Lovely Little Chicken...

Posting with out comment.

Wizarding World of Harry Potter #atozchallenge

Image via Wikipedia

As promised, here's a snippet about our trip to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Red1's tenth birthday she received this letter that must have come by owl.

February 18, 2011
Miss J***

First Bedroom on the Left
***** United States of America

Dear Miss J***

I am so terribly sorry to have to send you this by owl, but your parents’ Muggle fireplace is not connected to the floo network. I have a matter I need your help to resolve.

Rest assured that this letter is enchanted to protect our secret from the Muggle world. Even reading it out loud is safe to do, as they would only hear you humming. To a Muggle this page would appear to be a blank piece of paper.

I send you this letter firstly to wish you a very happy birthday. It isn’t every day someone turns ten years old…unless that is, if you happen to have a Time-Turner, then it might be possible to turn ten as often as you like, I suppose. 

That brings me to the second purpose of this letter. A student at our school returned a Time-Turner to me, but the rest of them were destroyed in the Battle of the Ministry, and now mine has gone missing. I fear someone may have mistaken it for a keychain or a bit of ordinary clock works and sold it in a Muggle store called Ebius Bay. Have you ever heard of such a place? Mr. Weasley describes it is a place in a cloud where Muggles buy and sell precious objects. I am not sure how Muggles get into clouds, it sounds much too magical to me, but there are so many things I do not understand when it comes to matters of the Muggle word. Perhaps your mother has heard of such a place.

Professor Snape and I have completed a tracking spell and believe we have located our precious artifact in your very own house. This artifact is very precious and I fear that it is being hunted. It will be protected only if it is accompanied by three young witches. Please look for two other witches to help you return it to my office at Hogwarts.

I have asked one of our house elves to deliver an article of clothing in your foyer cupboard. If you put this article of clothing on while your father is holding the Time-Turner, you will trigger a series of events in which he will instantly travel back in time to plan a trip to the Muggle version Hogwarts. Please let his poor Muggle mind believe that this was all his idea.

Once you are in my office, hold it up that I may see it. It must only be near me so that I may collect some of its charm to have more created. I will say, “follow your heart” and tap my wand on the balcony to collect the charm without the Muggles knowing a thing. After doing so, you may keep the Time-Turner as long as you wish. 

Sincerely yours and happiest of birthdays,
Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore

P.S. Please do hurry.

She managed to figure out the clues, find the shirt, the Time Turner and grabbed my arm. As soon as the spell was cast, we were off to finish packing the car. All three little witches had a blast and the park was terrific. The ride in the castle was the most incredible, non-roller coaster I've ever been on. Read the reviews, go, enjoy.

D23 Expo: The Search for Harry Potter Part 7 of 6

Image by bluemoose via Flickr

This series of posts began as a hunt for peaks inside The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Harry's adventure ride through the books that opened this summer. We're all pretty big fans of the kid.

We've been waiting for the theme park to open up patiently at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure and began our searching through blogs for pictures of the construction.



We found slews of news stories to tease us of possible equipment to be included in the ride. Sounds like this roboarm or Strong Arm, actually did win out in the end.





As launch approached and the fanfare started, we tried to find clips of what the park looked like from the inside! The numbers grew really fast. Walk throughs of the shops and long loving looks at window displays, but we wanted to see the good stuff. We were looking for the big ride.

Even on opening day it took the bloggers a while to get the 'ride through' clips posted. We had already seen a few videos of the que. The line show where you walk the grounds of Hogwarts, explore the halls, chat with the paintings, get the ride story from visions of the characters themselves, but it took another day or so to see the videos from inside the ride itself.

We'd been enjoying video clips of rides at other parks. Sharing stories of the evolution of the Jaws ride at Universal Studios. (The first year it opened, the boat skipper blew the shark up into big bloody-looking pink floating chunks of shark meat. It was closed up pretty quickly.) There are so many good stories. The girls like hearing about the rides that have closed too.

Image via Wikipedia

The Back to the Future ride was the best. It was so revolutionary in its day. One of the first "flying car" rides inside an IMAX((?)) theater. When it opened up the parks were going through a great transformation of ride technology and LINE deception. As a perpetual patron, I really appreciated the "pre-show" line entertainment. Even the very simple solutions of TV sets running cartoons and the addition of actual fans to cool you off.



But I must get back to the thread...  We were searching for the clips that showed the inside of the ride itself. After finally finding it I was terribly disappointed. NOT in the ride, but in the ability of the riders to be able to capture the ride on video. They couldn't! It was too dark. Too fast. Too much for the little cameras to capture it all. It was even almost too much for the microphones to handle.


This is the clip we finally saw that freaked everyone out a bit. It's a spoiler so don't click on it if you want to stay in the dark. (Which is kind of a joke, because half of it IS just blackness!)




What I learned was that perhaps the little ones need a little more time to age before we embark to Hogwarts. I'd hte to get them there and not feel comfortable letting them ride the Big Ride. What a let down that would be. But, man, I can't wait. And after a year or so, they'll have some of the bugs (not the good ones, they promise) worked out. Getting stuck on this one seems like it would be a blast too.

Looking forward to the day we get to go. This explains how we got ourselves distracted and started enjoying the D23 clips. The anticipation may be more fun than some of the rides and places themselves. The dreams of princesses and dragons will have to do. We have the books. And all the other books with no rides and theme parks.

I think we'll be fine as we wait.

To read all of the posts in this series, click on the keyword "wonder". I reserved that word for this series. Enjoy!

[Link to the Harry Potter wiki for more details.]

Related articles by Zemanta

• Video Tour: Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey from The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (slashfilm.com)
• The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - oh, the anticipation! (mymobileadventures.com)
• King Kong swings back to Universal Studios (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• You: Harry Potter theme park opens in Florida (washingtonpost.com)
• Emma Watson: Wizarding World of Harry Potter Sneak Peek! (justjared.buzznet.com)

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 6 of 6 (Star Tours 2 portion!!!!)

Image via Wikipedia

SO! Part 6. This is the last of the series. Whew. But did they save the best for last? Well, I don't know. It is Star Wars so at least they think they did. I have always been a little underwhelmed by Star Tours, but as one of the first cram you a little room that rocks you around ride, it wasn't bad. And no matter how many times you rode, it was always Pee Wee Herman's droid's first time out. Red1 loved it but Red2 was horrified at the thought of speeding into outerspace. We couldn't even tempt her with the promise of going all the way to Endor to meet the Ewoks.


The Star Wars weekends video clips are also something riotous to look up at YouTube if you dare. They had a very successfull kareoke competition that must be experienced.

One more surprise awaits.

I lied when I said this series was over. The last post will explain how we got here in the first place and show the results of that journey. Not in search of a mouse, princess or even Spock. (Lame.) We were in search of Harry if you remember...

Related articles by Zemanta

• LEGO stop-motion recaps the Star Wars trilogy (the good one) in two minutes (dvice.com)
• Final Boarding Call for Star Tours (wired.com)
• Pee-Wee Herman Is Jokey Smurf??? (perezhilton.com)

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 5 of 6

Image via Wikipedia

Get ready for some more cool news. At the end of this post some lucky guest will win a fabulous prize! I'm so jealous!

And speaking of The Jetsons and flying cars we have a weird little moment from Future World at Epcot. Funny how topical we all are. Recently an actual flying car was spotted at Mr. Cavanough's blog.

Back to California now. Disney's California Adventure Park, to be exact. Looks like a new water and light show. The granddaughter to the water shows at Epcot and Disney's Hollywood Studios in Florida. Red2 loved the princesses on boats and big scary witchy heads floating around.

Cars Land. How fun. Based on the Test Track technology he says. Test Track is one of the newer attractions at Epcot that I've actually been able to experience. Red1 wanted to go so we almost closed the park waiting to get in. Mrs. SFDaddy and Red2 watched the fireworks instead.

Oh, now for that last surprise... look under your seat! What did you win? I won 2 blank index cards, an American Girl Magazine subscription renewal request postcard and a green stretchy ponytail band!

Related articles by Zemanta

• Walt Disney World Dining for Vegetarian and Vegan Guests (florida-travel.suite101.com)
• Mo'Nique: 'Captain EO' Reopening! (justjared.buzznet.com)
• Need to go to Disney Land in 2012 (gianni.dalerta.com)

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 4 of 6

Image via Wikipedia

There's an exciting tomorrow waiting for you at Hong Kong Disneyland. A North American pioneering theme permeates one of the new kiddie lands here. You are going to get wet from the geysers, but it's probably not going to be boiling hot water. A new twist on the Haunted Mansion. Bad Monkey! 

Related articles by Zemanta

• Walt Disney World's Haunted Mansion: stupendous essay (boingboing.net)
• Demolition derby ousts Chinese homeowners (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Disneyland Indiana Jones ride recreated as Left 4 Dead level (boingboing.net)

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 3 of 6

Image by JPhilipson via Flickr

I'm not all that into the cruises or the Disney Vacation Club, but the place they're planning for Hawaii looks beautiful. We should visit when it's done. :)

I do have to thoroughly recommend doing Disney with their one-stop shopping deals. A few years ago we bought the plane ticket, hotel, park tickets and food all at once. The packet came in the mail with special tags for our luggage and they picked us up at the airport and whisked us away. We ate so well. The chefs in all of the restaurants received notices that we were coming and came out to speak to us about our various food allergies. Even the counter service locations had gluten and dairy free selections.

Disney is very good at keeping you in the park. For that trip, we succumbed to the mouse, and allowed ourselves to be totally immersed. It was ver-nice.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Disney Hawaii hotel to start accepting reservations for August 2011 (gadling.com)
• The Walt Disney Company Reports Second Quarter Earnings (eon.businesswire.com)

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 2 of 6

Part 2 as promised. This is the ONE that makes the most impact at our house. Will Red2 be able to contain herself? The Princess expansion may actually get us out to California after all eventually. We have mixed feelings about the whole theme park experience, but we're warming up to idea of just 'letting go'. It's a small part of all the awesome things we're doing and probably the most normal thing our kids get to do.

D23 Expo: Imagineering the Future of Disney Parks Part 1 of 6

Our journey continues with the D23 Expo. We started with clip 4 of 6 and just couldn't contain ourselves. Okay, I'm not going to pretend that the girls even saw these clips anymore. I'm just talking about me now, but we all knew that, right?

Enjoy clip one:

J the gardner arborist

A TV program in 10 minutes just made it click for a 3-year-old. A plant gets water from the ground through its roots; air from under its leaves; and with sun from the tops of its leaves it turns it all into food!
After watering the flowers on the porch we pulled weeds and found some baby pine trees growing at the mailbox. Maybe we'll watch them grow up into big trees. We'll have to ask mommy if that would be okay. She doesn't really love pine trees very much... but they do grow fast!