Disneyland turns 55

The Happiest Place on Earth will be of age to be considered a Senior Citizen this Saturday, July 17!

To celebrate, Disneyland will be distributing these special retro park maps all week long. And on the 17th, the park will be doing special things throughout the day.

At noon, a dedication ceremony will take place in Town Square, and at 4:15 p.m. cast members will sing Happy Birthday.

From 9-11 a.m. the Disney Gallery (now located on Main Street) will hold a signing for their 55th anniversary merchandise with artists Kevin Kidney, Jody Daily, and Noah.

The merchandise was inspired by original items found throughout the park when it first opened, such as the popcorn boxes and cups. Kevin Kidney and Jody Daily re-created said items out of ceramic. There's also a nice little tea cup set designed after the Mad Hatter's Tea Party attraction.






[all photos courtesy of Disney Park Blog & Kevin Kidney]

Where's Simba?

I did a bit more snooping about the It's a Small World renovations and came across this video that includes all the Disney characters inside the ride. I'm still not cool with it, but I suppose Disney had a slight clue as to what they were doing.

Like I said in the last post, people either really love or really hate this ride. By adding characters from Disney films, it creates a Where's Waldo kind of experience --  like how many characters can you find? It might even have people wanting to go back on the ride to see if they missed anything. 

Can you stand to watch the video and see who you can find?

[video courtesy of ThemeParkInsider.com]

If ya can't hack the 10 minutes and 50 seconds of saccharine goodness, you can take a look here.

PS: I managed to get through it (I like this ride though) and noticed that no other Disney songs were woven into the ride like I had originally heard. ::phew:: 

It's a Small World gets a (unneeded) facelift

When it comes to Disneyland's It's a Small World attraction, there are no inbetweens . . . you either love it or you hate it. I am not the latter. Sure the song is repetitive, but everything about the attraction is so "feel good." Plus you can never go wrong with anything Mary Blair has input in -- she designed the ride and has done concept art for many Disney films and shorts such as "Alice in Wonderland," "Peter Pan," and "Cinderella" to name a few.

Next Saturday, Feb. 28, Disneyland will be celebrating the re-opening of It's a Small World, which has been renovated to include characters and music from other Disney films like "Aladdin," "Mulan," and "The Little Mermaid." I am sooo not okay with the latest additions. The ride was fine the way it was, but I digress. 

Artist Dave Avanzino and Small World costume designer Alice Davis will be at the Disneyena shop on Main Street USA inside of Disneyland from 10 a.m. - 12 noon for a special signing of the new product releases that coincide with the re-opening.

Here's a peek at some of the items . . .

Mixed media paper structure by Dave Avanzino, edition of 10 ($800)

India costume based on sketches by Alice Davis ($4,800)

painting by Jimmy Pickering, edition of 50 ($475) or deluxe print ($35)

And of course there's also pins. 

[All photos courtesy of Disney]

Each one is an edition of 1000 and features how the latest additions will be featured in the ride. 

They're cute, but it's just not the same!!! ::sigh::