Candlelight Processional 2008 - Disneyland Resort

Over the weekend, I had the wonderful opportunity to work the annual Candlelight Processional at Disneyland. This was the second year I've been lucky enough to be a part of the event. Besides the incredible choirs, orchestra, fanfare trumpeters, soloists, & narrator (this year - John Stamos), we have such an wonderful production team. And as we spend 12 hours a day together for 2 straight days, it's so much better when you want to come to work to be with your team. I'm extremely grateful for the chance to participate in this traditional holiday event at Disneyland.

TSO Rocks!

So I was able to attend the TSO (Trans-Siberian Orchestra) concert on Saturday in San Diego! It was so fantastic. Early on, there was the possibility that I wouldn't be able to make their concert this year due to my schedule at Disneyland, but thankfully it worked itself out. Granted working a 50 hour week at Disneyland with the midnight showing of Twilight thrown in for good measure & the concert - it was a very long week! But all worth it. My holiday season has now begun: I've got the TSO CD's playing in my car & as soon as I've got the time, I'll pull out the Christmas decorations. I love this time of year. BTW, Twilight was awesome! Read the books, see the movie - so fabulous! If you don't know anything about TSO, check out their website at http://trans-siberian.com

Brandon duels Darth Vader!

Here is the video of Brandon during the Jedi Training Academy - dueling Darth Vader!

Brandon becomes a Jedi!

Brandon decided this was the time he was going to participate in the Jedi Training Academy at Disneyland. After all, his aunt has an "in" at the show - it's the least she could do! He said he wanted to learn the combination but he didn't want to "fight". So I called ahead and let my people know he didn't want to participate in the "dueling" of the Dark Side. But lo and behold, brave Brandon decided he could face Darth Vader & beat him fair and square! He got a diploma at the end & is officially a Padawan! Way to go!

I'm going to try and post the videos in another post

Walt Disney Studios+ Tour Pt 2 Take 2

Ok, so apparently the last slide show didn't take - so now I'm including a link to my kodak gallery slide show. This pictures won't have any notes about what you're seeing but you hopefully will be able to see & enjoy. Let me know if you have any questions about a certain pic & I'll be happy to explain. Here goes...

My fingers are crossed this works!

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=2re720l3.37mt48nf&x=0&y=s59124&localeid=en_US

Walt Disney Studios+ Tour Pt 2

Ok, let's try this - direct links to the slide shows!

Prospect Studios Slide Show - http://s123.photobucket.com/albums/o294/jadesmp/?action=view¤t=921283a4.pbw

Walt Disney Studios & Archives Slide Shows - http://s123.photobucket.com/albums/o294/jadesmp/?action=view¤t=e1c74557.pbw

Hopefully this will work - if it doesn't link directly, just copy and paste into your browser to see the pictures.

Walt Disney Studios+ Tour

That's is to say, I toured the Walt Disney Studios, Prospect Studios, & the El Capitan Theatre, all on a blistering hot day in LA. But what a great time - it was amazing to see the Disney Archives at the Walt Disney Studios; to stand in the operating room at Seattle Grace Hospital ("Grey's Anatomy") at Prospect Studio; and to walk backstage at the El Cap! It was all arranged through my Emerging Leader Program at Disneyland. They were terrific & I'm so glad they were able to put it together. It was my first time at the studios and my first time backstage at the El Cap.

I've put together a slide show of the various things I saw - which were amazing and ranged from an Academy Award to the bedknob from "Bedknobs & Broomsticks" to a statuette from "The Black Cauldron". Also, at WDS is the orginial multi plane camera that pioneered 3-D animation. Prospect Studios is also where they shoot "General Hospital" and where the West Coast office of ABC News is located. They have a huge scenic shop where the build, put together, and house the two shows sets.

I wish everyone could've seen what I got to see - absolutely fantastic!

Ok - so the slide show didn't work so well... I'll continue to work on getting it posted!

Pics & Fun

So it's been a VERY busy few weeks but I'm managing to squeeze in some fun (I'll save the work update for another blog)! Here are some pictures from the Leads & Trainers Party held in Paradise Pier at DCA. It's the Resort's way of celebrating the various Leads & Trainers - duh - so it's a small-ish group. To put it in terms a few of you will understand, the party was held from 8-11:30pm... during that time I was able to ride California Screamin', Toy Story Midway Mania (3 times), King Triton's Carousel, Mulholland Madness, Orange Stinger, take an hour to eat dinner, dance a bit on the dance floor, play the midway games, and take some pictures. Needless to say - I was beat at the end.


~Me having fun............~Chris is ready for TSMM


~Marcie & Chris waiting their turn....~Karen (my boss) working


~Sandy working too.......~Christine on the carousel


~Alex & Renee on TSMM.........~Christine & Chris on Mulhullond Madness


~Rusty & Marcie enjoying dinner....~The group, all on 1 bench!

Life Side

Thought I should also post about that life side of my life. So last Tuesday was the stage management summer soiree. It was held at a park down the road from the Resort. Holly did an amazing job putting it all together. Good food, fun games, and just a chance to be together in a relaxed, social atmosphere.

On Thursday, I went to the parking lot of the Fox Theater in Fullerton to see Back to the Future. They project it onto the side of the theater as a fund raiser to help restore the Fox Theater. Also, as it was Sept. 11th, they held a special flag raising ceremony in conjunction with a National Guard unit and the city's fire department. It was really quite well done. Holly, Chris, Sandy, Scott, and I enjoyed candy & beverages under the stars watching a classic (well, a new classic). Amazingly (or not) a group of youth next to us had never seen it. It was really strange hearing people laugh for the first time at the movie. Overall, good fun - and they're showing Ghostbusters in Oct - you bet I'll be there!

Friday was a busy one for me. First after work was Concert Under the Stars at Cal State Fullerton. My friends Adam Saucedo & Alyssa Marie Webb were both performing and I was super excited to support them. Ironically, the show was a tribute to Walt Disney's contribution to popular music. So Sandy, Chris, Sarah and I (all Disney folk) spent the evening listening to Disney songs. Adam & Alyssa Marie were fantastic - even if they didn't have as many solos as I'd have liked. Next up was a birthday celebration for Annalisa at the St. Regis Resort in Dana Point. We dropped Sarah off and headed south to join Annalisa and company. We spent the next 2 hours talking, laughing, and having a hoot.

Saturday was spent around the bathroom as I was recovering from a bout of food poisoning (I started not feeling well on the way to Dana Point). It was not pleasant. All plans went out the window - including work. But thankfully, it passed and by Sunday I was my jovial self again.

Sunday was nice - I attended church with Ashna & Preston followed by a late lunch at their home. They were so gracious to let me share their Sunday. Preston made a great pasta which we ate while watching Nim's Island - a cute movie I thoroughly enjoyed. After the movie I headed down to Karen & the boys. I picked up some dinner on the way and got to spend some time with the family. I also helped Karen baby proof the back door to the garage that Shane recently learned how to open. Then while Karen went to get dessert at Golden Spoon, Brandon played while Shane (who wasn't feeling well) and I watched Caillou, the holiday movie. I am a total Caillou convert - I can't wait to have kids so they can watch it. I wanted to finish watching the movie.

And tonight Chris & Sandy are coming over for dinner & a movie. The movie is still up for a decision - currently I think our choices are The Great Race, Xanadu, or something else entirely. It'll be nice to hang out just the three of us, we haven't gotten to in a while.

So there it is... the life side ;-)

Emerging Leaders Weeks 3-5

Well, I was really good about updating regularly for a bit and then I got behind. I blame my life - for once my work life balance favored the life side. Crazy for me, I know! So on to the update...

I'm almost halfway through the program and it's great! Oh, first, a shout out to Craig - a fellow Emerging Leader who found my blog here in cyberspace... You Rock! I've now completed three more classes: Systems Thinking, Good Show Begins with Me, and Business Results. Systems Thinking is just that - knowing how you fit into the greater system of business; thinking big picture & how one decision can affect many - often in departments other than your own. Good Show... is pretty self-explanatory. I'd even taken it before just a few short months ago. But it's always good to be reminded that Walt Disney created Disneyland with specific criteria in mind & it's up to us to uphold that standard. Business Results covered the more financial, internal workings and components to the company. The facilitator for the financial portion was an absolute hoot - totally dry sense of humor that kept me laughing the entire hour.

Also, we participated in our first Leadership Perspectives session - where current leaders sit down for a one on one with us. In this first session we were able to hear from and talk with the VP's for Food & Beverage, Human Resources, Travel, & Entertainment. Mostly what I took from this session is that we are all human, subject to the same passion, faults, and greatness. It was refreshing to know that my instincts are right on track with the VP's. I just need to trust them and own them.

The most exciting bit of the past few weeks was the opportunity to attend the 2008 Disneyland Resort Leadership Conference. Two days of seminars on everything from personal finance to Disney heritage to leadership practices. I attended nine sessions over the two days. I wish I could've fit in more. I listened to executives of the company - Ed Grier, Michael O'Gratten, and Jay Rasulo - talk about their styles of leadership and how they lead this company. I listened to the legendary Marty Sklar and his Mickey's 10 More Commandments of leadership. I attended a session about Ub Iwerks and his amazing contributions to the technology of film and animation. Another session was about Microsoft Office 2007 - it's rolling out at Disney early next year (most likely) and I wanted to be ready. Just touched on the basics but now I'm super stoked and ready to sign up for more practice sessions. Two of my sessions were dedicated to leadership practices - one on Giving & Receiving Feedback and the other on Leading Change - Lessons learned from the American Revolution. Absolutely fascinating... I learned so much - many notes taken from all the sessions.

I've also worked on & turned in my first homework assignments; began my project in earnest; and spent time training at Princess Fantasy Faire. All things I will continue in the next weeks as well. Here's to continued learning & fun!

September Nights!

Rick passionately relating some story, while hanging out at the Uva Bar at Downtown Disney.

Anna & Ryan listening to Rick relate some impassioned story, hanging out at the Uva Bar at Downtown Disney.

Tim kissing me as we ignored Rick, hanging out at the Uva Bar at Downtown Disney. We had such a good time Thursday night! I haven't seen Tim or Rick or Anna or Ryan in such a long time, it was so much fun to catch up & tell stories. I was kinda glad that the Park (Disneyland that is) closed at 8pm that night so we could spend quality time together just chatting. And it's even more fun when those around you get tipsy while you (and Ryan) stay completely sober, enjoying the increasing lightness of character of the others (whatever that means! - I couldn't come up with the phrase I really wanted, oh well - I think you get the point!). Definitely need to do this more often.

Sarah at the Night Flights Summer 2008 Concert Series at the new Orange County Great Park on Saturday night. She'd been told about this concert from an audio guy friend of hers - he'd said that an Irish folk modern group was playing & she thought of me. So we headed out to the former El Toro Marine Base and the new Orange County Great Park. It's really fantastic seeing this park finally taking shape. Check out http://www.ocgp.org/ for more information. And the concert & balloon ride are completely free. We saw the concert but didn't have time for the balloon ride - maybe next time. Eileen Ivers & Immigrant Soul played for 90 minutes and they were great! She'd formerly played for Riverdance so she knew her stuff. There were kids dancing in the aisles, good times being had by all - except for the lady next to us who "shushed" us near the end of the concert for talking. We're outside, at an upbeat, rocking folk music concert and she wants us to not talk - seriously! Whatever... not to be judgemental or ageist, but she was older and not exactly the proper demographic for the setting. Check out http://www.eileenivers.com/ for more info on what I heard that night.

On Sunday evening - Rick, Camille, Ryan, Anna, Eric, & Breanne spent the night playing at the Resort (Disneyland & Disney's California Adventure [DCA]). We started over at DCA on the new Toy Story Mania. Then I got to play on all the big kid rides I haven't done in a while due to the fact I seem to always spend my play time at the Resort with my nephews (which I love, don't get me wrong!). So I played on Soarin over California, California Screamin, Space Mountain, and the Nemo Submarines. It was my first time on Nemo - it was cute, not worth waiting hours in line cute, but worth waiting the 5 minutes on Sunday night. See one of the folks I went with has a medical condition that allows them to get a special card to bypass the lines at all the rides. Wow, do I want to always go to the Resort with them from now on! Yikes what a difference not waiting in line makes on your mood and all that you can do!

But now it's back to the grind of work. At least right now, it's a good grind. I'll get my summary of the past two weeks of the Emerging Leader experience up in the next few days - it's still totally awesome! Oh and last weeks Melissa Etheridge concert was fantastic! She's quite a storyteller & the people watching was SO much fun! Ask me about it sometime for a good laugh.

Last Summer Celebration

As summer comes to a close, and while Grandma is still in town, we decided to hit an Angels game one afternoon - the Angels ended up winning & we had a blast, especially the ice cream cookie sandwiches!


We finished the summer at Disneyland - riding rides, watching the Jedi Training Academy & Pixar Play Parade. It was a long fun day and a great way to finish off the summer!

Totally Random!

I won a radio giveaway today! I know! Completely hilarious - the local adult contemporary station does a "My 5 at 5" thing (the station is 104.3MYfm) where listeners can submit their favorite/top 5 songs & if yours is chosen you win! Well, I happened to be listening at home the other day at that time, figured I could come up with 5 songs, logged on & submitted. I had heard a fav song of mine recently - Life in a Northern Town by Dream Academy and figured I might be able to find other 'directional' songs to submit for a theme. My final list also included West End Girls by Pet Shop Boys, Wild Wild West by Escape Club, Morning Train by Sheena Easton (I know I cheated a little), and Paint the Silence by South (again cheating, I know!). Well, the station substituted Rag Doll by Aerosmith for my south choice but I'm totally okay with that because I love Aerosmith! And the kicker is I got two tickets to the Melisssa Etheridge concert on Friday at the Greek Theater in LA, plus admittance to the private patio pre-party! Don't know who I'm taking yet, I'm not a huge Melissa Etheridge fan but it's a free concert - heck yeah! I love totally random!

Emerging Leaders Week 2

Week 2 was fantastic! I started the week getting organized - reviewing last week & preparing for the upcoming week. First class of the week was "Leading the Disney Way". We spent the morning covering the 12 Disney Leadership Compentencies. Some are easier to apply in Entertainment than others. But all good to know for general leaderships purposes. The late morning/early afternoon covered Behavioral Profiles. I am completely blanking on the name of the system we used but the four profiles are Director, Socializer, Thinker, & Relater, with those same subdivisions - I am a Directing Relater. If you are interested, I will be happy to pass along the info - it all quite revealing. Really we all have all four profiles within our personalities & the dominant one can change depending on the situation, etc., but it's an interesting way of breaking down leadership & how one can change their approach depending on the type of profile they are interacting with at that moment. The afternoon focused on putting the day's knowledge to use in a team as we tried to "escape from the jungle". Each team had to assemble a helicopter using the 92 pieces at our table. My team finished first! We worked really well together. All in all it was a quite informative day.

The next class was "FOCUS - Acheiving your Highest Priorities" - all about managing your time. It used the Franklin Covey system as it basis. We talked about the pyramid process - identifying our values, using those values to set our goals, which helps us to plan weekly, and then plan daily. Again, if you're interested, I can pass along the info. Some of the principals I agree with and some I know I just can't commit to - which is a big piece of the process. But I am committed to doing my absolute best for the three weeks our instructor wanted us to commit to.

The rest of my time during the week was focused on internalizing & processing these classes. I also spent some time working on my project pitch. On Saturday I got to shadow the stage manager on "Remember...Dreams Come True" - Fireworks Spectacular. It was pretty much a typical stage manager type shift. The interesting bits were during the show, listening to the Pyro Team deal with the wind contingencies & which product to pull, etc.

Now I'm starting my 3rd week - working on my project, got a bit of homework, some more shadow experiences, and more classes! So far... so good!

I donated my hair!

A group of stage managers at Disney decided early this year to donate our hair to charity. I've been growing mine out since last July and two days ago went to the salon to make my donation. 11 inches donated, 12-13 inches cut total. Most of the group is donating to Locks of Love (www.locksoflove.org); my salon donates to Wigs for Kids (www.wigsforkids.org). My stylist also donated the cost of the cut with the hair!

It feels fantastic to have given to such a great cause & to have finally gotten all that weight off! I'm loving my new do - it the shortest hair I've had since I was 5 years old. I still don't totally recognize my reflection in the mirror.

Emerging Leaders Week 1 Done!

After week 1, I can say I'm really enjoing it. We started with a class called "Walt Disney & You". It was a great way to start off, reminding me of why I always wanted to work for Disney - the pride of knowing you are working for a highly respected & quality company. The next day's class was "Leadership 101" which is a brand new class to their program. They created it due to feedback from previous program sessions. It was a great introduction to the overall qualities & aspects to leadership, i.e. manage vs. lead, motivating, inspiring trust, seeing the big picture.

Also, last week I shadowed several different leadership positions throughout their day. I followed Entertainment 1 Day, Tech 1 Day, & Entertainment 1 Night. All were very enlightening, if only in small ways, but also very entertaining. This week, I've got two more classes - "Leading the Disney Way" & "Focus - Acheiving Your Highest Priorities", and I'm shadowing the Remember (fireworks) Stage Manager. I think my favorite upcoming opportunity is that I get to attend the Disney Leadership Conference Sept 3-4. I'll be attending sessions led my the executives of the company & sessions specific to growing my leadership skills. It's an incredible opportunity & I'm super excited.

So far no homework, but that'll change pretty quick. Also, trying to get started on my project. I've got my idea & am putting together my pitch. Then once it's approved, I get to go about making the idea a reality, and then putting together the whole experience into a 20 minute presentation to share with the class at the end of the program.

Stay tuned for more weekly updates! Granted, they aren't super exciting seeing as they are about Leadership, but it's my life for the next 12 weeks.

Summer Picture Time

So here's some pictures of what I've been up to this summer, including Grad Nites, more Born To Ride the Waves photos, friends in Romeo & Juliet, family, etc. Enjoy!