I love all the flowers at Disney, so I was excited for this week’s WW theme – Flowers and Gardens. We’ve visited several times during the Flower & Garden Festival, which is always gorgeous, but even when the festival isn’t happening, there are lots of gorgeous flowers all over the parks. Here are just a few of the pics we’ve taken over the years.

Pluto! – 2008 Flower & Garden Festival

Beauty and the Beast – 2011 Flower & Garden Festival

Tick tock, tick tock – 2008 Flower & Garden Festival

Christmas Stitch in Epcot – December 2012

Poinsetta “tree” – Epcot December 2012

Thanks to Deb for hosting another great Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop. Make sure to click through to see other beautiful pics and if you have some favorites to share, make sure you link up!

This weekend marked opening weekend for Oz the Great and Powerful and while I usually try to avoid opening weekend for most movies, the kids were so excited to see this one, we decided to get out of the house to spend a few hours in the merry old land of Oz. The movie tells the story of how Oscar “Oz” Diggs comes to the land of Oz and (I don’t think I’m spoiling anything here) becomes THE Wizard.

As in the Wizard of Oz, the movie starts out in sepia tones and then transforms to full Technicolor glory once Oscar lands in Oz. While not nearly as stunning an effect as the original movie, it really is gorgeous and the visual effects are top notch – Glinda’s bubbles were particularly impressive to me. The 3D effects were well done, although a few scenes were a little intense (more about that later).

The Emerald City – Disney’s Oz the Great and Powerful

Of all the characters in the movie, my least favorite is Oz, played by James Franco. I’m not a big fan of his and although I had high hopes, he didn’t do much to make me like him more. Luckily, there are plenty of other characters to like, particularly the supporting players like Finley, the flying monkey (voiced by Zach Braff), China Girl (voiced by Joey King) and Knuck (played by Tony Cox). You’ll even see a few familiar faces if you know any of Sam Raimi’s other films, like Evil Dead. The three witches – Evanora (played by Rachael Weisz), Theodora (played by Mila Kunis) and Glinda (played by Michelle Williams) are also fun to watch. Glinda, in particular, won the heart of Colorado Princess and I see a Glinda costume purchase in our future

Glinda, the Good Witch – Disney’s Oz the Great and Powerful

Oz has a good amount of action to keep things moving along, but really, we kind of know the story at this point, so there aren’t any major surprises. Fans of the original Wizard of Oz will notice several references to that film, including a few “horses of a different color” grazing in the background of one scene.

The one bad part of the movie for me was that it was a little intense in spots and Colorado Princess ended up on my lap for most of it. We’re usually cautious with movies that we think might scare her – typically watching it first before deciding if she can see it – but in this case, she is such a huge fan of Wizard of Oz and has been talking about this movie ever since she saw the first commercial, I wasn’t too worried. I think the 3D may have been part of the issue, but the action is certainly more amped up than anything in the original movie and it is much darker – lots of fog and spookiness. Of course, it didn’t help that there was a preview of Jurassic Park 3D before Oz started – that T-Rex freaks ME out!  After the movie, Colorado Princess told me she “loved it”, so I don’t think she’s permanently scarred, but I would say this movie is probably more for kids 7&up.

China Doll and Finley from Disney’s Oz the Great and Powerful

Overall, I thought Oz the Great and Powerful was good but not great. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with how much I love the original, but this one seemed to lack a little something…or, maybe I just really missed hearing Judy Garland sing “Somewhere Over The Rainbow”!

The second annual D23 Fanniversary roadshow kicked off this past Friday night in Burbank at the Walt Disney Studios and Colorado Dad and I were on hand to experience the fun. For those of you who have tickets to an upcoming show, or are maybe trying to decide if you want to go or not, I thought I’d give a quick recap of the evening.

If you’re not familiar with it, the Fanniversary is an hour and a half presentation celebrating Disney milestones that are celebrating anniversaries this year. The nice thing about these shows is that they are hosted in cities all across the U.S., so chances are, there is one coming to a town relatively close to you. Although there isn’t a show scheduled for Denver, we had a couple options fairly close to use with Phoenix, Chicago and the three Cali shows (San Diego, Burbank and San Francisco). Colorado Dad was already going to be out in California for work, so we decided to head to the first show in Burbank.

Although the pre-arrival email we received said that we shouldn’t arrive at the Studios before 7:30, we pulled up around 7:20 and there was already a line of cars checking in at the gate. We were directed to the Zorro parking structure (so named because it is built on the original site of the town set used in the filming of the Zorro series). There was not going to be photography allowed at the presentation, so I had decided to leave my camera back at the hotel, but I did snap this pic of the outside of the parking structure. Love it!

Zorro parking structure – Walt Disney Studios

Parking was easy and we were heading toward the theater and the check-in line within a few minutes. While we waited to check-in, we chatted with a few of our friends who joined us as well as Laura and Becky from the D23/Archives team (they are both two of the nicest ladies you’ll ever meet. Make sure to say “hi” if you see them around). After checking in, we were handed 3 glossy booklets, for Wreck-It Ralph, Brave and Frankenweenie, as well as a program and commemorative button.

Some of the “swag” fron Fanniversary 2013

I didn’t notice it until we got home, but the three booklets are the promotional glossies sent to Academy members during the Oscar voting period – they are gorgeous, full-color booklets and a really nice takeaway.

Promotional books for Wreck-It Ralph, Brave and Frankenweenie

Laura kicked off the night by asking us to please put away cameras and then she introduced our two hosts for the evening – Billy Stanek, aka the “new” Disney Geek from the D23 team and Justin Arthur from the Archives. I spent time with both these guys during last year’s Marceline trip and they are both great guys who have a passion for Disney, but I must say they seemed a little nervous getting started. It was their first run-through of the material in front of an audience though, so I can certainly understand it!

The 90–minute presentation went through a number of Disney milestones from film to television to the parks and beyond. I won’t go through all the anniversaries here so I don’t ruin it for anyone, but I will highlight the “youngest” of the three because they have special significance to me. 15 years ago, in 1998, Disney’s Animal Kingdom opened, the film Mulan was released, the Disney Cruise Line started with the launch of the Disney Magic AND Colorado Dad and I got married! Not only that, but for our honeymoon, we booked a land and sea package that allowed us to visit Animal Kingdom and sail on the Disney Magic where we watched Mulan for the first time. 1998 was a quite a year, not only for Disney, but for the DisneyFan Family as well!

The rest of the show provided a lot of great pictures, stories and memories, going back 90 years (Happy birthday, Walt Disney Company!). After the show, we had an opportunity to get a closer look at one of the exclusive pieces from the Archives – a gaucho doll given to Walt Disney during his trip to South America while filming Saludos Amigos in the 1940s.

It was fun to reminisce and overall, I really enjoyed the show. I probably wouldn’t have flown all the way to LA just for the show, but since we were already going to be out there, I’m glad we attended and it was worth the price of admission. There are still tickets available for the shows in Orlando (Mar. 8th), Chicago (Mar. 10th), Boston (Mar. 24th) and Seattle (Apr. 5th) and you can purchase tickets on the D23 event page.