Wine & Dine Half Marathon Costume Reveal

Happy Halloween! What better way to celebrate than with a little runDisney costume reveal?

The ideas for my Wine & Dine Half Marathon costume have been absolutely all over the place. Since I'm traveling with a group of friends for this trip, our original plan was to run as different characters from Toy Story. Well, that idea got scrapped a while back and after a lot of deliberation in my own head, I finally decided what I wanted to do.

This costume has been sitting in my closet for a while...actually, a long while. You see, about 6 years ago, Jason and I were invited to a Disney themed 16 year old's birthday party with the catch that everyone who came had to dress in costume. So, Jason and I did just that...and our outfits were a huge hit!

I'm still not quite sure how I convinced him to dress up as a Wildcat from High School Musical, but he agreed!

So, with the reboot of an all new High School Musical on the upcoming brand new Disney+, I thought it was due time to pull that old costume out of the closet and finally wear it to a runDisney event. I'm not sure why I didn't think of this before!

Although this costume took a little bit of tweaking from its previous state, and I look a hot mess because I currently have pink eye (seriously), here it is!

As you can see, the inspiration for this one came from the cheerleaders in the middle of this shot.

I used all runner-friendly material for this costume:

• Shirt: BCG Brand from Academy
• Skirt: SparkleSkirts.com
• Jacket: Adidas from Academy
• Headband: Red Sparkle Sweaty Bands
• Earrings: Red Paw Logo from Amazon

The EHS letters were cut from the Silhouette machine on red heat press vinyl and the red/white stripes are pieces of ribbon that were heat pressed onto the shirt. The wildcat logo was printed onto a heat press sheet, pressed onto an old piece of white t-shirt material, then hand stitched onto the jacket (so it's not permanent).

This should be a fun (and hopefully less rainy) Wine & Dine Half from the last one I ran (can anyone say splash & dash?). If you see me out there, don't hesitate to say hello!!

If you're running this weekend, I wish you the best of luck! Happy running!!

Princess Half Marathon Costume Reveal

I've been going back and forth in my mind for what seems like forever over my Princess half marathon costume ideas. Sad to say, sometimes the creative side of my brain doesn't quite kick in and fully function all of the way until the last minute has approached.

This past weekend, all of the pieces and parts finally came together to make my princess half marathon costume and I seriously love it! To me, it's practically perfect in every way! (Ok, I had to!)

The first place I always look to for costume ideas is Pinterest. Seriously, there's a world of inspiration out there on Pinterest, so if you're in a creative slump and don't have any ideas, check out Pinterest!

If you saw my "sneak peak" on instagram and guessed that Mary Poppins was the theme, you were (and are) correct!

In my initial brainstorming on this costume idea, I knew I somehow wanted to include the bird umbrella. (Y'all know me and my props!) Well, I knew I didn't want to run the half carrying a real umbrella (and I'm pretty sure that's not even allowed?). I couldn't think of anything to make a "fake" umbrella out of, either. It was during a run one evening when the inspiration hit me - what if I made the end of my GoPro the bird? Then my GoPro could act as the "umbrella"?! Genius.

While gathering supplies to create  this costume, I was so excited to see that I had most of them on hand, too! Score!

Mary Poppins Costume Supplies:

• Black top hat (ordered from Amazon) and affixed to a black headband I already owned
• Flowers (I had these white flowers already on hand - Mary's hat actually has daisies on it!)
• Red berries for the hat (I made these out of pipe cleaners and red ribbon!)
• White shirt (purchased from WalMart)
•  Black Running Skirt (already owned) from runningskirts.com
• Red bow for shirt (purchased for $1 pre-made at Walmart!)
• Red ribbon for "belt" around the bottom of the shirt
• Felt and ribbon to make the bird (also already owned!)
• Black compression sleeves from Legend Compression (already owned)

Putting this costume together literally took an entire Sunday because I also had to figure out how to hem a shirt on my own. I knew I waited until the VERY last minute and didn't want to put that on my mom, so I asked for her advice and I'm pretty pleased with the outcome!

Here's a closeup of the top hat. It did not come with the headband so I glued that one on myself. However, it did come with feathers and a bow that were already hot glued on, so my OCD self had to cover those glue marks with flowers!

Lastly, here's a closeup of the Mary Poppins bird. He is made entirely of felt (except the red ribbon). I used the outline of a bird I found online, cut out the outline with my silhouette machine on cardstock, then eyeballed and hand trimmed all of the rest of the pieces with scissors.

I also used hot glue to put it all together. He feels pretty secure, so here's hoping he stays on the bottom of the GoPro for 13.1 miles! We shall see what happens, I guess!

If you see me out there, please say hello! I'd love to meet you! :)

Happy running, Princesses! I hope all of your race dreams come true!

Vintage Minnie & Dopey Challenge Costumes

Happy New Year! 

This weekend was full of fun things, especially those related to our upcoming Walt Disney World trip for Marathon Weekend! Our bags are mostly packed and we are ready!

We will be spending our week at Port Orleans Riverside with plans for visiting all four theme parks over the course of seven days. Jason's even taking a Disney fishing excursion with a friend of ours where they will have the opportunity to fish in World Showcase Lagoon before EPCOT opens for the morning! He is SO excited!

As far as other plans go, we will be at the Expo on Wednesday afternoon and Brayden will be participating in his first 100m dash on Friday morning! 

For the races, I'll be sporting several different outfits, most of which I've already worn...whoops. The full marathon is a different story, though! A friend of mine wanted to run the full dressed as Steamboat Willie Mickey and that's where the idea for Vintage Minnie came into play!

Putting this outfit together was SUPER easy as it didn't require any extra work on my part. With running the full marathon, I wanted everything to be functional and easy to run in.

For the costume itself, I put together the following pieces:

• Solid black dry fit BCG brand shirt from Academy
• Sparkle Skirts sparkle light vintage blue skirt
• Legend Compression sleeves in black
• Vintage Minnie ears from Etsy (my running buddy purchased her Steamboat Willie ears from the same vendor so we will match!) 

I used this picture as my inspiration....

...and voila! 

Easiest costume ever!

For the 5K, 10K, and Half, I decided to bring back a few oldies to wear again. We had so much fun running as Anna & Elsa several years back for the Enchanted 10K, so that was a no brainer. Lilo definitely needed a redemption race since most of that one was spent under a poncho in pouring down rain (the Wine & Dine Half of 2014 aka the "Splash & Dash"). We couldn't decide what to run as for the 5K and as a last minute (literally) idea, we threw in Mousketeers to the mix (from the Disneyland Half of 2013).

Mousketeer - 5K

Anna & Elsa - 10K

Lilo - Half Marathon

So, if you happen to see me out there, please don't hesitate to say hello!

If you're running this weekend, have a GREAT time and enjoy every moment! If it's your first runDisney race, I hope you have a blast!!

2017 Tinker Bell 10K

Up until this point, the Disneyland 10K course was one of my favorite runDisney races. I loved the route and time spent in the parks, the characters, and the atmosphere! After the Tinker Bell Half Marathon Weekend though, the Tinker Bell 10K has now taken over as my favorite runDisney 10K!

Flat Pirate...uhh Karen ready for a grand adventure!

My friend Melissa and I were both on central/east coast time, so we loved the laid back, later wake-up call, easy to access Disneyland races. When I told Melissa that we didn't have to wake up until 4 a.m. for this race weekend, she was so excited! 

Getting to the corrals wasn't a difficult process (not like others I read about later)!We left the Disneyland Hotel around 4:45 a.m., passed through security, and were in our corrals shortly after.

Oh yes, and about Melissa's toy knife - we checked with security to make sure it was acceptable before bringing it into the race. According to the rules, as long as it looked like a toy, it was ok...and security agreed, so we were good to go!

We passed the time by taking a few goofy pictures! :)

It was so much fun running a Tinker Bell themed race dressed as Captain Hook and Peter Pan!

Before long, we were off and running!

This race course looped us around and behind Disneyland, then into the parks.

We saw several lost boys that were available for "selfies" (much like the previous day's 5K), which left me wondering if characters would be on this course at all. I'll admit, it left me highly annoyed.

Mile 2 hit and there was still no sign of characters. Don't get me wrong - I came to Disneyland for a fun race weekend with my friend and for the pink Coast to Coast medal...everything else was just icing on the cake. However, I do love seeing characters along the course and stopping for those I like - it's what makes a Disney race a Disney race! I also feel like it's kind of what you pay for with runDisney races but ok...that point could be argued too.

As we continued to loop in and out of the parks, we started watching costumes and pointing out our favorites. This guy happened to see that I was taking a picture and he wanted to be included in it....hehe!

We stopped by the train station and a super nice cast member took our picture. I later noticed that he was wearing a blue "legacy" cast member badge...he sure lived up to it because he really was awesome (we saw him a few more times throughout the weekend).

 

What's a race with Captain Hook and Peter Pan without a duel?! :)

Side note: If I never hear the song "Following the Leader" from Peter Pan ever again, I'll be 100% ok. I think that song is now burned into my brain!

Random pirate people were also located throughout the parks, yelling random things at runners.

One set of pirates cracked me up - they saw me coming so they started jumping up and down saying "Look! It's the Captain!" Then they asked what they should do as they were confused...so I told them they were doing an awesome job just standing there and shouting at people, and they were like "huh?". It was a funny interaction!

Mile 3 came and so did the first character stop.

Some say this was a "last minute" add in due to the feedback runDisney received from the 5K the day before. Personally, I was just happy to see characters!

The line seemed long but it wasn't anything compared to the line I waited in for Gaston during the PHM in February. Honestly, these lines seemed WAY more manageable vs the lines at the Princess Half Marathon weekend!

We definitely couldn't pass up the first opportunity! It was Captain Hook and Mr. Smee!

Running through the castle was a much different experience in Disneyland, too! Also, instead of running up Main Street, we ran down Main Street!

The next stop was Pirate Donald, so we hopped in line!

So cute!

Up next was California Adventure!

These races were my only chance to "visit" California Adventure during our trip, so I enjoyed taking it all in.

Here's an example of one of those "selfie" spots I mentioned earlier - Peter Pan and Wendy were high up behind a gate and were mostly waving to runners as they passed by. We were also strongly encouraged not to stop for long periods of time. Kinda silly if you as me but ok whatever...

Last but not least were Pirate Chip & Dale just outside of Soarin! We waited maybe 5 minutes in line and were on our way once again.

Cars Land was very neat to see again - and the sun was rising as we passed through which made it extra magical! 

After "following the leader" a bit more, we looped out of California Adventure and on to the finish line!

The usual water, powerade, food boxes, and bananas were waiting for us after we crossed the finish line and received our medals.

Although I was super hungry after running this race, I didn't bother with the food box. Instead, I knew that a bin of Mickey waffles were waiting on me! Yes please!

We ended our morning with the best breakfast ever, followed by a picture of us with our medals! :)

As a whole, I really enjoyed this race! I loved the course, the characters, and the overall experience!

Have you ever run the Tinker Bell 10K? What were your thoughts on the race?

For a recap of all of our race weekend fun, check out the links below:

• Tinker Bell Half Marathon Weekend Expo & VLOG
• Neverland 10K Recap & VLOG
• Tinker Bell Half Marathon Recap & VLOG
• Captain Hook Costume Tutorial

Captain Hook runDisney Costume

The Tinker Bell Half Marathon weekend is right around the corner and I am SO excited to share my Tinker Bell 10K costume with you today!

This little weekend getaway is a girl's trip for my friend Melissa and I. We both ran Princess this year and Tink will be a first for us, so we are looking forward to receiving our pink Coast to Coast medals!!

After discussing costume ideas over and over and over again...and again some more, we finally came to the idea of running the Tinker Bell 10K as Peter Pan and Captain Hook! At first, we were just going to wear previous Princess Half Marathon race shirts, then we decided on Peter Pan and Wendy (which did not have my creative brain going at all), so Wendy switched to Captain Hook, and here we are! This will also be my first time to run as a villain so I'm super excited about that! (For the Half Marathon, we are both dressing as Tink...complete with wings!) :)

After a little inspiration from Pinterest (gotta love it), I put together all the pieces and viola!

Putting this costume together was fairly simple and only required a beginners skill on hand stitching (I'm terrible at it).

Items needed:

• Red shirt
• Black bottoms
• Compression Socks (mine are Legend Compression brand)
• Hat with feather (hat from Amazon, feather from Hobby Lobby)
• Hook for hand (ordered from Amazon)
• Gold ribbon
• Wide black ribbon for a belt
• Yellow felt
• White vinyl or white lightweight material
• Thin black ribbon
• Needle and thread

 

I began with a red BCG brand running shirt from Academy. I always like to look at the BCG shirts first, because I'd rather sew to and hot glue on an $8 off brand shirt I might wear a handful of times vs a $20+ brand name shirt.

After gathering all of my supplies from various craft stores, I began with the white base layer of the shirt. The white piece was shaped on the silhouette and cut out on heat transfer vinyl, but could easily be hand stitched on with light weight white material if no access to a cutting machine is available.

I also hand stitched gold ribbon around the collar of the shirt. You can see my terrible hand stitching skills in the photo above! 

Next came the thin black ribbon across the front part of the shirt. I hand stitched and knotted off each end piece so the thread didn't pull.

Done!

For the belt, I measured out and cut the wide black ribbon to fit around the entire shirt. I decided to stitch the belt in random spots around the shirt so I wouldn't have to worry about it moving around on me during the 10K.

I also measured the felt square for the belt buckle and made it a bit wider than the black ribbon.

Pinning the "belt" in place helped make this process so much easier!

Once it was all said and done, I hot glued the belt buckle in place.
 

The hat and hook came from Amazon. Sadly, the hat arrived with pieces broken off and one of the cross bones missing. After a little digging, I found a Pirates in the Caribbean scarf and made my own piece for the hat!

The feather was purchased from Hobby Lobby and also hot glued onto the inside of the hat.

In all, this took about four hours total to complete. I had so much fun making this costume and can't wait to wear it this weekend!

Arrrrgh!

Oh wait, Captain Hook doesn't say arrrrgh....

"I'll get you for this, Pan, if it's the last thing I do!" How's that? :)

I hope to see some of you out on the course! Don't be shy...say hi if you see me!