Snow is Just Around the Corner!

Both literally and figuratively!

Max & I spent a lovely hour and a half curled up watching Snow White and the Seven Dwarves the other day. I was so warm and cozy it was hard to resist falling asleep- did you know they have a solid 3 sleep scenes in that movie? Snow White is sure prone to a nap- I don't recall Sleeping Beauty induldging in multiple lie downs a day! Of course, if you don't get up for 100 years, I suppose you've had your beauty sleep!

In any case, we're brainstorming as to what our Date shall be-- trying to find something suitable, feasable, and not too expensive! Easier said than done. Any ideas, anyone?

In the meantime, here's a little Disney related treasure for you all to check out!

10 awesome Disney songs which didn't make it into their movies!

Hope you enjoy it as much as I did!!

See you soon,
Sarah

Disney Date: Alice In Wonderland

A Madcap Adventure

Alice in Wonderland is the first date from our Disney Legends list. We chose it because the activities we thought of for it were pretty simple, and it's been so long since I saw the original Alice movie I was very excited to see it again!

Our Alice date consisted of a seriously hefty dose of Alice. In sum: Alice in Wonderland the play; (A children's musical, but with some adult humour here and there!) Alice in Wonderland the movie (Disney Cartoon); then a brief break and onto Alice, Tim Burton style.

Safe to say, a lot of Alice.

Our day started with the play, which was done by Shakespeare by the Sea, a wonderful establishment in Halifax which performs plays ourdoors in Point Pleasant Park over the summer. Their focus is Shakespeare (their version of the Merry Wives of Windsor was hilarious!), but as you can see, they do other things as well!


The Red Queen & Alice (photo from the Chronicle Herald)

Since it was 1 pm on a Sunday, of course lots of families came out to see the play. Their engagement and interaction was wonderful-- the Red Queen even ended up in a bit of a dialogue with one of the kids, headed in to act two, which was just as funny as any of the written humour.

The play was well done, creative, and entertaining. As always, Shakespeare by the Sea was a joy to watch. I wasn't enchanted by the musical numbers as much as I was by the animated Alice, however, which was a bit sad for me- I love to sing along!

Still, it was a great date, and we brought along a blanket and some snacks and lemonade for sitting out in the park. An hour walk there and an hour back to the house later, it was all well worth it (and the lemonade was gone!)

Part two of our Date was the food section. This was kind of twofold: we made some tea size snacks for ourselves, but since we're mid move to Ottawa my tea and tea pots are packed, so we also went out and had ourselves a teaparty, inspired by the Mad Hatter, March Hare and Doormouse's wonderful (if haphazard) spread.

The tea party turned out wonderfully. We got our tea on at The Sweet Hereafter, a cheesecakery that's only about 10 minutes from our house along Oxford Street.

Exterior of Sweet Hereafter & the owners pictured

The Sweet Hereafter stands out with its cool painted exterior, but the inside is where it really shines. Aside from being filled with a bajillion different flavours of cheesecakes and cupcakes, its a very cool interior decor that was well suited to our Alice vibe!

Our seats & tea spread!

We got a pot of vanilla bean tea, which was delicious; and two cupcakes, which were equally amazing and went sooo well with the tea. Plus I was hyped because come on, cupcakes. One was even free because we were accidentally served the wrong one. So he let us keep it! <3!

Our home cooked snacks were alas, not as glamorous. But we tried! And they tasted juuuuuust fine! We made vlaai, a dutch dish that I'm still confused about (Max said that this one, while tasty, was a poor example of vlaai), and mini cheesecakes. Drool. The recepies are here (cheesecake) and here (vlaai), except that I used a homemade graham cracker crust on the cheesecakes. 

After our meal, it was Alica Marathon time. We snuggled on the couch and watched the animated Alice... and I have to say, I didn't enjoy it nearly so much as I remember. It was much stranger than I recalled and it alarms me to say that as an adult (arguably, anyways) I didnt find it as enchanting anymore. Also, the bit about the walrus eating the oysters-- well, that's always creeped me the heck out! And I honestly didn't remember it all ending with Alice waking up (and deciding that she does like things that make some sense, after all). It was good to watch, it's been such a long time- But I think after having seen Burton's update so recently, I expected more of a plot than I got. Sad! And overall, even though I didn't enjoy all of the nonsense (though a lot of it I did- ahh, the flowers singing! The bit where Alice accidentally wrecks the white rabbit's home! And visually, I do find it stunning) I'm not sure that I like that the takeaway message seems to be that one should pay attention to thy history lessons and squash that pesky imagination.

I do, however, like the takeaway from the updated Alice. I love that adult Alice gains such confidence from facing and triumphing in Underland. And for me, it was a treat to have real characters in the Mad Hatter, Queens, doormouse and other additions. And again, visually- unf! What a fun film to watch just for all those colours and spectacular design! I think Tim Burton was a fine match for an older Alice, indeed.

Overall, our Alice week was a fun mess of festivities, and how I love tea parties! Probably my only regret is that nobody did the futterwacken!

Till next time,

Sarah & Max

 

Disney Date: Aladdin

Disney Date #1: Aladdin

Ah, Aladdin!

Exotic, funny, charming, adventurous, prince and the pauper type fun. I’ve always loved Aladdin, in large part because he was the first ‘prince’ to be an underdog and was ever so much more developed (and ever so much more fun to watch) because of it. Plus, no one can convince me Robin Williams wasn’t a genius as the Genie!

Our ideal date for Aladdin would probably be to ride a magic carpet around the world—heck, we’d settle for camels! But, as both are in short supply here in Halifax, we had to decide on something more realistic. Luckily, Halifax isn’t lacking in much other than camels and magic flying carpets.

We decided to pay homage to our Arabian friends with a date to our local Black Market.

Sounds perfect, right? Where better to emulate a street rat? But don’t worry; the Halifax Black Market is a (perfectly legal) hot spot for foreign goods, perpetually crammed with shoppers looking for a piece of the exotic at home. You know the type- smells perpetually of incense and is comprised mostly of goods from India or Thailand (suitably marked up to compensate for the local access). But the smells, the music, the colours and fabric and beads and dangles and general madness do comprise to create a mini cave of wonders: exactly the feel we were going for. The best adventures always start at a cave of wonders! Luckily, we didn’t have to traverse a desert or get swallowed by a dubious sand cat to get in; just elbow past some locals on a lunch break.

To get in the spirit, we tried on some (uber comfy!) Aladdin pants. Sadly, the comfyness was matched by the price, and so my dreams of princely pants have been put on hold for another day.

Look guys! This is my attempt at Jasmine hair haha. It works a lot better with thick black Disney Princess hair, I guess!

We did, however, walk out with these litte treasures: Earrings that Max bought for me :) Which I love!

Our adventure continued with food. We weren't sure what to eat for our Aladdin theme, because food doesn't play a huge part in the movie, but we did manage to come up with a few ideas! Since the intro song is Arabian Nights, we decided to work from Arabian; and since Saudi Arabia covers the majority of the Arabian Peninsula, we thought Saudi food would be a good place to start.

Then we faced the dilemma of deciding to cook for ourselves, or trusting the experts. So, our first stop was to the Halifax Farmer’s Market (which I adore) to hunt up spices and chefs.

There we found part one of our meal: The delicious mango lassi, a thick, yogurt based smoothie type drink which is popular all over the Arabian peninsula. But the market had little else to reveal in the way of treasures, so we headed out again and this time landed at Mary’s Place II, a delightful and affordable cafe in Halifax which specializes in Middle Eastern food. There we dug up another classic: falafel. While this was only the second time I’d had lassi, I’ve eaten falafel a few more times, but it holds a special place in my heart because I’d never eaten it before dating Max (who, once I mentioned I’d never eaten falafel but wanted to try, promptly took me out for falafel. <3) So it was a wonderful addendum to the date meal, in my opinion!

Our meal requirements were at that point mostly covered, in my mind, but it felt like cheating not to make something ourselves. So with one last inspiration in mind we headed home.

Remember the loaf of bread Aladdin steals, setting off the “One Step Ahead” musical scene? Well, we figured, a loaf of bread is something we can work with! With that in mind, we added cheese (Max’s Dutch roots flexing themselves! Haha), but to keep it extra Arabian we used cheese flavoured with cardamom. It made for an interesting flavoured grilled cheese sandwich, but hey! Exotic Aladdin Meal complete!

Lassi, Falafel and Grilled Cheese!

Date and Meal complete, we were ready to snuggle in and enjoy our movie! Unfourtunately, disaster struck and I realised I’d lost one of the lovely earrings (Already! I know, I was impressed too L). I guess we should have spent more time looking for a magic lamp!

Until next time!

Sarah& Max

The little heart on the left is painted rocks pressed into the cement outside the black market. Adorable :)