Monday Motivation: The Power of Princessing at the Apple Blossom Festival

Once upon a time I was an Apple Blossom Festival Princess. The year was 2009 and it was my town’s Centennial. I wore the crown, the white dress and the gloves and represented Middleton, NS with pride.

Now let’s Flash-forward 6 years to one of the craziest days of my life, Apple Blossom Festival Saturday 2015 a day that tested my mind, body and my soul a little bit. Jet-legged after a strange night of chips and dancing I set out to help promote an upcoming event at the restaurant that I work at in both of the day’s parades. It was crazy. As you can see, I was a little Frozen as “Elsa” on a very warm Spring day.

For the shorter parade early in the day there were other superheroes and princesses with me in the parade. For the Grande Street Parade I was the lone princess and met with hugs and “Elsa, Elsa” cheers everywhere I went. As crappy as I felt it made my day to light-up so many children’s (and adults) ABF.

With that being said, I was in the costume and made-up from 9am until 5pm and then I returned to Boston Pizza to waitress for the rest of the evening. Unfortunately there was no time to remove the makeup and the hair extensions so I looked a little strange and definitely not like myself until about 10:30pm when I finally returned home.

The next day I was sweating glitter when I hit the gym.

It was totally worth it; all the hugs, the smiles, the long-squats to talk to kids and the jogging to catch-up to my float (I had to constantly play catch-up because so many people wanted to take pictures and hug me).

Why did I do it? I’m not a weirdo. I may be a giant Disney nerd, but threatening I am not. I did it for multiple reasons. Attention is near the bottom of the list. Originally I did it to help out a friend with a marketing/promotional event; I know how hard it can be to get people to do things like this to promote bringing in business so I figured I would do anything to help.

The reason I owned it, even though I felt horrible and would have rather stayed in bed was because as a kid all I wanted was to go to Disney World. Seriously, that was it. My family would go to local festivals but we never had the chance to go on a family vacation, my parents could not afford to lose the time working at their small businesses. As an adult I have experienced both Disneyworld and Disneyland and I know how special it feels to be acknowledged, even for a moment, by your favourite characters. You may get older, but that feeling never does.

I know for a lot of children here in the Annapolis Valley festivals like Apple Blossom and the Annapolis Valley Exhibition are as close as they get to a family vacation or even a family outing. To bring a little bit of Disney magic to them here at home brought me out of my horrible mood and truly inspired me to suck it up and get on with the show. You never know what might come from the light in the eyes of a child or an adult for that matter!

You might think I am being a little silly, but taking part in the Apple Blossom Parade dressed as Elsa brought back a unique feeling that I had only felt once before when I was Princess Middleton 2009. On our Apple Blossom Tour of the Annapolis Valley we visited my first school, Annapolis East Elementary School. We were working our way down the Valley visiting each of the Princesses’ hometowns and I still feel that my stop was the most special. I was a town employee; I coached tennis and worked in the day camps during the summer and while I was in high school I refereed minor hockey and was heavily involved in sports so many of the children knew me or had a connection in some way.

We arrived at the school about 30 minutes after I spilled a glass of chocolate milk over my slim-fitting, easy to manage Princess Gown so my mother had to meet me with a dress we had all started calling “The Monster” because it was huge. Seriously, it was big and heavy and took one or two small children out every event that I went to.

That's me in the middle in "The Monster" back in 2009.

After changing dresses we were ushered into the school like true royalty. I was introduced to the children and I swear they cheered louder than any other group of students during school visits. Sorry to the other Princesses who may be reading this, in Middleton we are a competitive bunch and these things matter to us. Instead of a normal Princess Q&A that other schools did a bunch of my tennis students pumped some tunes in the gym and we danced with all of the children. There were so many children yelling “Katie, Katie” and fighting to dance with me that I thought we were never going to be able to leave the school that day. There were some tears.

Someone even made me a Barbie! 

In those once-in-a-lifetime moments it did not matter to me that I was not the Queen because it sure as hell did not matter to those kids. As I led them in the “Y.M.C.A.” cool went out the window and I made a mark on those children’s day and maybe even a little more.

My experience with the Apple Blossom Festival this year was very similar. I would say about 90% of the children really knew in their hearts that I was not Elsa, but they did not care they were just happy to be acknowledged with a smile, wave, hug or a couple of quick words.

The whole time I had one quote in my head, a little something I have been trying to incorporate in my personal and professional life for quite a while now:

“They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”-Carl W Buechner

So here is my Monday Motivation for you, go make someone feel something that makes you proud to be human.

BTW here is what my day looked like... 

A photo posted by Kate Bruce (@kategbruce) on May 31, 2015 at 10:28am PDT

My First Radio Ad as an Outsider

Over the past few months this blog has shifted from being a place for me to showcase my on-air work in radio and musings from my daily life to a place for me to post my thoughts whenever I can. Many of my previous posts that were work related celebrated work that I had done, a lesson learned as part of my job, cool things that I got to do as part of my awesome job or rants that started as a short 45 second radio break.

I’m going to try to continue posting here about the things that impact my life. I don’t think I’ll be blogging about the jerks at table 61 who did not tip, but I will be blogging about things I learn or find challenging about my new career path in marketing. I’ll continue to post my random workout thoughts, because I believe being health conscious is a very important part of my life and when things are working out (no pun intended) in that area of my life everything else falls into place.

Even though this is no longer a blog that focuses on my life as a “radio personality” today’s blog is featuring a little piece of work that I did for radio for my marketing job. I am the Marketing Coordinator of Valley Credit Union here in the Annapolis Valley and one of my tasks for our RRSP/Investment Season Campaign was to write and voice our radio ad. This took our radio advertising in a new direction that people around the office really seem to enjoy. It challenged me because my wisdom teeth are slowly breaking through my gums and I had not realized that I was having trouble annunciating until I heard my first run through. Yikes, it was bad!

Writing and voicing this ad really forced me to get out of my radio comfort zone and experience advertising from the other side of the table.

I have been thinking a lot about retirement these days (I guess it comes with the job) and I have
decided what I would like to do about 30 years from now. I think I would make a fabulous "Fairy Godmother". I would love to cruise around Disney Parks hanging out with kids, adults and super fans. I think it could quite possibly be the best job to do during retirement.

Are you going to cut loose from the work world when you retire or are you already planning to have a side job? I'm so worried that I will be bored with all the free time that comes with retirement and I have a fear of being old and cold so I think that being "Fairy Godmother" is the perfect fit!

Here is the ad, I hope you like it!

My First Trip To Disney World!

It has been a little over a week since I left the place "where dreams come true" and re-joined the real world. Returning to Nova Scotia in full-fledged fall was a shock to the system, when we left for Florida we had been experiencing unseasonably high temperatures for Canada's Ocean Playground in October. I'm talking a week

long stretch in that had hit 20 degrees every day. I don't think we have had a truly nice day here in the sunny Annapolis Valley since we returned... gross. 

Back to the magic... Our trip to Disney World was amazing! It was my first time visiting Florida and it turns out going at the end of October is the perfect time of year (for me anyways) to go. Everyday was sunny and in the high 20s or low 30s and I don't think I felt a drop of rain after stepping off the plane! 

The entire trip was fabulous; we spent everyday of our seven-day trip exploring the four Disney parks. There really is so much to do we were fully immersed and could have used an extra day. Our longest day was Saturday (the first day we were at the park) we started at the Animal Kingdom when it opened and finished the day off with "Extra Magic Hours" at the Magic Kingdom until about 2am. It was a long day, so we napped after lunch. Taking advantage of the extra hours was key, we felt like we accomplished so much in one day so we did not have to rush as much the rest of the trip. 

So much of the "magic" actually happened before we ever left Nova Scotia. If you are a seasoned Disney Adventurer you may not be a fan of the new "My Disney Experience" app and system for reserving "Fastpasses" and experiences but it was a huge help and a nice guiding hand for our trip. We never waited more than 30 minutes to get on a ride and that only happened once in the Magic Kingdom for the hottest ride at Disney, "The Seven Dwarfs Mine Train". To be fair 30 minutes is a very short wait to get on this red-hot ride; we experienced it at about 1am during the "Extra Magic Hours". The only unfortunate thing about the new "My Disney Experience" app and planning website is that things can be fully booked up (like the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train) before you start planning your trip! This happened to us so we knew that it was do-or-die to get on the ride and we took our one shot when we could in the middle of the night. It turned out that as I was trolling the system the night before our last day of vacation someone else cancelled Fastpasses for the ride so we snagged them and got to ride New Fantasyland's crown jewel a second time. 

Speaking of New Fantasyland lets take a second and talk about the addition to the Magic Kingdom that is bringing the crowds back to Disney World to re-experience the magic. I am so happy that my first visit to Disney World was after the New Fantasyland expansion. We truly experienced New Fantasyland from hanging out in Gaston's Tavern to telling Belle a story as part of "Enchanted Tales With Belle" we did it all! I strongly recommend booking meal Fastpasses and pre-ordering food at "Be Our Guest". We only did quick-service dining in the Magic Kingdom and our meal in the Beast's castle was by far the best quick-service meal we had! (You can check out the Fastpass system for "Be Our Guest" here) 

Well now that the magical part of the trip has been discussed lets travel back to the adult world. As a twenty-five year old woman I would have to select the World Showcase as my favourite part of the trip. We were lucky enough to experience the Epcot International Food & Wine Festival while we visited, making the World Showcase even more interesting. With the added booths it truly made it feel like you were walking around the World. We had the majority of our table service meals at Epcot's World Showcase; it was like dining in a new country every night! For a look at some of the restaurants we visited you can check out my profile on Trip Advisor. 

We also enjoyed The Animal Kingdom and Disney's Hollywood Studios. We felt as though The Animal Kingdom was a true half-day park for us but we also felt that it was home to the best roller coaster of any of the parks, Expedition Everest. Yes, we liked it more than the Mine Train! Hollywood Studios also had rides that we loved, but overall had an empty feeling... like there was a lot of space ready to be transformed. The "Rock 'n' Roller Coaster" and "Tower of Terror" were rides that we absolutely loved and had us coming back to Hollywood Studios day after day. We also had one of the BEST meals of our trip at Hollywood Studios at "Hollywood & Vine". Yes, this was a little questionable as the restaurant is the host of the Disney Junior character dining experience and we really did not care to see any of the characters because we are adults without children, but the menu looked amazing! The food selection did not disappoint. Though the kids rain around willy-nilly chasing the characters and mowing down chicken nuggets, I totally recommend this restaurant (and the lobster mac & cheese) to everyone! 

"Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party" was another highlight of the trip, getting to dress-up and run around the Magic Kingdom trick-or-treating made me feel like a giant child! World Showcase may have been my favourite adult part of the trip, but my inner-child loved the Magic Kingdom! We brought a massive haul of candy back to our hotel room and still had a full bag leftover when we arrived home. The photo opportunities were really neat with rarely seen Disney characters and the atmosphere in the park was spooky... It was busier than I expected on a Tuesday night with ten days to go before Halloween, next time I would try to go in late September to beat the crowds. 

Overall we had an awesome time at Disney World. It was the first time in a long time that I have skipped the gym and discarded my healthy eating habits. I was feeling a little sluggish towards the end of the trip after being fuelled by sugar and sweets for an entire week, but that is part of vacation, right? On a side note, everyday we took on average about 30,000 steps! Tracked with the brilliant "Breeze" app it was fun to keep track just how much we were walking and then figure out the distances. 

We celebrated #Halloween last night at the #MagicKingdom. Adult trick or treating, parades, fireworks and very short ride lines. It was so much fun! #disneyworld

A photo posted by Kate Bruce (@kategbruce) on Oct 10, 2014 at 6:33am PDT

Calgary Hosts Canada's Only Lego Kidsfest 2014

Over the weekend I got to take part in an amazing event in Calgary. It was Canada’s first Lego Kidsfest at the BMO Centre. On the one and only stop in Canada (ever), the Lego Kidsfest sold-out every session over the weekend of brick-filled fun.

The model museum is one of the highlights of the stop on Lego Kidsfest. It is an incredible display of what Lego can build. Darth Vader, Batman, Lightning McQueen, Gandalf, R2DC, C3P0 and Boba Fett are just a few of the full-size models on display in this part of the festival. Throughout the over three acres of Lego related fun there are many full-size models.

As you can see, I managed to find Lego Cinderella in the Disney Princess display.

I spent my days hanging out in the Brick Battle Zone with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I think this is the most fun of all the Lego zones. The Brick Battle Zone is an area where kids take part in Lego related activities for prizes. Lego pizza relay races, Duplo bridge building contests and tower races were my jam for the weekend. It was a lot of fun, but Lego sure is hard on the hands. If you are taking in Lego Kidsfest on one of its tour stops make sure you keep an eye on this section of the festival so that your kids get to take part and take home some great prizes.

Other really cool parts of the festivals are the Lego Super Heros and Lego Disney Princesses areas; both of these zones have free photo booths!

Creation Nation is an interactive section of the festival where kids build inside a template of the Canadian flag to make a pretty cool version of Canada in Lego inside the flag.

Another thing you need to check out while at Lego Master Builder Academy. Sign up as soon as you arrive to insure you get a session with a Lego Master Builder. These sessions run about 40 minutes and teach you skills that the people who create the most impressive Lego works have developed. On top of learning the art of crafting the most magnificent Lego works you can enter a raffle for Lego MBA prizes. There are limited spots in this zone so make sure you get in on it quickly!

If you have not watched the Lego Movie yet I strongly recommend it, even if you are not a huge Lego fan. I watched it with a bunch of twenty-something guys stone sober and absolutely loved it. It is hilarious and features some of the funniest actors in Hollywood right now. My favourties Chris Pratt and Will Ferrell start in the movie along with the amazing Elizabeth Banks and Alison Brie. Also, Liam Neeson and Will Arnett are hilarious as Good Cop/Bad Cop and Batman/Bruce Wayne. The star-studded cast really delivers for adults and kids, see this movie now!

Another cool thing about the Lego Movie and the Calgary connection is that Canadian songstresses Tegan & Sara sing the theme song for the Lego Movie, “Everything Is Awesome” with the Lonely Island. I don’t think I have ever heard the word awesome used more over the span of a weekend than at Lego Kidsfest. It was a very appropriate descriptor for the weekend.

On the left is the HUGE pile of free play Lego for kids to go wild in. Seriously, kids went CRAZY over this massive pile of bricks. It was like a day at a multi-color bricks. I saw kids building and burying themselves in this huge mound of Lego. It is crazy to see how much kids love and respect the patterns and models, but still want the freedom of free play.

Get your tickets early if Lego Kidsfest is coming to your area, it is well worth your time!

Throwback: Disney & McDonald’s Hercules Plates

Back in 1997, little Kate was a HUGE Disney nut. Yes, I was obsessed. I thought any other animated films

were inferior to any Disney movie (rightly so), there were few that could compare (Swan Princess, Thumbelina). Hercules was one of the big ones I can remember being released to crazy fanfare, I loved it. I saw it multiple times in theatres and was SO excited for its release date.

My family had at least one fast-food meal a week. Usually Saturday afternoons, I remember how excited we would be to go to McDonald’s (most weeks) when the toys were good. To us, the Hercules toys were the BOMB. I know it sounds so lame now, but as a kid in the 90s the Zeus football was hot stuff. The plates were extra and super cool, because they were extra on top of the happy meal and a SUPER treat. My sister and I totally fought over the Megara plate… screw The Muses, right?

Well our plates are long gone after long time use in the microwaves for snack and not so serious meals. In case you are wondering, each plate will run you about $5 on EBay (on the cheap) but more likely $9. Or, you can pick up the whole set of six plates in mint condition for about $50. There are some more pricey sellers looking for hundreds of dollars, clearly these people live in a bubble of lunacy. I forget how much they cost back in 1997, but I have a feeling they ran about $2.99 with a meal purchase. Let me know if you can remember how much they were, I was just a wee filly back then.

I loved these plates, they were colorful and durable… until you put them in the microwave. I do maintain they are the best nacho plates ever. 

October 29: National Cat Day

I am a dog person.

I realized this in Grade 2 when my family moved to our very own farm and we were given our very own catfrom my Grandparents farm. His name was Leo; he may have been a she. I fought tooth and nail to have a cat, a very specific cat that was my Grandparent’s barn cat that was named Pumpkin. Pumpkin may have been feral, so my parents opted to adopt one of Pumpkin’s golden kittens (less feral) and named it Leo.

Creative names for cats would come later for the Bruce family. Willard, Fletcher, Jimmer, Vesuvius/Olympia, Ugly, Sylvester and Gimp are just some of the names given to the many cats that have lived at Annandale Farm over the years.

So, even though I am a dog person I thought I would pay tribute to my favourite cats on this National Cat Day.

Here they are:

The Queen of sass.

Truthful cat.

Broadway cats.

The Disney cats, even when they are bad they're good.

The World War Z cat.

How could I leave Puss out?

Avenger cats.... the most majestic.

Salem, the lovable pest. 

And everyone's fave, Nic Cage cat.