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My African Trek Adventure Begins

Posted on July 28, 2011 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

Have you ever wished you could go on an African Safari and watch animals running, eating, and playing in the wild? I did, but the reality is that going to Africa is not in my future right now.

Lucky for me, I was one of the lucky people that was able to try out the new Wild Africa Trek at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. As part of the Saturday afternoon activities of Disney Social Media Moms Celebration, I had the chance to go on the adventure of my life. Of course, the biggest decision I had to make once it was finally time to go, which camera to take. With some major prodding from Ellen of Confessions of an IT Girl, I took TechyDad’s new DSLR along. Please note – this is his baby. Often times, the look of panic on my face is of ruining his new toy and not fear for my life.

We were picked up from the Grand Floridian Resort early in the morning. We took a back entrance into the Animal Kingdom. Before heading to Disney, Shannan, From Cribs to Car Keys, and I joked that we would hold each other up as we crossed the bridge and promised to keep each other moving. Here is Shannan signing her life away:

From here, our group was taken to the area to get weighed (there is a max here) and fitted with our Trek uniforms. No, they were not uniforms – just harnesses that had to fit just right for certain areas of the trek.

Later on there is a great shot of me from the rear where you can see just where this fun contraption goes. It honestly looked a lot more intimidating than it was. Once we were all in our gear, had our water bottles, we were ushered to the lockers. You are not allowed to take anything along on the trek that is not attached to you. Bye-bye phone, DSLR lens cap, and hello safari animal protection. Then, it was time to try the practice bridges.

From here, we were given some juice. You know this was just to test how good our bladders were since there are no restrooms for close to two hours while on the trek. This is where my pre-kid teacher bladder had to kick it back in. There was NO coffee for me this morning.

Once we were all set, the entire group stopped for a photo as we set off on our adventure.

Yes, the real fun was about to begin. We started by walking into the Pangani Forest area where anyone can explore. I was not going to include this photo, since my rear is quite visible. Shannan persuaded me with a reminder: “That harness totally made our asses look HAWT. So here’s the photo of our hawt derrières.

The time in the Pangani Forest area was to explore and check our audio. Yes, we all hate cute little ear pieces in so we could hear these two amazing tour guides that took us on our adventure. A huge thank you to Alex and Bethany for everything. They were so great knowing that a group of Social Media Moms was watching their every move.

At a point in the forest, we went off road to where only guests on the Trek are allowed.

This path was where you had to watch where you walk because the terrain got a little different. We were now in Africa and you never know what you may “bump” into.

Alex stopped to tell us about the fossil that was along the trail. We soon learned that it was from a hippo. As we listened, Bethany was snapping photos. One of the great perks of participating in the African Trek is that you get a Photo Pass CD of your adventure. If you ask, they will snap a photo of anything along the way.

Moments after this, we were hooked up with our harness to observe the hippos. I will save this for another post. Just an FYI, this was one of my favorite parts of the experience and one that I will never forget. Hungry, hungry, hippos really left an impression.

Have you ever been on a special tour at Disney World? If you have I would love to know. If not, which would you like to try.

Disclosure: Although we paid for our own trip to Disney World, we were given an incredible deal thanks to Disney. The sweet conference fee included 3 nights at the Grand Floridian, several meals for the entire family, 7 day park hoppers for everyone, conference/meals for me and some other items to take home. Also note that Disney never asked us to blog about this event. As a long time Disney fan, it is my pleasure to share my experiences from the event.

Categories:
bloggy friends Conference Disney DisneySMMoms interesting me moments photos TechyDad travel

Type-A Whine

Posted on June 23, 2011 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

At this very moment, I am sitting here feeling pretty sorry for myself. Yes, I will admit it – there are tears in my eyes. So far, Wednesday (when typing this) has been a pretty horrible day. I think things were going too well. It just had to crash a bit for a slight reality check.

The rain outside is not helping my mood. Sure the rain can make things beautiful and green, but it can add to the depressed nature of a day.

Of course, the biggest thing on my mind right now is that I want to be on an adventure with some of my Tech Valley Bloggers friends. They are on their way to Asheville, NC. Why Asheville? Well, they are off to Type-A Parent Conference.

I have dreamed about going to Kelby’s amazing event. After Disney Social Media Moms Celebration, we met Kelby and her beautiful family at Hollywood Studios. We chatted for a while until our kids were anxious to keep moving, seeing, and doing things in the park. I told her I planned on getting to Asheville for #TypeACon. Before we split up, we stopped to take a photo.

Ironic that I am wearing my Eeyore shirt. I sit here and feel a big gloomy right now. Of course, the reality is that TypeACon was not meant to be this year. Several items in real life made it impossible to swing. I am a mother and wife, but also a girl that is bummed. The opportunities to learn, network, and then some in Asheville are amazing. To all of my friends – have an amazing time. Learn lots and please share what you can. I know I will be looking forward to CutestKidEver’s live blogging from the event.

So please don’t mind me if I whine just a little the next few days. I will perk up Friday for my 10th Anniversary with TechyDad. Now, I may take another walk in the rain, listening to the pitter patter of the drops instead of watching the Twitter stream all a buzz in the south where many lucky women and men will be taking everything in in Asheville.

Categories:
Conference decisions DisneySMMoms friends looking back me moments photos vent

Facebook The Final Frontier

Posted on April 8, 2011 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

Several years ago, I started working on a Facebook page for my blog. For some reason, I never pushed the publish button. At the time, I was more focused on other ends of the Social Media spectrum. The reality is that not everyone likes Twitter. A lot of people prefer to use Facebook. By not pushing that button and setting up the Facebook page, I was only hurting myself.

While at the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration, one of the guest speakers was Matt Jacobson.

Jacobson is the head of market development for Facebook. While listening to everything that he told us, I knew that I was going to have to go home and finish working on my Facebook page. One of Jacobson’s biggest points that hit home is separating your personal and professional Facebook identities. He showed us an example using Mark Zuckerberg’s two profiles. He also talked about Building your brand on Facebook.

Yes, I knew it was time to get to work on Facebook. There was a need not only to publish a public page for The Angel Forever, but to have my own personal profile for family and friends.

Later in the day, Chris Brogan took the stage.

One of the many items that Chris talked about was using different forms of social media as outposts to get people to your blog or home base. Yes, I was utilizing Twitter in many ways, but Facebook was something that I foolishly ignored for too long. I will be sharing more from DisneySMMoms in the upcoming weeks – there is a lot to process.

While home with a sick kiddo this week, I finally tweaked my Facebook page for this blog. Over on the left, I even put a way to head there if you would like to.

See, I even took time to get a button for the side of my blog like the one above. It is a work in progress, but so is everything else in life.

This week my question to you is:

Do you have a Facebook page for your blog? Any input on whether having one or not having one has made a difference from your experience. If you do have a Facebook page, I would love to know so I can stop by visit and say hello.

If you feel a little bit of love in your heart, I would love for you to like The Angel Forever on Facebook as well. Thanks so much!

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Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.

Aloha #146

Categories:
Aloha Friday Blogging Conference Conference DisneySMMoms looking back me moments photos

Figuring Out The Answers

Posted on April 1, 2011 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

Yesterday, I wrote a post called Are You a Good Enough Mother? At the start, I asked:

Have you ever had one of those moments where you doubt yourself, wonder what is happening, and question whether you are a good enough mother/parent/adult/human?

I explained that I am working on taking the words of Rene Syler, aka the head GEM/Good Enough Mother to task.

Now, thanks to Rene and some Rene-isms (also listed in my post yesterday), I have a lot of things on my mind, planned for my blog, and more importantly ideas for my life. The first is to be able to accept that nobody is perfect and know that being a good enough mother is awesome. Oh and thanks to a comment from Rene, I have another Rene-ism to add:

“You may not have all the answers, but you’re smart enough to figure it out.”

I know this statement from Rene is true, it’s just hard to sit by, be patient, and get those answers figured out – especially when your children are involved.

Today, my Aloha Friday question continues along with my quest to bring you along on my journey as I embrace my inner GEM and work on reinventing myself. The reality is that most of us do reinvent ourselves at least once in our lives. So my question to you:

If you had the chance to reinvent yourself right now, what would you want to do and why?

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Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.