best youtube video

Everyone knows that I'm Brady White's biggest fan... and this should prove why!  I l.o.v.e. the Ellen Show, so Brady made this video about all the stuff I talk about! :)

letsallgo,
jennafer


PS: today for the first time I was able to request tickets!!  hopefully we'll be sitting in the audience soon! :)

behind

I'm behind on e-mails, phone calls, blogging and facebook messages.  I'm sorry to everyone who has tried to find me... I've been buried under these covers, drinking hot tea, snuggling with my pup, swallowing as much Tylenol the USA allows and filling this trash can up with snot-filled kleenex's galore.

I've missed my first P90X days since I started.  I'm two work-outs behind :(   Do you think it's okay if I just add them on to other days to catch up???  I'm sure Tony won't care! :)

frog in my throat,
jennafer

tube flops

So, I tweeted a couple days ago that I am wearing these and trying to sell them at Sanuk...  It's amazing what people will say right to your face when you're wearing something they don't agree with...

Here are a few extremely true examples:

"That is RIDICULOUS"

"I love coming into stores and seeing what the crazy kids are wearing these days"

"Just so you know, Ashley is the only one that can pull those off and make them look cute"

"Are you serious?"

The good thing is, I'm constantly being humbled everyday!

If you like these-- GET SOME! :)  Check them out here:
http://www.sanuk.com/product/307635/SWS2177/_/TUBEFLOPS

tubeflopper,
jennafer

night time

Last night we went to Disney for a few hours before it closed.  We thought we would miss the crowds but it was still busy at 11:00pm!! There is nothing better than a Disney park at night! :)

My new favorite ride is TOTALLY the Storybookland Canal Boat ride.  A tour guide takes you through all of your favorite Disney character's homes and castles!  Plus you start the ride out by heading down Monstro's (the giant whale in Pinocchio) mouth!  Such a cute ride:

We rode Winnie the Pooh:

Many Scary Adventures of Snow White-- this was a favorite of mine at WDW, so I was thankful that it was just as magical here:

Mr. Toad's Wild Ride... still really creepy:

Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters... Brady won:

Indiana Jones ride-- reminds me A LOT of Dinosaur at Animal Kingdom-- I'm predicting this will be one of my dad's favorites! :)

Mickey's fun wheel was pretty great-  pretty slow, but fun :)

We ended the night with a TREAT-- I've been craving breakfast food since we moved... so Brady took me to Denny's where a friend of ours (from Kamp) met us.  We stayed there way too late and ate way too much food.  My stomach is still hurting-- I don't know if it's from laughing so hard or all of the pancakes I consumed! :)  

I'm still spending my days selling shoes at Sanuk or dishing out ice cream at Haagen Dazs-- right now we're trying to sell these and I have to model them.  And you think your job is hard...

park hopper,

jennafer

Welcome to Disneyland, how can I help you?

Monday was my interview!  I arrived 45 minutes early (nervous much?) and sat in a hallway with twelve other Disney hopefuls...  We started at 1:00 watching a video on what it means to be a Disney Cast Member and the "look" that we need to respect and display.  At the end of the video we went in this room and took a computer "test" about our character.  (Are you late, sometimes, always, never....  Do you feel comfortable relaying a problem to a superior, sometimes, always, never... etc.)  Anyway, after that we went back into the hallway and waited. waited. waited.

They called us in one by one and only three of us were asked to stay for the second round of interviews. It was SO humbling to watch them turn away some FANTASTIC people.  This economy has literally humbled me to my knees as I've been searching for a job and watching some close family members persevere through the job market.  These nine people that they turned away were fun, cute and NORMAL!  If ya'll could think about praying that these nine people get placed in a fantastic job and soon, (I know they are all strangers to you, but God knows them!) I would LOVE that!

The second round of the interview was a one-on-one type deal where I was interviewed by Tammy.  She's super sweet and looks almost identical to Cameron Diaz (believe me when I say that it was SO hard for me to remain professional and try not to tell her...).  All she wanted to know about was my job at Walt Disney World and how I handled conflict there, stuff I didn't like about the job (uh, nothing! that's why I'm here lady!), and what I was willing to do for the Disneyland Resort.  

After about thirty minutes she offered me two jobs.  The ONLY two part time jobs that were available...  She was EXTREMELY nice about the fact that she knew I don't want to spend my entire Disney career behind a cash register... but that is where I will start out, and stay for the next four months!  I can still go to auditions during this time, and at the end of my "probation" period, I can transfer to an area of the park that is more up my ally!

I know that some of you reading this are thinking that I'm absolutely crazy for moving my family to California just to stand behind a cash register at some theme park...  but it's different.  At Disney it doesn't matter WHAT you are doing, you can make magic and you are respected and you are NEEDED!  I'm so thankful that the Lord has humbled me over these past five months while my resume has just been SITTING in the casting office!  I'm so thankful that it took me six trips to the casting office before they would even give me the time of day (HIP HIP HORRAY FOR ENRIQUE!) !!  Because of the past five months, I am SO COMPLETELY grateful for the opportunity to take people's money at some restaurant in fantasyland!  

I'm hopeful for what comes next, excited for what the Lord will show me during these humbling four months, and so so so grateful for all of my friends and family for loving me during this time.  My friend Ashley wrote me on facebook and said, "note to self: to get more comments on facebook, simply become a Disney Cast Member".  She's exactly right!  It's so fun to see friends from high school, campers I barely know and RANDOM people stand behind me on my silly Disney dream! :)  I am so so blessed!

WE DID IT!!!!!!!!!!   

have a magical day,

jennafer

they are technically only fireworks if they take place over a castle

UPDATE: Days with Disneyland ID-- FOUR, Days spent at the park-- FOUR

LOVING having my Disney ID! :)  So thankful the Lord provided it with us being here less than a month!!

We went to Disneyland and purchased Brady's season pass!

Getting his picture taken for his ID:

The finished product!!!!  

I think I was 1 million times more excited than Brady about this occasion, and he wanted to make sure I mentioned that it was my doing taking these pictures, and I'm the crazy Disney one of the two of us...  

The next day we biked to Disneyland and FINALLY had our first California Dole Whips-- A+

We took a tour of Sleeping Beauty's castle:

Went to a petting zoo where they have this really weird small donkey...

Headed to California Adventure and road California Screamin'

And road CA's Monster's Inc. Ride-- super cute! :)  Brady was awarded Scarer of the month!  I'm so proud!

We then biked home and my friend, Jenny, picked me up and we headed to the parks for MORE magic!!!  Our first stop was this fun Animation class at CA-- here's what the teacher's looked like:

and here is our version:

We experienced "BOOM" and it was FANTASTIC!  This thing shoots you up in the air so fast!  

My favorite ride at WDW is Prime Evil Whirl and I found out last night that they have one here!!  It's not called that but it is just as funny!! :)  

We ended the night watching DL "wishes" firework show-- and it was AMAZING!  Tinkerbell flies BACK AND FORTH here-- and TWICE!  She's so cute!  Here you can barely see her floating on the right hand side of the castle!  It's an awesome show!  While trying to find the perfect place to view the firework show Jenny said, "I'm so not above standing in front of a little kid."  She's so much fun to go to Disney with!!! :) 

We just came back inside after my first Longboard lesson-- I am awful and Brady, of course, is awesome at it...  go figure-- I think I'll stick with my green bike.

it's laundry day,

jennafer

night of magic

Brady's best friend from High School was in town, sooo he went to spend time with him and I went to play at the parks!!!  I only had a half hour at California Adventure and then two hours at Magic Kingdom, but it was AWESOME!  It's so fun to ride rides that are in WDW, but they are different here--  I rode the monorail for the first time- it's so fancy here!  Plus it went over it's a small world and it's OUTSIDE!  SO WEIRD!   I'll take a picture of it next time-- here's some pictures of what I was able to do last night! :)

I started the night out at California Adventure! :)  This park is so awesome!  It's themed so well (it's Disney... duh) and the music is so fun (beach boys, california-type songs, oldies).  I made it to California Screamin' and it was awesome!  My favorite roller coaster has always been (sorry Mickey) Wildfire at Silver Dollar City, but I think this ride topped it!  It was AMAZING!  Here's what it looks like:

and here is what I look like riding it:

I then headed to Magic Kingdom (or is it just called "Disneyland" here?? I don't know!) and went on Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters-- I thought this was different than the buzz lightyear ride at WDW, but it was pretty much the same.  Except you can tell this one is newer-- it has better guns with lasers so you can tell where you're aiming (huge help to me) plus, I thought it was really funny that outside it says that it's "based off of Disney's Toy Story II" not just Toy Story...  anyway, my score was awesome... I totally beat everyone around me :)

I wasn't going to ride Space Mountain because I wanted to ride all the rides that were new to me, but the line was short so I tried it and I'm SO GLAD I did!  This Space Mountain is WAY less jerky and really really fast!!  PLUS YOU SIT TWO TO A SIDE!!!  WEIRD!

Then I headed to the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage--  it was really really cool.  NOT recommended for those who even remotely think they have claustrophobia!  Here's the little window that you sit in front of and watch nemo and his friends! :)

Mr. Toad's wild ride--  a lot like all the other Fantasyland rides, except this one you end up in Hell and it's even hot and there's little red demon-type things flying around... I thought there would be a happy ending but nope, that was the end of the ride... creepy

Pinocchio's Daring Journey!!  Really cute!  

By this time it was five minutes before park closing so I made it to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad--  This was another ride that surprised me!!  At WDW it was kinda shaky and I didn't always LOVE it, but this ride obviously just got a referb. because it was AWESOME!  A perfect ending to a magical day! :)

Here's the miniature castle! :)  Still packs a lot of magic though!!

And look who I got to meet!  My boss :) He could barely stop moving he was so excited that I was working for him again (as you can tell by the blurry picture)...  Mickey, Me and my Disney ID! :)

I'm getting trained today at my job!  Ready to make some magic!!

downtown disneyan,

jennafer

happy valentines day to you and me

Well, Valentine's day came a little early this year... and in the form of TWO BICYCLES!!!!  A couple days ago I went to Santa Monica to hang out with Elaina and she helped me find great deals on two really cute bikes :)  I don't have a picture of Brady and I riding them yet, because yesterday we got them downstairs and it started to rain, and today it's supposed to rain all day-- so we're going on a bike date all Friday to map out the best bike route to DISNEY :)

Here I am picking out the cutest one :)  Mint green for me, dark blue for Brady!!  (Anabelle gets a basket on mine... :)  Pops called and told me I was "so Dorothy")

Fitting them into the car was a fiasco! Hysterical really! :)  but it worked and they made it to Anaheim!!

Then yesterday I went to orientation for my job as Sanuk! :)  They are "operating participants" at the Disneyland Resort so it's important that all employees know the history of Disney and give guests the Disney experience because for some people (like Brady and I these past few weeks) Downtown Disney is the closest they will ever get to the Disney parks!

Brady dropped me off in the pouring rain to orientation and (of course) I had to swing by the casting office to see what was going on!  I asked for Enrique because he gets things done!  :)  Unfortunately he didn't remember me :(  but he did call a manager and told me, "you should be receiving an e-mail by the end of this week or at the latest Monday morning"  YESSSSSSSS!  I skipped again to orientation... really skipped.

I left precious Enrique (my favorite cast member right now) and headed to orientation--  which I LOVED!  Everyone around me was complaining that the movies were too long and the people were talking too much, but I loved every second of it!  I'm so so so thankful to be working for a company that holds such high standards of it's employees!!  It was wonderful to be refreshed on all the Walt trivia that I'd forgotten... and learn a few new facts-- like, I didn't know that California Adventure only opened 9 years ago on February 8th! :)

While I'm sitting in orientation I feel my phone vibrate... I figure that it's Brady trying to figure out when to pick me up, so I'm extremely sneaky at peaking at it--  and it's not Brady.  IT'S AN EMAIL FROM DISNEY ASKING ME TO SCHEDULE AN INTERVIEW!!!!!  I could barely contain my excitement!!!  God is so good!!

At the end of orientation, they handed us our ID badges (which also serve as our passes to get into the park) and I just stared at it for a few minutes.  This is what I've been working so hard for and praying for!  God is so amazing to not just let me get a job at Starbucks or the Gap somewhere random-- but He allowed me to get a job at this magical place that brought us to Anaheim!  THANK YOU LORD!!  After I realized that everyone was complaining that their faces looked orange and had already tucked theirs away I quickly hid mine and tried to continue to hide my excitement.

I immediately texted Brady and told him to NOT hurry up to come get me-- BECAUSE I'M GOING TO DISNEYLAND!  I walked SO FAST up to the gates and called my dad-- I mean, I can't go to Disneyland for the first time in 18 years without my #1 roller coaster partner!!  I have to admit, I cried while I walked through the turnstile...  (I think he and mom were crying too... sorry to rat you out guys)...  and it was PERFECT!  The castle was so magical!!  Everything seemed so familiar, but different.  Dad got to pick which ride we rode first and he chose Pirates.  I headed to the left of the castle and walked right on explaining every step of the way to my fellow Disney lovers... (I know, I know... I'm crazy)  At least by this time the tears had stopped, but the monster-size smile was still overtaking my face :)

The park closed while we were on the ride so that's all the magic I could experience last night, but you better believe I walked SO SLOW right down the middle of main street to leave the park!  It was so beautiful and NOT CROWDED at all!!  I got the chance to stop and look into some of the windows that Walt actually designed himself--  it was so interesting!  I'm probably the only human to look at the castle and these windows and kept repeating "thank you, God!  You are so good!  Thank you thank you thank you!"  but I caught myself saying it out loud a TON!

I'm SO grateful for these past few weeks that haven't been easy!  I'm not taking ANYTHING for granted!

We got home and I immediately scheduled my interview! :)  Monday at 1:00PM :)

ready to make magic,
jennafer

weekend review

WE FOUND A CHURCH... and I'm completely in LOVE with it!  It's PACKED on Sundays-- but packed in a GREAT way!  Every seat is filled and you're surrounded by people who ADORE to worship, praise and LOVE on you!  It's the most welcoming environment I've ever been in!  We went to our first small group meeting last week and loved the people we met...  everyone was extremely honest and excited to get to know everyone.  It's so cool to think that all those "strangers" I met a few days ago will shortly be my friends, accountability partners and community! :)  We are so so thankful!  This morning's service was awesome. :)  Check it out... www.rockharbor.org  :)

I also got my bag in the mail! :)  Brady bought me this for our anniversary and I LOVE it! :)  It's the perfect  little clutch! :)  Have I plugged REMNANT on my blog enough?  If not: remnant.bigcartel.com

Also, this is EXTREMELY new, but I LOVE cleaning our apartment!  It's probably just because it's new, but I really enjoy cleaning it.  (Why I got this sudden zest for cleaning when my mother-in-law doesn't live 100 yards away from me, and my mom within driving distance, I HAVE NO IDEA!!!!***)  but I really do LOVE it!

So, we found a church, I love to clean, we eat organic stuff--- california is doing wonders for us :)

ready for monday,
jennafer

P90X UPDATE: I'm on week three--  every part of my body is yelling at me right now... :(

***Honestly, GoGo loves me, despite my bad cleaning of the log cabin and my mom knows I'm a mess waiting to happen-- the comment was for dramatic effect!

guard your eyes mickey

Yesterday we went to UNIVERSAL STUDIOS HOLLYWOOD!  I was extremely excited to be headed toward a theme-park (even though I KNEW it wouldn't be "magical"), I figured it would have some pretty good rides :)

We found out that Universal is less than an hour away from our home... and you shouldn't wear shorts when it's 65 degrees outside...  Here are a few pictures from our fun day :)

Driving to our day of fun :)

Can you name what movie this is from??

The park is split up in two sections... and upper and lower part--  the upper deck has AMAZING views looking out over Hollywood and the beautiful mountains!! :)

If P90X wasn't enough for one day, we thought it would be really cool if we would walk up this giant staircase... totally UNcool...

Look at this crazy guy we found!!!!  I do like how at Universal the characters just kind of wander and do life with people...  there are no lines or anything, they just hang out at the park with you... pretty fun!  It probably also helped that there were only 17 people at Universal yesterday! :)

We ended our evening with some CREEPY CREPES!!  We found out that "city walk" is universal's "downtown disney" and it is SUPER awesome and has tons of fun stuff to do!  We watched "The book of Eli" which I really liked, but that movie theatre is EXPENSIVE!  We will not be supporting Universal movies anymore...

So that was our day!!!  Universal in Hollywood doesn't have the Hulk or the Dr. Suess land that I was really excited about... but it does have a REALLY great "back lot tour" thing that showed you a lot of sets and I found out that they were filming Little Fockers (the third "meet the parents" movie) RIGHT THERE!  BARBRA STREISAND WAS WITHIN YARDS OF ME!!!  I should have jumped off the tram right then... what was I thinking?

disney>universal,

jennafer

things are looking up

Monday was awful.  I went back to the Disney casting office to hear the exact same thing that I've heard the other two times...  they can't help, the can't do anything, I just have to wait.  :(  I then proceeded to walk all around downtown Disney picking up applications and talking to ANY Disney managers I could find! :) One (named Helen) was super awesome and took my resume and said that she would love to call over to Casting for me! :)  I needed to hear that! :)  I came home with a stack of applications and a defeated heart!!!

I filled everything out and woke up Tuesday morning to go hand them all in--  everyone was really nice, but no one is hiring right now!  THANKFULLY, a lady asked me to come in for an interview at Sanuk (www.sanuk.com)-- and we hit it off! :)  Praise the Lord!!  She offered me a job and I ACCEPTED!  I am now a Downtown Disney Employee at the cutest little shoe place on the planet!  The owners of Sanuk also own Haagan Das, she asked if I had anything against Ice Cream-- to which I laughed in her face and simply replied, "no".

After I finished with the interview,  I went to the casting office again to ask about the status of my application (again).  A GREAT guy was SO helpful and actually spent some time with me!  He offered to call a few managers to have them look over my application... before I left he said, "this doesn't mean anything, it doesn't mean I'm getting you a job, or an interview is on the way... but I can tell you that I'm working to get your application noticed."  PRAISE THE LORD FOR THIS SWEET MAN!  I think I skipped back to my car... I don't care who saw me... I skipped.

SOOOO  I start work on Tuesday-- I get to go to a Disney "class" to learn all about the Disney "look" and special cast member guidelines... :)  I CAN'T WAIT!!  Krista (my new manger) said that I would probably be board out of my mind at the class because I already know everything they are going to touch on-- she couldn't be any more WRONG!!! :) I can barely type fast enough to let you know how excited I am!!!

I'm not a Disney cast member yet, but I'm VERY VERY close!!  Plus, I don't work at Taco Bell!

yo quiero,
jennafer

P.S. (hint*hint*size*6.5)  http://www.sanuk.com/product/341036/SWF1007/_/TWEEDY

P.P.S.  We're going to Universal tomorrow!  I can't wait!  I hope I get to meet Lucille Ball!!!!