Fall Travels: Disney World

Happy fall!

How is your autumn season going? I can't believe it's the last day of September. I've decided that after I get my editing goal done today, I'm going to pull out the Halloween decorations!

This month, after Comic Con, I went to Orlando to see two of my favorite places: Disney World and Harry Potter World. Sigh, I really wouldn't mind living there–in the parks I mean (really, I've worked it out. I would live in Cinderella's castle and eat park churros and ice cream all year).

You know what I love about Disney? How flawlessly they immerse you into new worlds by targeting all five senses. How could your imagination not take off and create new stories, characters, and ideas when you're surrounded in the sights, smells, and sounds of Main Street, Tomorrowland, and Adventureland? AND Disney World has four parks to get lost in. I always make sure and jot down ideas of inspiration while we're traveling in space, jeeping through the jungle, or dancing down Main Street. I know it's cliche, but I honestly feel like a kid again. You can see the proof below.

Halloween Party at the Magic Kingdom. This is my best friend since elementary! We have refused to stop playing dress-up just because we're adults.  

I love the new Fantasyland at Magic Kingdom. They have a new interactive Beauty and the Beast experience that completely lives up to the hype. 

Hollywood Studios with Rock 'n' Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror. So creepy and wonderful at the same time. 

A lovely, rainy day at Epcot. Let it be known that Epcot is no longer a "boring and educational" park. It has changed A LOT, and it's worth going to. 

Animal Kingdom with plenty of dinosaurs, tigers, and even a yeti from Everest. I love the adventurous theme throughout this whole park and how each section takes place in Africa, Asia, and India.

Thanks for stopping by! Do you have any trips planned for fall? 

Grim, grinning, ghosts

I’ve had such a good fall season so far. Back in August I was already so pumped for Halloween that I made a list of spooky things I wanted to do. The list included: making creepy cupcakes, going to Gardner Village, looking through Halloween editions of The Martha Stewart magazines, taking fall walks, and watching (lighthearted) scary movies.

Fall is such an inspirational time for writing. Think about it, the air is crisp and cool, the leaves are crunchy. Houses smell like pumpkins, cinnamon, and brown sugar. Movies like Haunted Mansion and Hocus Pocus put scenes in your head of swirling masquerade parties and haunted ballrooms. I LOVE IT.

The 31st is almost upon us, so if you haven’t yet, enjoy some candy corn, pumpkin carving, vintage decorations, monster mash, Halloween fun.

P.S. I watched the Addams Family for the first time last week. Gomez and Morticia were so wonderfully strange and humorous to me. I told my husband to grow out a mustache (which I quite like) and I think we might attempt to be the infamous couple on all Hallows eve.

Quoth the Raven

During this time of year I like to read some of Edgar Allan Poe’s greatest poems and short stories. Poe really was such an amazing writer, his work was so haunting and eerie, yet eloquent and beautiful. Unfortunately I feel like my first exposure to Poe’s writing was on a Simpson’s tree house of horror episode (admit it…you’ve seen that episode too). Bart Simpson was masquerading as the raven yelling “Nevermore, Nevermore,” while Homer played the tormented narrator.


I feel like during Poe’s life he never got the credit he deserved for his writing, like so many authors. I’m sure you know some of his most classic tales, but if you’ve never done so, read his work (maybe not alone though. Even though it’s over 100 years old, it’s still scary).

Because it’s fall and I can’t physically give you a handful of Twix, Reese's, and Kit Kats (Okay getting off subject slightly), I will instead post for you a couple of my favorite parts of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven.

THE RAVEN

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door-
Only this, and nothing more."

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore.
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore-
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

"Be that word our sign in parting, bird or fiend," I shrieked, upstarting-
"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!- quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted- nevermore!

[http://www.eapoe.org/works/info/pp073.htm]