Board Games I Love

I don't play board games incredibly often.  It's not because I don't enjoy playing them.  I mean, I asked for two new board games for Christmas.  I just don't usually have anyone willing to play them with me, or I just never even think to get them out.  I haven't even played Scattergories (which I got for Christmas) yet.

Quelf is definitely one of my favorite board games.  I love how crazy it is.  There's no way you can play it without laughing.

Apples to Apples is another one of my favorites.  I got Disney Apples to Apples for Christmas, and I love it.  Adding Disney to anything only makes it better.

I have no idea how much of a board game Scene It is, but I love it as well.  I have two different Harry Potter Scene It versions that I haven't played in forever.  It's hard to get people to play it with you when they're not as big of a fan as you.  My sister also has Friends Scene It, and I have Twilight Scene It.  I like these more than the normal Scene It since I know the movies/TV shows better.  I don't really know many of the movies on the normal Scene It.

Clue is another board game I love.  In addition to the original Clue, I also have Harry Potter Clue.  The Harry Potter edition is a lot different than the original, but I still really like it.  It can be a bit confusing when you first start playing it though.

I remember that my grandma used to have a Game of Life computer game that we used to play all the time at her house.  I think I played that before the actual board game.  I love it as well, and I own the Twist and Turns version, which I don't like as much.  The games are over in about ten minutes with that version.

My grandma, sister, and I used to play Monopoly all the time, so I have to add it.  I particularly like the newer version.  Plus, there are lots of different versions you can get for different fandoms and stuff.  There are several I would love to play but haven't gotten to.  I think I played the Disney version once, but I'm not sure.

What are some of your favorite board games?

Beauty and the Beast in 3D

I love two-hour delays!  You won't have to make it up, but you get to sleep in for two extra hours.  There's even still some snow on the ground outside, but it's not much.  I think it's supposed to snow again tomorrow, but I doubt we'll get much.

In current events today we finished playing our quiz show game thing for this week, and our team won again!  It actually seemed easier than last weeks.  The last question was who won the Iowa caucus, which we'd been talking about all week.

After school Haley, Jordan, Rachel and I went to go see Beauty and the Beast in 3D!  We went and ate at Taco Bell first, and then stopped by Walmart.  The movie was amazing!  I loved the Tangled Ever After short that was shown before it.  It was so cute!  (I still haven't seen Tangled all of the way through...)  Beauty and the Beast was amazing.  It's my absolute favorite Disney movie (as most reading this probably know), and there was no way I was going to pass up seeing it in theaters.

I'm not a 3D fan.  3D movies always give me headaches.  But I've been pleasantly surprised with the Disney re-releases in 3D.  Beauty and the Beast was just like The Lion King: the 3D was there, but it wasn't incredibly noticeable.  I don't know how to describe it very well.  It's like there are multiple layers to the movie, but nothing's flying out at you.  It was a completely different 3D than the previews and Tangled short that came before it (which did have some things flying out and such).  With both The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast I didn't get headaches like normal, and I loved getting to see both on a movie theater screen.  If you're a Beauty and the Beast fan, I definitely recommend going to check it out even if you don't usually like 3D.

Favorite Disney Non-Animal Sidekicks

About two months ago I wrote a blog post on my favorite Disney animal sidekicks.  This time I'm doing my favorite non-animal sidekicks.  (I've also realized that I didn't put Timon and Pumba on the animal sidekick llist.  How did that happen!?)  I didn't come up with many, so it's a rather short list.

The Genie from Aladdin.  It's true that he's not human, but he's also not an animal.  Never Had a Friend Like Me is probably my favorite song from Aladdin.

The various toys in Toy Story.  Again, not human, but also not animals (although some are animal toys).  I was never the biggest Toy Story fan until the third one.  (I think it was because it made me sentimental about how I grew up with the other Toy Story movies.

Christopher Robin in Winnie the Pooh.  I'll be honest, he was never my favorite character, but I feel like he needs to be on this list.

Lumiere, Cogsworth, Mrs. Potts, Chip, etc. from Beauty and the Beast.  It's no secret that this is my favorite Disney movie ever.  I love all of the various humans turned objects in the movie.

The Lost Boys in Peter Pan.  I think they're all cute, but they (and Peter) tend to get on my nerves a bit whenever I watch the movie.  I can't blame them, since it makes sense that they'd be immature, but it does annoy me a little.  Still, they act like cute little kids in certain parts of the movie.  (I've just realized it's been years since I've seen Peter Pan.  I should watch it.  I've been seeing things about this new mini-series that's supposed to be about Peter Pan discovering Neverland or something.  I want to look into that...)

Dopey and the other seven dwarves from Snow White.  Snow White has always been one of my least favorite Disney movies.  Still, I remember Dopey and the other dwarves being one of the only things I even remotely liked as a kid.  (And Dopey was always my favorite.)

I'm sure there are some other awesome non-animal sidekicks, but those were all I could think of.

Favorite Romantic Disney Moments

It's another Disney post!  This one is about my favorite romantic moments in Disney movies.

The end of Beauty and the Beast.  Of course I have to start this post with Beauty and the Beast.  Belle and the Beast are my favorite Disney couple, and I love the end of the movie so much.  Belle's also the only Disney princess on this list because I honestly don't like the romances with any of the other princesses.  I feel like out of all the Disney princess movies, Belle and the Beast are the only ones who really seem to fall in love with each other (except maybe Aladdin and Jasmine because I really like them too).

The ballroom dance scene in Beauty and the Beast.  This is a close tie with the other Beauty and the Beast scene.

The spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp.  This has pretty much become a classic scene that everyone recognizes.

EVE "kisses" WALL-E in WALL-E.  These two are so adorable for the whole movie.

Simba and Nala during Can You Feel the Love Tonight in The Lion King.  I love the two of them so much!

Jane deciding to stay with Tarzan in Tarzan.  I love the romance between them, and I love when she decides to stay.

Disney Quotes

Here are just a few awesome quotes from Disney movies:

A dream is a wish your heart makes when you're fast asleep. In dreams you will lose your heartaches. Whatever you wish for, you keep. Have faith in your dreams, and someday, your rainbow will come smiling through. No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing, the dreams that you wish will come true. - Cinderella

Do not be fooled by its commonplace appearance. Like so many things, it is not what is outside, but what is inside that counts. - Aladdin

It's because I like you, I don't want to be with you. It's a complicated emotion. - Finding Nemo

Always let your conscience be your guide. - Pinocchio

Absence makes the heart grow fonder... Or forgetful. - Peter Pan

Forever is a long long time and time has a way of changing things. - Fox and the Hound

Teenagers. They think they know everything. You give them an inch, they swim all over you. - The Little Mermaid

What do you want me to do, dress in drag and do the hula? - The Lion King

Let me get this straight. You know her. She knows you. But she wants to eat him. And everybody's okay with this? DID I MISS SOMETHING? - The Lion King

Yes. So whenever you feel alone just remember that those kings will always be there to guide you and so will I. - The Lion King

The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it, or learn from it. - The Lion King

The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all. - Mulan

Oh, it's not the first time I was tossed out of a window, and it won't be the last. What can I say? I'm a rebel. - The Emperor's New Groove

Someday, you're gonna wind up all alone, and you'll have no one to blame but yourself. - The Emperor's New Groove

This is my family. I found it, all on my own. It's little, and broken, but still good. Yeah, still good. - Lilo and Stitch

Ohana means family, family means nobody gets left behind. Or forgotten. - Lilo and Stitch

Pudge controls the weather. - Lilo and Stitch

Boy, have you got your lions crossed. - The Lion King

You can speak whale? I wish I could speak whale. - Finding Nemo

There are so many other great ones.  I'm impressed that I didn't put any Beauty and the Beast quotes considering it's my absolute favorite Disney movie.

Favorite Disney Animal Sidekicks

Time for another Disney post!  This one is about some of my favorite Disney animal sidekicks.  As usual, these aren't really in any order, and there are probably some awesome ones that I'm completely forgetting.

1. Rafiki from The Lion King.  Rafiki probably wouldn't be on here if I hadn't recently seen The Lion King 3D in theaters.  I'd forgotten how awesome and hilarious he is.  I'd be incredibly annoyed with him if I was Simba when he first meets Rafiki (besides as a baby), but I love him as a character.

2. Zazu from The Lion King.  I love him even more than Rafiki.  He has some great bits in the movie.  Something I'd completely forgotten about the movie until I saw it a week or two ago was the bit where Zazu begins singing It's A Small World, and Scar says something about him singing anything other than that horrible song.  I love how Disney is making fun of their own song there.  This has next to nothing to do with Zazu, but I just wanted to share that tidbit.

(Also, it's weird classifying Rafiki and Zazu as "animal sidekicks" when everyone in The Lion King is an animal, but the do fit both animal and, basically, sidekick.  The same goes for a couple of others on this list.)

3. Abu from Aladdin.  I just think he's so cute and adorable!

4. Sebastian from The Little Mermaid.  He sings Under the Sea and Kiss the Girl.  That alone makes him awesome.

5. Flounder from The Little Mermaid.  I don't have an exact reason for him to be on this list, but I'm still putting him here.

6. Mushu from Mulan.  I think he's hilarious.

7. Dory from Finding Nemo.  This is a Pixar film, which I don't usually include, but I'm making an exception for Dory.  "Just keep swimming.  Just keep swimming.  What do we do?  We swim, swim, swim, swim, swim."  Yeah...  Plus, she can speak whale.

8. Crush from Finding Nemo.  We'll include Squirt (who's adorable!) in here too.  They're both awesome.

9. Benzai, Shenzai, and Ed from The Lion King.  They may be evil, but the hyenas are hilarious, especially Ed.

10. Percy from Pocahontas.  He's so cute.

11. Meeko from Pocahontas.  He's also really cute.

I think this is one of my longer Disney lists.  There are just too many awesome animal sidekicks in Disney movies.  I know there are a lot more than I even put on this list.

Favorite Disney Moment

It feels like it's been a long, long time since I've written a Disney post.  This is going to be another list of my favorite Disney moments.  These can be just about anything, and like usual, I'm sure there are going to be lots of awesome ones that I miss.

Belle and the Beast's dance in Beauty and the Beast.  I love the scene, and the song is one of my favorite Disney songs.

The opening of The Lion King.  To me this is a very iconic Disney moment.  It's one of the first things I think of when I think of The Lion King.  I love how the opening of The Lion King 2 is very similar.

Simba becoming king in The Lion King.  It's just an amazing scene.  I don't really have a reason.

The Beast dying and becoming human again in Beauty and the Beast.  This scene is so sad and beautiful and amazing.

The ending of Pocahontas.  Normally, I probably wouldn't have thought of this, but I saw it as I was reading this post.  I love the awesome instrumental of Colors of the Wind that's playing in the background.

In the incinerator in Toy Story 3.  Even though I knew they were probably going to make it out, it was still really intense.  Plus, I love how they all work together to get out.

The ending of Toy Story 3 when Andy and Bonnie play with the toys together.  It's such a sad moment, but at the same time, you know it's for the best.

I think seven moments are a good number to go with.  What are your favorite Disney moments?

Busy Weekend

The blog post you're reading right now was written over a kind of long period of time.  I wanted to write about this, but I didn't have time to just sit down and write, so I wrote bits and pieces of it whenever I could.  Part of it was written Sunday, and part of it was written Monday.

This weekend has been extremely busy.  On Friday we had a social after school.  The idea was that the new kids could meet new people and stuff like that.  We got free drinks, and then everyone basically grouped into their normal groups.  I don't even remember seeing any of the new kids, and the freshmen seemed to stay in one large group toward the entrance of the gym.  Ji and I were supposed to get quotes for the yearbook.  It didn't go to well since no one really wanted to be there.  We got a total of three quotes.  My sister wrote down something completely random that had nothing to do with the social, and my friend Haley and another boy just made stuff up that they didn't mean.  The only good part was getting out of class.

As we were walking to our lockers after the social, Ji mentioned that she wanted to do something after school.  I was reluctant at first because I had tons of homework, but then my sister showed up too.  Needless to say, Ji came over.  We made brownies and had a lot of fun.  (Even if Ji and I think the brownies made us sick.)  After a while, my mom, brother, and sister were going shopping, and Ji and I eventually decided to go along too.  We went to Factory Card Outlet first because my sister wanted stuff for her birthday party.  Ji and I may or may not have played with some toy swords.  After that, my mom and brother went to Target while Ji, Regina, and I walked down to some craft store that I don't remember the name of.  Ji and I kind of ditched Regina and just wandered aimlessly around the store.  Regina took forever, so at some point, Ji and I decided to go next-door to Petsmart.  We looked at all of the animals, but we definitely stared at the cats for the longest.  They are so adorable!  I wanted to adopt them all.  There were two kittens running around with each other, and another two were laying on top of each other.  They were all absolutely adorable.  We eventually made it back to Target, and we just kind of looked through clothes and other stuff until it was time to leave.

The next day Ji, Laura, Haley, and I went to this theme park in our area called Holiday World.  We were there all day, and everything has already started to blur together, but I'll try to pick out some of the more memorable things that happened.  I know the first thing we did was go to eat at the Alamo, the Mexican restauraunt in the park.  After that, I can't really remember the order of anything.

We didn't really ride that many rides now that I think about it.  We rode two of the roller coasters, the Liberty Launch, the log ride, and Raging Rapids.  That was about it.  I got absolutely soaked on the log ride and Raging Rapids.  I got the wetest out of my friends, and my clothes never dried.

We also watched two of the shows.  One was were they sing a bunch of country songs and the other was a diving show.  I've been to this park a ton of times and seen both of these shows before.  The diving show in particular never really changes, but they'd added this whole part that none of us had see before that was pretty funny.  One of the divers was out in the audience (behind us actually), and he started saying stuff about how he could dive better than the diver up on the "stage."  We didn't realize it was part of the show at first and were a little weirded out.  At one point, one of the divers was dressed like Tarzan.  Haley's been wanting to watch Tarzan forever.  You should have heard her when he came out.

We ate way more that day then I have ever eaten in that park.  I had fried oreos for the second time.  Those things are amazing, but I can only eat two.  I gave to other two away to my sister, who had joined us by this point.  We also ate blue and red ice cream. That stuff is amazing!  Haley and I actually went to get ice cream while Ji and Laura got some other food somewhere else.  While carrying the ice cream back to the restaurant they're in, it all started melting.  By the time we got back, I had red and blue ice cream down my leg.  Ji's was basically soup by the time she ate it since she was still in line when we got back.

At one point Ji and I went into this glass blowing shop that no one else wanted to go in.  We were in there forever.  I honestly hadn't bothered to go in there since I was a little kid with my mom.  Later on, we went back in because Haley wanted to get fudge from the candy/baked goods area in there.  I decided to get a mystery box in there.  Regina told me I shouldn't because everything in those boxes sucked.  She was wrong.  This store is in the Christmas section (remember we're at Holiday World), so a lot of the stuff was Christmas-themed.  I picked the least Christmas looking box and got a dolphin one.  It even has a little heart!  I love it!  Plus, it was cheaper than if I'd actually picked it out.

Ji also wanted to play a lot of the games.  At one point, Ji, Haley, and I played this duck game that everyone wins.  It's meant for little kids, so we were a little embarassed at first.  Ji and I got little ducks, and Haley got a teddy bear.  Laura also won a stuffed minion from Despicable Me playing another game that she gave to Haley.

As we were leaving, it was decided that Ji, Laura, and Haley would come over to our house and watch Tarzan, which Haley's been wanting to watch forever.  We even invited our friend Jordan.  We picked up Jordan, and then went to Ji's house for a bit.  I've never actually been to Ji's house before since she usually comes to mine.  We all sat in her room talking (and looking through her diary written almost entirely in Spanish while she lived in Guatelmala) while she took a shower.  Ji warned us that her mom would over us food, and she was right (although we turned her down).  I've only met Ji's mom a couple of times, but she is a very nice and friendly person.

We eventually made it back to our house.  I was finally able to change out of my wet clothes, and we sat in my room and talked for about ten minutes.  Then, Laura reminded us that she had to be back home in about an hour and a half, so we needed to start watching Tarzan.  Watching a movie from your childhood is so much more amusing with other people.  None of us had watched it in a while, and we made some interesting observations.  Ji, who said she had hated the movie before, was crying at the end.  She also said she was shocked by Jane's voice (last time she'd watched it, it had been in Spanish), which I found funny for some reason.  When the movie was over, everyone went home, and I got to relax for the first time that day.

Sunday was pretty much homework day since I didn't get to work on it Friday or Saturday.  Let's just say I'm glad that's done with.

Belle: My Favorite Disney Princess

I've mentioned in multiple Disney posts that my favorite Disney princess is Belle.  I think it's time that she finally has a post dedicated completely to her.

I've loved Beauty and the Beast since I was a little kid, and I think one of the reasons was that I found Belle more relatable than any of the other Disney princesses.  Why?  She loves to read.  I'm sure that wasn't the only reason I liked her, but I'm positive that it was a big factor.  I've basically been a bookworm since I was born, so I always love characters that enjoy reading.

In addition to that, I love that Belle isn't the typical damsel-in-distress.  She stands her ground with the Beast and Gaston.  Of course, I didn't think much about this when I was younger, but I do think I realized it in the back of my mind.

I've always loved romance books and movies as well, and the Beast and Belle are my favorite Disney couple.  I don't really have a definite reason for this.  I do know that I typically like couples that start out arguing and then fall in love with each other (I have no idea why), so the fact that they don't really like each other at first may have something to do with it.

As a side note, I've often wandered if my love for Beauty and the Beast had something to do with my obsession with werewolves later on.  The Beast himself isn't a werewolf, but he's kind of similar.  I just can't help but wonder.

Anyway, my two main reasons for loving Belle so much is that she loves reading and she stands up for herself.  There are several Disney princesses that could fit the second one, but I can't think of any that have shown a love for reading.  I've realized over the years that if there's a character that loves to read, they'll probably become my favorite character of the book, movie, TV show, etc.  I guess it provides something that allows me to relate to them.

Disney Icons

Yep, it's yet another Disney post.  I'm really starting to enjoy these.  I feel like I don't get to talk about Disney enough.  This post is about different Disney icons.  (I don't know if icon's the right word, but I can't think of another one).  There are certain images that you see that always remind you of Disney.  In this post, I'm talking about two of them.

The first is the Mickey head and ears.  It's essentially only three black circles, but I bet it would be hard to find someone who doesn't immediatley think of Disney when they see it.  One of my favorite things about it is that it's hidden in different locations around the Disney parks.  I haven't been to Disney World since I was twelve (at which time I wasn't looking for hidden Mickeys), but when I go back (hopefully kind of soon), I plan to keep an eye out for them.  Also, this isn't the exact same thing, but has anyone else got one of those hats with the Mickey ears from one of the parks?  I think mine from when I was about six or seven is still laying around somewhere.

The other icon I want to talk about is the castle.  You know which one I'm talking about.  Every Disney movie you watch shows a castle before the actual movie.  It's one of the things I think about first when I think of Disney movies.  I decided to look up more about it, mainly to find out which princess' castle it's supposed to be.  From what I read, it's a combination of Sleeping Beauty's castle at Disneyland (and the Hong Kong Disneyland) and Belle's castle at Disney World (and the Tokyo Disneyland).  I like the idea that they combined the two instead of just choosing one of them since everyone's going to have a favorite castle.  (Mine's Belle's since she's my favorite Disney princess, and I've only ever been to Disney World.)

I also love the new castle shown before movies. Even though I'll always be found of how it used to look when I was younger, the new one does look so much cooler. I remember being impressed with it when I saw it the first time.

This whole thing about the castles has made me wonder about something.  Why were Belle and Aurora's castles choosen for all of the parks instead of having a different princess' castle at each park?  I'm going to try and find some stuff about that.