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    Tuesday, July 14, 2009

    Videos from England Tour 2008

    Ok, I *finally* got around to uploading some of my videos from when I was on vacation in England in May 2008 to YouTube.
    :)

    Two are uploaded so far - and I've got a couple more I'll upload later.
    Enjoy!

    -- Evensong at York Minister
    or click here: http://bit.ly/fptG8

    -- Bells of York Minister
    or click here: http://bit.ly/14dWix


    Both of these were taken on 5/22/08 in York UK.

    Friday, July 10, 2009

    And now for something completely different...in hair color :)

    Some of you may not be aware, but I've been thinking (planning) about dying my hair reddish for the month of July for a while now....especially once I decided to do a Molly Weasley outfit for a group trip (in costume) to see the Harry Potter movie.

    And since I wanted it to turn out nice (and look fairly natural), I decided to spend the money and have a professional do my hair instead of attempting it on my own. And let me just say, I am SO glad I did. (I love my hairstylist, btw - she's awesome! I would recommend her to anyone. She's the only one I go to when I get my hair cut or trimmed.)


    So, anyways....today I had my hair appointment at 4:30pm. I arrived WAY early (I know, me! You can pick yourself up off the floor now ;), and crocheted and chatted while I waited for my appointment. I also took a few "before" pics to use as a reference for comparison with my 'after' pics.
    =)


    Before Pics



    After looking at my reference pics of Molly Weasley, Sherri set to work and started mixing dyes.
    First, she mixed up something that stripped color from my hair WITHOUT bleaching it. (And it actually worked. Nifty, huh?)

    Here's a shot of me sitting with the 1st round of stuff.
    (She applied it in streaks, to do a sort of highlight effect. This helped her see how my hair would react to the dye...plus it would help give some lighter highlights later on to make it look more natural :)





    After washing out that step, and drying my hair, a new batch of color (tint) was mixed up and applied ALL over my hair...and really worked in.


    Here's two pics with the 2nd stage tint worked into my hair...and me crocheting while I wait for it to do its magic.





    And here's afew pics from the final result!
    (And from while she was curling/styling my hair - after she trimmed it, of course :)


    Of course, by the time we're taking these last shots, its pretty dark in this hair salon (still sunny outside...but bad lighting inside). In the sunlight the blondish parts really show up...and the whole think looks natural with the multi-shades/hues.

    All in all, I'm completely happy with my new hair-color. :) It's certainly different...and fun.

    Can't wait to get some pics of me in the sunlight, to see how it looks in natural light. :)

    Wednesday, July 08, 2009

    Adventures in Ticket Purchasing (Harry Potter Group Movie Outing)

    Yesterday afternoon tickets for non-Midnight showings of Harry Potter at Cinema Fusion Anaheim went on sale. Yes! (Finally!!)

    Besides the fact that Cinema Fusion Anaheim is a pretty nice movie theater, in a nice outdoor shopping center (Garden Walk of Anaheim, near Disneyland), it also happens to have a 21+ Screening Room! Yes, that's right - one of their theater rooms is reserved for patrons who are at least 21 years old. (And yes, they do have a bar, so you can have beer or wine with your movie, if you prefer :)

    The main selling point for my group with regards to this location for our group movie outing is the fact that while we all like the Harry Potter movies, and most of us going are costumers (or know someone who costumes) and will use any reasonable excuse to dress up ;-), we all REALLY like the idea of seeing the next Harry Potter movie without a gaggle of noisy kids in the audience!

    As I'm the designated person to check show times and buy a block of tickets for our group :), I've been checking the website seems like daily for a while now, but no luck....until yesterday afternoon/evening. (I was in contact via email with someone at the theater, and had been told to definitely start checking on late Monday afternoon, 7/7...but unfortunately nothing was posted on Monday ). So, yesterday when I got home from work, I checked the theater website and saw that times were now posted for non-midnight showings! Yes! I immediately looked to see if there's *an around 8pm* showing for Friday 7/17. (Our ideal time since we have people driving down from Los Angeles to join us in the OC). However, the only 8:00pm showing was in the regular (general/family) theater and not the 21+ theater. Our choices were either 7:15pm or 10:15pm...so I quickly decided upon the 7:15pm and attempted to buy the block of tickets.

    Problem! Oh no! Website would only allow a max of 6 tickets to be purchased at a time. I could theoretically purchase 6, and then go through the steps again...twice... to make sure I buy enough tickets for our group of 13. But that's just plain annoying. Group ticket discount doesn't start until you have a min. of 25 people, but you can't purchase more than 6 online? What's with that? (Plus, who knows if the credit card company will find multiple purchases from the same place w/in a matter of minutes a tad suspicious? Don't really want to find out).

    So, by this time, I'm a tad frustrated cause I can't find a number to call the theater directly and talk to a 'live' person. And I decide I'll just DRIVE over to the box office and buy the tickets directly. They should be able to sell me enough ticktes in one purchase. So I did.
    =)

    I quickly sent out an email to the group to let them know of the change in estimated time (to an actual time), and that I was driving over to purchase the tickets. And then while I was driving I started placing phone calls to make sure people got the message. (Didn't want to get tickets for someone if they couldn't make the 7:15pm show after all!) Fortunately, no one had a problem with the slightly earlier time for the show. (Later would have been easier for people traveling, obviously, but that wasn't the hand that we were dealt).

    Instead of heading directly to the theater, though, I took a detour and headed over to the Hensley's place, since they're fairly near my destination. After chatting for a few minutes (and they finished their dinner), Charlie, Rowan, & I went over to buy tickets (while Maegen and Rhiannon stayed home...Rhiannon decided to skip joining us cause she was dressed in her pretty blue princess dress and wanted to watch Cinderella while mom sewed ;-).

    At the Garden Walk, we made our way over to the theater, and I went inside to purchase 13 tickets while Charlie walked around (pushing Rowan in his stroller).

    Success!! I was able to purchase 13 tickets for Friday, July 17th at 7:15pm.
    And I let them know we were coming in costume!
    The guy working the register asked me what I/we were coming as, so I rattled off a few of the names of characters (outfits) we had signed up. He then turned to his co-worker (or manager, not sure), and said something to the effect of 'make sure I'm working that night' :).
    LOL!

    I made sure to get the parking structure ticket validated at the Theater, then went to find Charlie & Rowan. I eventually met up with them, and we made our way to the car...only to discover at the car that the now-validated parking structure ticket was MISSING! Ack!!! Frantic searching was to no avail. I went through my entire purse and wallet (a few times)...even had Charlie look. Nothing. I retraced my steps, went back to the theater and inquired if I had somehow left it or dropped it as I left...still nothing.

    Dissapointed, I continued to retrace my steps and even asked a janitor if he saw a parking structure ticket on the ground. (His English wasn't that great, so I'm not sure if he really understood my question. Oh well).

    I met up with Charlie on a different level of the parking structure, where he had stopped after driving around with Rowan (who had started fussing while just sitting in the carseat in an unmoving car). We watched the end of the Disneyland fireworks (well, I semi-watched...I was still going through my purse and wallet...again) while Rowan had a bottle.

    When the fireworks ended, we gave up on finding the ticket and made our way to the exit where we spilled our sob story about losing the ticket and only coming in to purchase tickets (which I showed). This guy wouldn't budge - no ticket = pay max parking fee ($12!!). Bummer!

    Though dissapointing to have to pay the parking fee, at LEAST we did manage to score enough Harry Potter tickets for the day and time we wanted. :) Yay!!!

    (And yes, I double checked that I had all 13 as we left the parking structure :)

    So that's my adventure in buying tickets for the new Harry Potter movie!


    AND if anyone else would like to join us, feel free to come along. (You just need to get your own tickets). The more the merrier!!
    :)


    DATE: Friday, July 17, 2009
    Movie Showtime: 7:15pm
    Theater: Cinema Fusion Anaheim (21+ Screening Room)
    http://www.cinemafusionanaheim.com/
    >Located at the Anaheim Garden Walk (on the corner of Disney Way and Clementine, on the 3rd floor)
    >Address: 321 W. Katella Ave, Anaheim, CA 92802
    >Parking: there's a parking structure off Disney Way or Katella Ave, but the closest access to the theater is from the 4th floor of the structure off of Disney Way. (4 hours FREE parking with validation from the theater).


    Current "Cast of Characters" attending:

    Molly Weasley (me!)
    Ginny Weasley
    Hermione Granger
    Luna Lovegood
    Professor Sybill Trelawney
    Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody
    Draco Malfoy
    Rita Skeeter
    Fleur Delacour (in her blue Beauxbatons traveling outfit)
    Nymphadora Tonks
    and the rest are probably misc. students from Hogwarts.


    So, if anyone else would like to join the group movie outing, here's a simple, easy costume: a generic student (from any of the houses)! We could always use a few more "Hogwarts Students" in our group. =)

    Generic Hogwart's Student Outfit: Black skirt or pants, white button up shirt, black or grey sweater, tie, and black shoes (and in the case of girls, some Mary-Jane's for shoes). Easy!