other topic you would like them to write about.

When they are finished writing, have the children draw a picture about the prompt in the right ear of Mickey and in the left, have them either draw a picture of themselves, place a photo of themselves or just sign their name.  Depending how you want to display this writing piece, you can decide if you want the children to cut out the Mickey head or not.

This lesson plan is specifically designed for Mickey's birthday, it not only celebrates in a Disney way, but allows the children to practice their writing. I have a few more more ideas with this Mickey prompt which I will be posting soon, including a bulletin board idea.

Until next time: Class Dismissed!

Weekly DDL Post

This week on The Disney Driven Life, I posted something that is definitely of interest to parents, mainly parents with preschool-aged children. Changes are coming to Playhouse Disney- Live on Stage and you an read about the details by clicking here! Don't forget to read all of the other unique and awesome posts over at TheDisneyDrivenLife.com!

The Wonderful World of Disney Web- Nov 15 to 21

I have realized that there are so many wonderful Disney related events on the internet during the week, that it is hard for people to keep them all straight! Because of this, I have decided to start The Wonderful World of Disney Web (WWDW), a weekly post where I will list everything I know that is going on that week related to Disney.  Here is what I know is coming This week:

Monday, November 15

• 1:00 PM Eastern- Cosmic Reid's Starlight Cafe- Listen at www.magicalmouseradio.com for 90 minutes of great Disney music and AMAZING Disney interviews hosted by "Cosmic" Chris Reid! You can join his chatroom during the show as well at http://cosmicreid.com/

• 8:30 PM Eastern- Ryan Kilpatrick's TweetWatch: Lady and the Tramp - Join the Friendfeed at http://friendfeed.com/disneyfilmproject to chat and watch the movie with lots of Disney friends!

Tuesday, November 16

• 8:00 PM Eastern- Live Recording of innermouse- Go to http://keithbarrett.com/tv/ to see and chat with the hosts of innermouse as they make this week's episode

Wednesday, November 17

• 7:30 PM Eastern- WDW Radio NewsCast- Lou Mongello fills you in on all of the lastest Disney news live via webcam. Click Here to find out more about NewsCast and Go to http://WDWNewsCast.com to join in the NewsCast live!

Sunday, November 21

• 8:00 PM Eastern- Be Our Guest Podcast November Live Show- Every month, the awesome members of the Be Our Guest Podcast have a live show with chat and call-ins! To join the chat, go to BeOurGuestMike's Friendfeed and to listen to the entire Live Show, tune in to www.magicalmouseradio.com

For easy access to all of the scheduled events for the week, I have added a new page to my site: http://thetruedisneyfan.blogspot.com/p/wwdw and all of the events that are in this weekly post will also be on that tab. Check there also for the list of events that may be more updated than the one seen in the Sunday post.

Do you have a favorite Disney event that is not listed here? Do you have an event going on this week or coming up that you would like me to add to the Wonderful World of Disney Web Schedule? Send me an email at lady_aurora_yensid@hotmail.com or send me a tweet to http://twitter.com/lady_aurora and I would be happy add it to the list!

A Fun Evening In for Disney Fans

A friend of mine on twitter, Ryan Kilpatrick, has an awesome blog that, if you have not checked it out yet, you are missing out!!  It is called Disney Film Project and, as the title may suggest, it is all about Disney films. Not just feature films either, but shorter works as well! Ryan has a goal to watch all of the Disney theatrical films, both feature and short, in one year. He does make a disclaimer that it may take more than a year, and, I will admit, I hope it does because following along and learning about different films with him is just too much fun!!

He has been able to make his experience interactive thanks to Friendfeed.  Ryan schedules what he calls a TweetWatch, where whoever wants to join in can go to his blog's FriendFeed account (http://friendfeed.com/disneyfilmproject) and watch a movie with him! Ryan picks a Disney movie for that day, learns lots of different facts about it and while everyone watches the movie together, he tells us facts about it. It is a great learning experience and a fun way to spend the evening interacting with fellow Disney fans. Having been able to take part in several of these TweetWatches, I have gotten hooked on the experience and look forward to the evenings when it takes place, which is usually a Monday evening.

If you are interested in joining in on one of these TweetWatches, your first opportunity is this Monday, November 15th at 8:30pm Eastern.  The movie this week is Lady and the Tramp, one of my all-time favorites, which I am very excited for! To join in the fun, just have the movie on the menu screen and join the DisneyFilmProject's FriendFeed and wait for the signal from Ryan to press "Play" and begin the movie.

Click here for a full schedule of TweetWatch movies for the next few weeks and check back to Ryan's site frequently to learn about all of the great shorts he watches throughout his film project journey: http://disneyfilmproject.blogspot.com/. Follow Ryan on twitter at Twitter.com/RyanKilpatrick

unKNOWN Actors: George Lindsey

The actor we are looking at today is from Jasper, Alabama, born on December 17th, 1935, and is best known for playing a character that was, as my sister would say, quite a goober.  This actor is none other than George Lindsey, and that character is Goober Pyle, a comedic character from such shows as Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., The Andy Griffith Show, and Mayberry RFD.  When he wasn’t playing this goofy cousin to Gomer, he had several other acting gigs, some of them with, you guessed it, Disney!

George is first spotted in a Disney work in 1964 during Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color.  In the show Bristle Face, he played Hermie Chadron.

In 1970, he did his first Disney voice over, providing the voice of Lafayette, the bloodhound sidekick of Napoleon in The AristoCats.

A few years later George was once again voicing an animal, but quite a different kind.  In Robin Hood (1973), he was the voice of Trigger, a vulture who worked alongside of the Sheriff of Nottingham.

The last Disney voiceover he did was in 1977 for The Rescuers, the voice of a Rabbit.

After his voiceovers, his only other Disney gig was in 1982, playing a guy named Wally in the Herbie the Love Bug television show, an apparently unsuccessful show that only had 5 episodes.  From what I have read, none of these episodes have been released on DVD or anything by Disney.

He may have only been in a few movies, but George Lindsey has a recognizable, comedic tone in his voice that can be heard through his characters, making them easy to pick out.  His characters were silly and his voice complimented the characters actions perfectly!

Steve Barrett's Awesome Interview!

Chris, Jess and Steve with an Animal Kingdom Lodge Hidden Mickey

Back in June, when Chris and I went to Walt Disney World, we had the great pleasure of meeting many wonderful people.  Two of those wonderful people were Steve Barrett and his wife Vickie.  If you are a Disney fan of any sort, you probably know the name Steve Barrett from many areas; Celebrations Magazine, Cosmic Reid's Starlight Cafe, WDW Radio....but when you hear his name, there is one main thing he is associated with: Hidden Mickeys! His Hidden Mickeys books are very popular, so much, in fact, they are sold ON Disney Property! Not just there of course, you can also buy them at local bookstores and at the Intrepid Traveler website.

The reason I bring up Steve right now is because recently, he was interviewed by ABC/Travel about his beloved Hidden Mickeys! Here is the video interview that Steve did with Scott Mayerowitz:

There is also a written article on Steve and his Hidden Mickeys, which can be viewed by clicking here and if you would like to see some pictures of Hidden Mickeys, click here for a photo slideshow featured on ABC's website. 

The Student Teaching Journey Begins...

Going to step away from the Disney part of the blog for a moment and talk about a journey I am beginning in my educational/professional life. Yesterday, I got my official letter from my Senior Seminar class saying who my cooperating teachers would be for student teaching! I have received my first choice, which is Claymont Elementary School, a school that is about 5 minutes from my house and where I went from 4th through 6th grade.

My Official Letter!!

The principal there, Jim Grant, is the principal my mother worked under at Darley Road Elementary before the school closed down and my two cooperating teachers are women that I know and have worked with before from Darley as well! My regular education placement is with Maria Natalie in her first grade classroom where I will be from Jan 10th to the end of February.  My special education placement is with Rachel Goldwasser, a teacher in the Delaware Autistic Program and she teaches Kindergarten through 2nd grade.

I am really honored and excited that these teachers are going to let me become a part of their classroom family and I cannot wait to meet the students! Now that I know my placements, my next step is to go to the classrooms and spend at least 5 hours in each and write a paper on my experiences.  I am planning to go to Mrs. Natalie's classroom next Friday to visit and will see Ms. Goldwasser's room after Thanksgiving.

I am still deciding how I want to blog about my experiences. I know I will be updating with big events, but for smaller updates, I am possibly thinking of doing a video blog update.  Not sure yet though, I will have to see as they year continues. 

Weekly DDL Post

This week on the Disney Driven Life, I look at the additions made to one of my favorite walk through attractions, Walt Disney: One Man's Dream! There seems to be some cool additions made, so click here to read the article and find out what they are!

Great Disney Toy Deals for friends in the UK

In the past, I have written posts that only pertained to everyone in the US and/or Canada.  Well, this is not one of those posts. In fact, this post is especially for all of my friends in the United Kingdom.  I understand how difficult it can be for you to buy Disney items when you are so far away from Disney.  Well, if one of the items you are looking for are toys and games for your children, then I think I have found a reasonable solution for you!

Tesco Direct has come to me to let you all know about the awesome and affordable Disney toys and games that they have.  While I was looking through the site, I found toys and games that I have never seen before, they are very unique and look like a lot of fun! The prices seem to be quite affordable as well! (Thank you to my friend Kymie for confirming  as I am not well versed in pounds)

 So what are the toys that they offer? Well I have 3 links to share: Toy Story Toys and Games, Disney Princess Toys and Games and Disney/Pixar Cars Toys and Games. There are quite a lot of toys and for all ages! Are any of these categories featured on your child's Christmas list? Want to find something unique and Disney to surprise them with this year? It is definitely worth your time for you to check out these Tesco sites!

Have you used Tesco before? Are you planning to purchase from them in the near future, especially for any Disney items? Leave your feedback and let me know what you think?

What exactly do you do for Celebrations Magazine, and how did you get started with them?

I run the twitter and facebook pages mainly for Celebrations Magazine. A couple years ago, Lou had a call on his show asking if there was anyone who would be interested in helping with the magazine and I sent him and Tim a message saying I would love to help in any capacity.

Ask me anything

Weekly DDL Post

This week on the Disney Driven Life, I talk about news about the upcoming attraction: Star Tours II.  The pilot has been announced and I know I found it to be quite shocking! Find out for yourself by going to The Disney Driven Life.

unKNOWN Actors: David Ogden Stiers

For our featured actor this week, we have a relatively well known actor, David Ogden Stiers.  He was born on October 31, 1942 in Peoria, Illinois and has had cameos in many different television shows throughout his career.  His most known television appearance is in the show M*A*S*H, playing Major Charles Winchester from 1977 to 1983.  His first Disney appearance was several years after this and, you will see throughout his Disney appearances what a unique voice David has, being able have many different accents and tones throughout his career.

David was used first in a Disney film in 1991.  In Beauty and the Beast, we get his first set of contrasting voices, providing the low, smooth voice of the narrator at the beginning and the high strung high pitched voice of Cogsworth.  He is the only one who has ever done the voice for Cogsworth, making voice appearances for supplemental movies including Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997) and Belle’s Magical World (1998) and appearances in television shows, such as The House of Mouse (2001). He was even the voice for Cogsworth in the 2005 Playstation video game, Kingdom Hearts II.

After his first appearance, he next appeared in Pocahontas (1995), providing two opposite type of voices once again; the dark, stern voice of Governor Ratcliffe and the light, airy voice of Ratcliffe’s assistant, Wiggins.  He would voice Ratcliffe once more in 1998’s Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World.

In 1996, David leant his voice to the Archdeacon in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) had him voicing Fenton Q. Harcourt for the film.

In the American version of the 2001 Studio Ghibli Film presented by Walt Disney Studios, Spirited Away, David provided the English voice for the character Kamajii.

After doing some of these minor voices for a few years, David’s next huge character came to be: Mr. Jumba Jookiba from 2002’s Lilo and Stitch.  Jumba, like Cogsworth, would be a repeating character for David.  You can hear him voicing Jumba in the Experiment 626 video game (2002), Stitch! The Movie (2003), Lilo and Stitch II: Stitch has a Glitch (2005), the TV movie Leroy and Stitch (2006) and he was occasionally featured in Lilo and Stitch the Series (2003-2007) on television.

There are two other small movies that he has done a voice for, and those are Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo (2004) and Pooh's Heffalump Halloween Movie (2005) where he voiced the Narrator for both.

David has even done a couple of Disney voices this year! For the Kingdom Hearts: Birth to Sleep video game, he provided the voices for Jumba and, surprisingly, Doc, one of the dwarfs from Snow White.

It seems as though David Ogden Stiers is hooked on Disney.  Since his first appearance, he has made dozens more and doesn’t seem to be slowing down.  I know I will look forward to hearing his voice in future Disney creations.