Saturday Salute – Disney’s Liberty Tree Tavern Dressing

IMG_2265Liberty Tree Tavern is a restaurant located in Liberty Square at Disney World’s Magic Kingdom park.  Diners there for lunch or dinner enjoy traditional American fare amid Colonial themed décor.  Offerings include such dishes as “Declaration Salad”, “Liberty Lamb Stew”, “New England Pot Roast”, and “Pilgrim’s Feast” (includes cornbread dressing) to name a few.  Reviews (available at many websites) for Liberty Tree Tavern are mixed – If you want to give it a try, I recommend lunch as your best bet for a good experience.  

Leading up to Thanksgiving I saw several of my favorite Disney sites post Liberty Tree Tavern’s dressing (aka stuffing, but mine would not be going in the turkey) recipe and I thought, what the heck – looks easy enough – why not give it a try.  So while my little turkey was in the oven, I threw a batch together. 

I made a double batch of cornbread the night before (using Fisher Cornbread Mix).  After it cooled, I crumbled it up and stored it overnight in a gallon bag before toasting the crumbs in the oven per the recipes instructions on Thanksgiving morning.

You can find the recipe I used here at allears.net (excellent resource for all things Disney).  I cut it in half since my 2 batches of cornbread ended up at about 6 cups of crumbs.  It was very easy indeed.  If you’re looking for a cornbread dressing recipe, this one would be excellent for beginners – I’m sure store-bought, pre-made cornbread would work just as well as baking your own. I baked my dressing in a 9″x13″ pan for 45 minutes at 325 degrees (slipped it in alongside the turkey as it was finishing up) and it turned out great.  Well seasoned, great texture, not too soggy.  Raymond, always willing to be a taste-tester for me, gave it a two-thumbs-up.

If you try any Disney recipes – I’d love it if you’d share the details with me!

DIY Disney Mickey Head Door Wreath

General Dis Pics 11.13 055Yes, indeed, I’ve been crafty Disney-style once again.  And I have to say, I’m pretty happy with how well this wreath turned out (need a longer hanger!).  Being a little (or a lot) ADD, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t have the patience for adding all the ornaments to the Mickey head I made out of some very inexpensive supplies, but I stuck with it (and managed to even find a shortcut!).  My trusty sidekick, Junior cheered me on (helps me to have company during the creative process – would help me more if he had opposable thumbs). 

If you want to make one of these fun and festive wreaths for yourself, here are the deets:

What you need:  (if I had to guess, I’d say I spent about $35-$40)

  • Wreaths and/or wire garland (one big circle, two smaller ones)
  • Two big cylinders of shatter-proof round ornaments – preferably two different sizes. 

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    Super inexpensive $8 wreath

  • Craft/Floral wire – I just used what I had at home…a couple different kinds, in fact.

Let’s get started:

  • One large wreath will be Mickey’s head – very little of the greenery will show, buy the cheapest one you can find and it’ll be great.   
  • You’ve got a couple of options for the ears.  If you can find small wreaths, those would probably work.  I couldn’t find any at the 50% off Christmas decoration section at my favorite craft store (yes, General Dis Pics 11.13 041you’re right, I bought a lot of stuff while that sale was going on!).  So I found these inexpensive wire garlands (on sale, two for $5) and shaped them into the size I wanted for the ears.  Initially, I tried to make them too big, so be careful. General Dis Pics 11.13 047

Here’s what they looked like once I figured out the size I liked best.

  • Now break out the floral/craft wire and wire the ears onto the head – as usual, no need to measure, just do what looks good to you.  They’ll be a little floppy, but will stabilize once the finished product is hanging on the door – mine’s been outside for several days now, and is doing just fine.
  • General Dis Pics 11.13 068If you found two different sized ornament, use mostly big ones on the head and mostly smaller ones on the ears – to me that helped with the overall look/scale/proportion of the finished product.
  • Wire the ornaments onto Mickey.  I did then entire head before starting on the ears.  Here’s the shortcut – you can put 2-3 ornaments on one piece of wire before attaching them.  Saves time!

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    Blurry? Junior took it

  • Once you’re happy with the number of ornaments you’ve attached, that’s it!  Finished!  Totally awesome, delightfully Disney-fied door decor for your own Disney home. General Dis Pics 11.13 055

Thanksgiving Tradition – The Disney Movie

IMG_2260I’m sure we’re not alone.  I bet a bunch of you go to the movies on Thanksgiving.  At our house, it’s a very long standing tradition.  So much so, it just wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without a trip to the movies.

I’ve done a little research and am pretty sure the list below is correct.  If a year is missing – we did not see a Disney movie – either because we had already seen Disney’s most recent release OR there wasn’t a new Disney movie available (we still went to the movies, but probably didn’t have as much fun).

Today I’m thankful for family, health, happiness, and Disney Movies! 

Did you see any of these on Thanksgiving?

    • 1991 Beauty and the Beast
    • 1992 Aladdin
  • 1994 The Santa Clause
  • 1995 Toy Story
  • 1996 101 Dalmatians
  • 1998 A Bug’s Life
  • (Christmas Day) 1998 – Mighty Joe Young
  • 1999 Toy Story 2
  • 2000 102 Dalmatians
  • 2001 Monsters Inc.
  • 2002 The Santa Clause 2
  • 2003 Brother Bear
  • 2004 The Incredibles
  • 2005 Chicken Little
  • 2006 The Santa Clause 3 – The Escape Clause
  • 2007 Enchanted
  • 2008 Bolt
  • 2010 Tangled
  • 2011 The Muppets
  • 2012 Wreck it Ralph
  • 2013 – FrozenIMG_2268

We got home from seeing Frozen just a little while ago and whoa!  That was one fantastic (very musical) Disney movie!  If you haven’t seen it yet, GO – get there in plenty of time to see the short “Get a Horse” before the movie.  Also, stay through the credits for a little surprise at the end.

Normally I don’t care about watching a movie in 3D, but I highly recommend it in this case.  Best movie I’ve seen in a long time.  Best of all – they didn’t show all the best parts (or give away the entire story) in the previews.  I know you’ll love it as much as we did!

Hope your Thanksgiving has been a happy (and entertaining) one!

 

 

 

Happy Thanksgiving – I’m Thankful for YOU!

Med Cruise 2013 Camera 003On this Thanksgiving Day, I just want to take a minute to say thanks to you (and I’m thankful for you!)  My little Disney blog is now a month old.  I’ve managed at least a post a day and you have followed along, helping me reach nearly 100 Likes on my Facebook page (and 260+ twitter followers @life_of_green).  Many of you have encouraged me daily and several of you have liked, shared, tweeted, and pinned over and over again.

I started this endeavor to help me adjust to my (and Raymond’s) new “empty nest” status – I would have kept pouring my Disney heart out everyday even if nobody read a word (it is amazingly therapeutic), but you did read, and tweet, and pin, and comment and support me to an extent I had not anticipated.  I’m flattered and sincerely touched. 

Thank you for reading – please continue to like and share with anyone else you feel may be interested…the more the merrier.  I’ll be right here sharing a little of my Disney life with you.  Happy Thanksgiving.