GRADUATION CRUISE 2017 || Magic Kingdom Day {Day 2}

Hello All,

I can't think of a catchy opening so I'm going to jump right into the post. If you missed the first day of this trip you can read it by clicking here. 

We decided that our goals was to leave Port Orleans: French Quarter around 10AM. I work up around 8:30 so I could get ready and we could stop in the quick service restaurant for breakfast. Mama Judy was moving a lot slower because she hadn't had a good night sleep. But eventually we got on the road. We got breakfast at the quick service restaurant there. I had beignets for the first time and they were sooo good. 

Finally it was time to head to the park. We didn't have to wait to long before the bus showed up. When we there we had to stop at guest service to buy tickets as well as redeem the points we had earned from being Disney Visa cardholders. Once that was all sorted out we headed in with our first stop being the Main Street Bakery which now offers Starbucks. I got a drink and then had a mini photo shoot in front of the castle.

Quote on the shirt: There's nothing a little Starbucks and Disney can't fix
Shirt: YouNameItEmbroideryG

After that we made our way to "new" Fantasyland because Mama Judy hadn't been to Disney since it opened. When we got there we saw that Gaston was meeting so we decided to hop in line. I will say that my meet and greet with Gaston was kind of boring. I'm not sure if he was tired after being out for a while or if he is just better with young kids but it is still always fun to meet him.

View of the castle while waiting

Side of Gaston's Tavern

Mama Judy testing out my camera

After that we decided to hop in line to go on the Little Mermaid ride which is always a cute ride especially if you love the story. 

View of Prince Eric's castle

Posing in front of my favorite Prince's castle

Cute Disney detail

After that we headed over to the Tomorrowland so that we could ride the People Mover. A favorite for both of us. 

View of Astro Orbiters form the People mover line

Did you really ride the People Mover if you didn't take a shoe pic?

When we got off the people mover we had some time to kill before our reservation for Be Our Guest. Since Donald is my favorite character we were going to try and meet him in Storybook Circus unfortunately the line moved a lot slower then predicted and we had to hop out of line.

We had lunch at Be Our Guest. The food was good but Mama Judy did say that she probably wouldn't eat there again unless we were on the Disney Dinning Plan because it was super expensive. My favorite part is that it looks so much like the rooms in the 1991 version of The Beauty and the Beast. And the food is pretty good. Especially the grey stuff...don't worry I asked the dishes. 

After lunch we headed over to Liberty Square to see the wait times for some Adventureland rides but got stuck by the parade. I got a few pictures but our view was pretty terrible.

Mama Judy got a call from work and by the time she was done we decided to stay in that area and see The Hall of President before Trump gets added in. While we waited we got to see the new muppets show. 

It was cute and great time to rest your feet. We watch Hall of Presidents and then headed back to Tomorrowland to Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor, which is one of the corniest and cutest shows at Disney and I totally recommend it. 

After the ride we hopped back in line to meet Goofy and Donald in Storybook circus. Donald is always on my list and it's always so much fun meeting him. Later in the trip I have a great interaction with him but you'll have to wait.

Me and Goofy

Me and Donald

Mama Judy had pretty much hit her Disney wall at this point so we used our last joint fastpass and went to see Phillarmagic which if you like Disney music you'll love the show. Mama Judy left after that while I stayed. 

The first thing I did was go over to Princess Fairytale Hall where I had a great interaction with both Rupunzel and Tiana. 

After that interaction it was almost time for my Haunted Mansion fastpass. If you don't know Haunted Mansion is my favorite ride every! Like I am obsessed with it! I even have an obscure Haunted Mansion quote on my laptop. 

After that ride I headed over to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad to see how long the wait time was and ultimately decided to hop in line because it was only about 50 minutes. Normally I love doing solo Disney time but in this particular case it kind of sucked because I was in between two groups of people my age and it was a little lonely. But when I got to the ride it was worth it. I never asked to be in a specific row on a ride but this time I was put in the back row. And it was so much fun!  One of the best experiences ever!

After that I left the Magic Kingdom and headed back to the hotel. I took a quick shower and repacked my bag to get it ready to go in the morning. Then I crawled into bed and went to sleep dreaming of the cruise starting the next morning. 

And that is the end of day 2. I will be back (hopefully soon) with more of these posts plus posts from another vacation I just back from.

*This post was not sponsored by any of the linked sites. All thoughts and opinions are strictly my own 

and I was in no way compensated for mentioning them ***

BOOK REVIEW: Just One Day

Hello All,

I have officially finished book 4 of my 2017 reading goal! In case you've missed the reviews so far this year you can catch them there ---> Since You've Been Gone & As Old As Time (I didn't write one for the second book I read because I was so busy right around the time I finished it). According to Good Reads I am 27% of the way through my 2017 reading goal of 15 books! But that's not why you guys came here, you came here to read a book review so let's get started.

The fourth book I read this year was Just One Day by Gayle Forman (I added the Good Reads link because it tells you places where you can buy it).  Which follows the character Allyson through one year of her life. It starts at the end of her summer trip the summer between high school and college. The biggest and most exciting summer of your life. On the last day of the trip she meets a Dutch boy named, Willem and the two of them go to France for just one day. The next morning she wakes up and Willem is gone and she spends the rest of the year attempting to find Willem again as well as find the girl she was that day in France. 

This book has been on my To Be Read list for such a long time. Mainly because I loved the books If I Stay and Where She Went by the same author, Gayle Forman (You can read the joint review I wrote here). I had heard in a few different places that these books was not as good as the fore mentioned novels. But I still wanted to give this book a chance. And to be honest I agree with the opinion I've seen floating around the internet. 

I guess I should start with my biggest issue, I didn't like the main character of the novel. I felt like she spend the majority of the novel complaining instead of doing something about her issues. She also came across as very judgy in my opinion. In fact I think the only character she didn't judge harshly was Willem. 

After reading the back summary of the novel I knew that the majority of the book would follow Allyson life post the day with Willem but she spend 100 of the 360-some odd page novel with Willem. Which was good to build the love connection between Allyson and Willem but it made the rest of the book feel rushed. There were pieces of her life post that day that I would have loved to learn more about. 

The ending to me also felt like it drew on forever. Like I kept thinking I was at the end and there was still like twenty more pages. Maybe if I had liked the character more then I would have like how drawn out it felt but I just wanted her to figure it out what she wanted.

As much as I didn't like the book I do plan to eventually read it's sequel, Just One Year which follow Willem through the same year. Maybe I'll like Willem more. Although I won't be reading it right away because I need a break from these characters.

I'm not sure who I would recommend this book to. I don't want to say no one because there is a very huge chance that because I didn't like the main character I wasn't able to see the positive side of this book. I feel that this book has the potential to be read by someone at that exact time in their life when they need to read it and have the message help them through whatever hurdle they are struggling with. So, maybe I would recommend it to anyone who is sitting on the edge of who they were and who they are going to be, people going through a huge life change.

I like to rate the books I read on a scale of 5. I've gone back and forth about what I was going to rate this book and I have decided that this book is getting a 3.25 on my scale. The writing was good and the story was a good concept I just didn't love the other elements. 

Have you read Just One Day? What did you think of it? Let me know in the comments below.

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*This post was not sponsored by any of the linked sites. All thoughts and opinions are strictly my own 

and I was in no way compensated for mentioning them ***

GRADUATION CRUISE 2017 || Travel Day {Day 1}

Hello All,

Welcome back to my blog and my cruise recap posts! Today is going to be the boring day on this trip's recap because there are next to no pictures. But I still want to document the trip. So, enjoy or skip it. And if you haven't already you can check out the recap of the whole trip here. Now that the housekeeping is out of the way let's get started.

On Thursday, January 5 I woke up relatively early because I had some errands to run. I had to run to Best Buy to get a charger for my camera. I also went to DSW to look for water shoes for Mama Judy, as well as I believe target to grab sunscreen I think. 

When I got home I finished packing up my carry on and I charged my laptop. As well as doing some last minute cleaning. I also had to run to my friends Tori's house because she was keeping an eye on our house while we were away and I needed to give her a key. 

Finally it was time for us to leave the house. We had to run a quick errand to Target and then headed to the airport. We got through security very quickly, there was next to no lines there, which is always good. We plopped down in a seat and Mama Judy attempted to take a nap (remember when I napped on the airport floor when I was coming home from Disney in 2015?). Our local airport also had a candy bar so I went and enjoyed some candy. 

We got on board our flight. We were flying Jet Blue which now offers wifi. Which was awesome because I was able to get some YouTube work done from the air. Other then that our flight was pretty smooth and we arrived like twenty minutes earlier the expected. 

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We headed to the ground level and got on board The Disney Magical Express which is an awesome way to get to the Disney Resorts. We were one of the last few people to get on the shuttle so we got going  pretty quickly. We were staying at Disney's Port Orleans: French Quarter. Mama Judy and I had stayed at the Port Orleans when I was younger but I had no memory of the resort. But I will now say I LOVED it. Probably one of my favorites. 

We went to check-in where we ran in some difficulty. Mama Judy's legal last name is pretty unique and sometimes computers get confused. Finally we got it all sorted out and got to our room. We got curled up in our beds and watched a Lifetime movie while we waited for our suitcases. Although I fell asleep before they got there. 

And that was the end of day one. I'm going to try and get these posts up ASAP but I don't want to guarantee when the next one will go up. 

*This post was not sponsored by any of the linked sites. All thoughts and opinions are strictly my own 

and I was in no way compensated for mentioning them ***

BOOK REVIEW: Since You've Been Gone

Hello All,

I'm back with another post! I'm actually trying to marathon write post today so that there may be content on my blog again. I know I've been bad, if you miss me I have been active on YouTube (same name as blog), Instagram/Twitter/Snapchat which all use the user name @judy_judy94. But that's not important. Today I am here to do another book review!

I have officially completed my third book this year! My goal is to read at least fifteen books this year and review as many as possible. I did review the first one (You can read it here) although I didn't review the second one because I was pretty busy around the time I finished it and never got around to writing it. 

So, what was the third book I read this year? I read Since You've Been Gone by Morgan Matson. Which a book about Emily during the summer between junior and senior year of high school. She goes away on family vacation and returns to find out her best friend, Sloane, has basically disappeared. But Sloane left behind a list of challenges for Emily to complete. The list was:

 1. Kiss a stranger 

2. Go Skinny Dipping 

3. Steal Something 

4. Break Something 

5. Penelope 

6. Ride a horse 

7. 55 S. Avenue, ask for Mona 

8. The Backless dress and somewhere to wear it 

9. Dance until dawn 

10. Share some secrets in the dark 

11. Hug a Jamie 

12. Apple picking at dawn 

13. Sleep under the stars. 

Emily becomes convinced that if she completes all these activities she will find Sloane. Along the way Emily develops a friendship with classmates Frank and Collins. And with Dawn the girl who works in the pizza place next to the ice cream shop Emily works in. Along with the help of her new friends Emily sets off to cross things off her list. 

I must say I loved this book. At the beginning I was worried I would hate the book because Emily fell in a YA troupe I'm not a huge fan of, where the main character is shy and let's her loud best friend does all the "talking" for her. But the more I got to know Emily the more I liked her. Matson also did a great shop of showing the good and bad of having a best friend like that. 

I love reading books that have a romantic element, even if it's not the main element. This book did have a sub plot of romance and I will say I shipped Emily with the book's love interest so hard. Although there was a character who was Emily's boyfriend from before the story started that I low key liked him a little more. 

My favorite part of the book was how developed the side characters were. I feel like I truly got to know the side characters and really could put myself into Emily's shoes. So, many of these characters feel like they could one day get their own novels and stories. 

Overall I rated this book a 4.35 out of 5. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoy YA books, especially if you like the more emotional adventure ones or the ones about friendships. 

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Have you read Since You've Been Gone? What did you think about it? Let me know in the comments below!

GRADUATION CRUISE 2017 || A Trip in Review

Hello All,

Happy Thursday! In January I went on a Disney Cruise with Mama Judy to celebrate my college graduation! I know i've been kind of cruddy at keeping up with my blog post but I have so many pictures to share so I'm going to attempted to share them here. If you guys have been around for a while you know that I often will start vacation wrap ups with a trip in review post (Disney Cruise 2014, Disney at Christmas 2014 & Disney 2015). These are some of my favorite post to do because it gives you a clue about what's coming and it gets me excited. Also I plan to use this post as a home base and link all other post here once they've been written. 

Thursday, January 5, 2017

This was the day our trip started. I spent the morning running last minute errands. Our flight was later in the evening so we didn't land in Orlando until 9:30 PM. We went and checked in a Port Orleans French Quarter and relaxed. 

Friday, January 6, 2017

The first full day of our vacation we spent at the Magic Kingdom. Mama Judy had been to Disney World since they opened New Fantasyland and she wanted to see the new area. We explored the park as well as having lunch at Be Our Guest.

Me at Be Our Guest

Saturday, January 7, 2017

We boarded the Disney Fantasy for our cruise. We were excited to start a new trip as well as explore any changes that were made to the ship. We had dinner at Animator's Palate and went to an event at the Tube.

Our first towel animal (Swan) thanks to our awesome State Room Host, Michael!

Sunday, January 8, 2017

This was our first day at sea. Mama Judy and I enjoyed the Rainforest (one of the treatments at the spa) as well as exploring. We both took naps and enjoyed the day.

Monday, January 9, 2017
On Monday the port of call was Mexico, we got off the boat and saw the Mexican Ruins!

Tuesday, January 10, 2017
On Tuesday the boat stopped at Grand Cayman. Mama Judy had a spa appointment and we were both tired so we stuck around the boat.

Wednesday, January 11, 2017
This was probably my favorite day of the cruise! On this day we got off the boat in Jamaica and experience probably the best excursion I have ever experienced.

Thursday, January 12, 2017
This was our final day at sea the first Star Wars Day at Sea aboard the Disney Fantasy. Since I didn't really know anything about Star Wars I hung out in the adult section and finished the book I brought with me (You can read the review here).

Friday, January 13, 2017
The last day! The last of the cruise is always the worst and the saddest. But on this day we stopped at Disney's private island, Castaway Cay. This was cold and windy but we tired to make the best out of it.

Saturday, January 14, 2017

We finished our trip and headed home...already dreaming of the next cruise! ;) 

And that was a quick review of our cruise. Over the next few weeks I will attempt to get as many post out as possible about our cruise. Thanks for reading! 

BOOK REVIEW: As Old As Time

Hello All,

This year I made a Good Reads goal of reading fifteen books over the next twelve months. And I am excited to be able to say that I have officially finished the first book! And since I love to share my opinions on books and movies on this lovely blog I decided I would review it!

The first book I read this year was the novel As Old As Time by Liz Braswell. Which is the third novel in Braswell's series A Twisted Tale. I have not read the first two books in this series though because I believe that they are all stand alone books that have the common theme of re-telling traditional Disney movies. 

In this case the book re-told the story of The Beauty and the Beast which is one of my all time favorite Disney movies. The twist in this novel is that the Enchantress who be-witches the Beast is actually Belle's mother. Together Belle and the Beast have to break the curse and try to uncover the mystery of the real reason the Enchantress cursed the beast. 

This novel is broken into three parts. The first part is written in Flashbacks where we see Maurice and Belle's mother meet and fall in love. But it also re-tells the first part of The Beauty and the Beast. The re-telling is pretty much exactly what we see in the animated classic. During this part I question whether I wanted to put it down and give up or continue on. 

When I got to the second part I was glad I did. This is when the novel starts to twist on the original story and bring life to a new story. I was also really excited for this part because I was hoping to get a better idea of why Belle and the Beast were such a perfect match (But more on that later). While at the same time keeping to the original story when we saw what Maurice was going through.

The final part of the novel was a little bit of a let down. By this point I had pretty much guessed why everything happened the way it had happened. And was even disappointed by the answer to one of the mysteries. The last chapter of the book made want a sequel though because Braswell left it open for Belle and the Beast to start a whole new adventure. But from what I've seen online there doesn't seem to be a sequel in the works. 

Now the piece of the book I was most excited about was to really get to see what made Belle and the Beast such an amazing couple. I mean in a book that is almost 500 pages long we had to get an in-depth look at the characters. But in that regards I was disappointed. I learned a little more about Belle as a person. And good amount more about the Beast's past. But I didn't romantically ship them. I didn't find myself hoping they'd get together...I would have been just as happy to see them shake hands and go there separate ways. That was something that disappointed me to no ends because they are such an iconic Disney couple. 

Overall I rated this book a 3.75 out of 5. It was very close to making it to 4 stars but the slow start and the lack of romantic connection between the leads did hurt it in my ratings. With that being said I know everyone has their own taste so I would recommend this book to people who like fantasy or fairy tale novels and someone with an open mind when it comes to telling the story in a different way. Although I WOULD NOT recommend this book to anyone who is a big fan of Disney's Beauty and the Beast and who wouldn't want to see the story change. 

Source

Have you read As Old as Time? If so, did you enjoy it? How would you rate it? Let me know in the comments down below. 

College Graduation

Hello All,

Guess what? I wrote this post almost a month ago and forgot to hit publish. LOL. But no seriously guess what!

I graduated college! After four and half years of college I have finally graduated! And it feel absolutely amazing! This last semester, especially, has been a lot of work but it'll be worth it. 

For those of you guys wondering I got a bachelor of science in Liberal Studies with concentrations in communication, media studies and creative writing. And no I'm not going into journalism or news production. I do have a future career in mind but since the career is in field that requires a lot of confidentially because of that I'm not comfortable discussing exactly what it is online.  I'm currently in the process of looking for a job and it may make it that I will be moving across the country which is really exciting. When I know where I'll be heading I'll let you guys know, at least a general location. 

As for the day itself it was so much fun. I started the day out by getting ready, to which I actually filmed my first Get Ready With Me video on my YouTube channel (You can check it out here). Then we headed to school and got a prime parking space. I gave Mama Judy directions to the theatre when graduation was taking place and then headed to the place where we line up.

I don't know if every school does it this way but my school has us line up by school but other then that its free range has to where you sit/stand. Right as I walked in I get a text message from my friend Chris asking me where I was and he told me where he was. I went up to where he was standing. I ended up lining up with the 3 other graduates from the Media Studies department, which was good because I had so much fun with them.

We headed into the theater right on time. I saw Mama Judy while I was walking in and she was already crying.

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We didn't have a lot of speakers at the graduation itself so it went by rather quickly. My favorite speech was done by the president of the university, where it talked about intental kindness when all around so much hate is happening. I think its an idea that we should all carry around with us.

When it was time to get the degrees we again were called by school with the school of arts and sciences going last. When the finally called us we all whooped and "got lit" as the kid in front of me said. As each person went up they got whoops from the different people in the audience who knew them. When they finally declared us college graduation we whooped and went wild.

After graduation finished I met my parents outside to take pictures. And I made Mama Judy be an Instagram Mama while I posed for some Instagram worthy pictures. If you're interested in following me on Instagram you can by searching @judy_judy94.

When we finished taking pictures I went to say good-bye to my boss. I don't think I ever mentioed it on my blog but for the past year and half I have worked as a student employee in my college's residence life department. I wanted to stop and say good-bye to my boss because she had such an impact on my last couple of years.

After saying good-bye to my boss we headed back to my hometown where we had dinner with some of our close family and friends. It was so much fun celebrating with some really important people in my life. Plus it was at one of my favorite restaurant where the staff knows us by name which made it extra special.

Graduation was such an amazing day and I am so grateful for all the people who have supported me over the past four and half years. And for anyone who has read my college adventures which I have been sharing since the end of my freshmen year thank you. I can't wait to share the next chapter with you guys.

I also want to give a special shout to Natalie, who was my first blogging friend all the way back during the first summer of the World According to Emma. Natalie and I had actually went to the same college and both graduated this December. Congrats Natalie! You can check out her blog by clicking here.

A now enjoy all the awesome pictures and a video snap that I'm adding in.

Me with my degree folder

One of my Instagram inspired pictures even if it hasn't been shared yet

And Instagram picture 

My cap, shout out to Mama Judy for helping decorating it 

My dad and I

Mama Judy and I