I’ts almost Halloween Time at the Disneyland Resort and the latest news is that this year, more spooky fun will expand into Disney California Adventure Park! Halloween Time will kick off on Friday, Sept. 15 and go through Tuesday, Oct. 31, 2017. It’s truly a time of year you won’t want to miss out on experiencing!
Just last week, exciting news was released about the special nighttime overlay for Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: BREAKOUT! and how it will be transformed nightly into Guardians of the Galaxy – Monsters After the Dark! I can’t wait to ride it! To read more about that, please click here.
Guests visiting this year during Halloween Time will be able to experience Halloween for the first time in Cars Land in Disney California Adventure, as it’s transformed with a special HaulO-Ween makeover.
The citizens of Radiator Springs will don Halloween costumes and decorate their respective homes for the season. Lightning McQueen, Mater, Cruz, Red and DJ will be all dressed up–as a super hero, a “van-pire,” a pirate, a clown and a punk rocker, ready to go “trunk-or-treating.”
Attractions will be transformed, too, with Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree turning spooky as the Graveyard JamBOOree, and Luigi’s Rollickin’ Roadsters getting a seasonal twist to become Luigi’s Honkin’ Haul-O-Ween. 
Scary the Scarecar will stand guard over the entrance to Route 66, a preview to the Haul-OWeen transformation awaiting guests in Cars Land. With Fillmore’s Jack-Oil Lanterns, the web spun over Flo’s by a Spider-Car, and the Cozy Cone dressed up in car-stumes, the townsfolk turn Radiator Springs into Radiator Screams.
Oogie Boogie will appear for the first time at Disney California Adventure, too, taking over with his twisted tale of a forever Halloween, inspired by “Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.” Oogie Boogie’s oversized silhouette beckons guests through the main entrance of the park and he brings to life a swarm of bats around Carthay Circle Restaurant and Lounge. Guests walking down Buena Vista Street will also be greeted by a new 10-foot-tall statue of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow, holding his jack-o’-lantern head up to the sky!
Disney California Adventure also will be featured for the first time as part of the pre-party mix-in for Mickey’s Halloween Party, a separate-ticket event that features special entertainment, Disney characters in their Halloween attire, and trick or treating at locations throughout Disneyland. 
This year, a ticket to Mickey’s Halloween Party has even greater value as guests will be able to visit Disney California Adventure as well as Disneyland during the three hours prior to the beginning of the party in Disneyland.
Tickets for Mickey’s Halloween Party went on sale July 17 for Annual Passholders, Disney Vacation Club members and Disney Visa Card holders and on July 24 for the general public so you should purchase yours before they sell out. For more information about Mickey’s Halloween Party, including dates, read the post I wrote about hit here. Party tickets may be purchased online and on mobile devices at http://Disneyland.com/party as well as at the Disneyland Resort main gate and by phone at 714.781.4400.
What are you most excited about this year during Halloween Time at Disneyland Resort? Share with me in the comments!
One way I encourage my daughter to lead a healthy lifestyle is by modeling it for her. There are also some things our family does to stay active together and have fun doing so. We enjoy going on family walks together. We also love to enjoy other outdoor activities such as a hike in the foothills or a jog along the beach. Being active together a perfect opportunity to bond as a family.
We also allow my daughter to make choices of physical activities that she enjoys doing to maintain that active lifestyle. She is pretty athletic and has participated in a variety of activities ranging from dance & cheer to swimming & martial arts.
It’s also very important to teach children about the importance of making healthy food choices, whether they are eating at home with you or our somewhere on their own. Our family spends time together on Sundays doing meal planning and grocery shopping for the upcoming week. 
Since our work, school, homework, and extra-curricular activity schedule are somewhat busy ones, we try our best to prepare meals together in the kitchen about 4 times a week. Dinnertime is when we share about our day and talk about anything else we’re excited about.
It’s also important to teach your children to give back to the community. I believe that giving back is one of the most important things you can do for others. Also, by doing so, you are modeling the importance of thinking about others’ needs and serving others for your child(ren). We seek out different ways to give back including volunteering with the homeless and bringing necessary supplies to the animal shelter.
The Boys & Girls Clubs of America has a great resource for families trying to live an overall healthy lifestyle called Triple Play. The program is the leading comprehensive health and wellness program and serves young people at Boys & Girls Clubs. Triple Play gives kids the tools and awareness necessary to put them on the path to a great future. This is exactly what we want for our children.
In our own family, we do a few different things to promote a healthy lifestyle. I feel better when…we model an active lifestyle, make healthy food choices, and give back. What about you and your family? What can you do to support this mantra?
I recently discovered (the hard way) that I can’t possibly keep up at that pace without having some kind of backlash. Although stress is inevitable, trying to do too much all the time, will only result in your body screaming at you to slow down. In my case, I ended up with the flu. According to the doctor, that was my body telling me to slow down!
One of the benefits of being a Kaiser Permanente member is having access to the wide range of services available. Not only can members schedule a medical appointment with their doctor when they need to but they are also able to discuss things like stress management, that can also affect your health.
I had the pleasure of spending some time chatting with Dr. Michael Hanna of Kaiser Permanente Orange County about my own stress and kind of picked his brain for some advice on how to best manage it all. I told him about my tendency to try to “do it all”. His first suggestion was this:
There are certain situations that we really have little to no control over. Dr. Hanna highly recommended putting my energy into things I can do something about. As a father, himself, Dr. Hanna had some other great advice for busy parents who find themselves in the same boat and juggling a lot, about how to best manage & combat their stress. Here are some of his best tips for managing stress:
Exercise
Sleep 
Declutter and Organize
How to Manage Stress When It’s Actually Happening to You
At the end of our talk, Dr. Hanna said something that really stuck with me. He said, “Have hope! This too, shall pass!” Honestly, if you can just rally through the trying times, there’s going to be something good that will eventually show up for you. 
Kaiser Permanente strives to help all of its members and employees work towards total health and wellness. Members can take classes, covering a wide variety of topics relevant to health, that are a good fit for their own situation. Being able to successfully manage stress, or in simpler terms “life management”, can only have positive benefits for an individual. To learn more about Kaiser Permanente and the services health and well-being services available to its members, go
I added more fresh fruit (I love citrus), trail mix, and Weight Watchers Light Mozzarella String Cheese to my snacks and carry them in my lunchbox to work as snack options.
Since I was a kid, I’ve always loved string cheese. It’s so fun to to peel it as you eat it. I was surprised (in a good way) to find out how full of flavor and fun to pull apart, this 
It’s definitely a satisfying choice when you need a snack on the go. I shop for mine at Walmart, in the cheese section and they come in a package, individually wrapped, to help with portion control.
Each serving is only 1 SmartPoints. I feel good eating that kind of a snack and knowing it’s made from real milk.
Right now, until January 31, 2017, Walmart has a digital savings offer for shoppers to save $1.00 on 2 Weight Watchers Cheese items at Walmart. To grab your own digital coupon, click 
Since starting my new meal planning and meal prep, I feel a lot better and have more energy. My pants are also a little looser-fitting, which is a good thing! How are your New Year goals going?
I also teach school and am a first grade teacher, which requires me to be up on my feet a majority of the day. I spend a lot of time on the carpet with my students reading to them and doing many activities. A 
I just get bored with the same old lunches and I also find that if I don’t pack enough food or go to work without a lunch at all, I end up grabbing not-so-healthy things. One of my personal goals when this school year started (I’m also a teacher) was to reduce, or even eliminate, “driving through” for lunch.
The first thing I leaned was that “a lunch doesn’t have to look like a lunch“.It’s a concept that seems odd and not normal to me. When I think about packing a lunch, I visualize what my own mother used to pack for me. However, I learned that the most important part about packing what you’re going to eat all day when you’re away from home is actually the balance between nutritional value and adequate portions. 
The nutritionist helped me think of a long list of “non-traditional” lunch items to include in my lunchbox. Here are just a few:
Honestly, I love all of these new ideas for lunch. I’ve actually seen other teachers eyeing my lunch in our Teachers Lounge.
Although water isn’t actually food, the nutritionist stressed the importance of drinking enough water on a daily basis. I shared my water drinking challenges with her. As a teacher, there are days when I walk around my classroom just carrying my water bottle around and still have a full water bottle at dismissal!
She suggested adding natural flavoring by using things like cucumber or strawberry to my water. I love the way it tastes when it’s infused and it’s so much easier to drink my daily requirement now. I also learned that water isn’t just important for your insides, which helps regulate you, but also beneficial for your external appearance, aka your skin! Drink your water!
The nutritionist asked me right away to describe what my weekly lunch meal prep looks like. I really didn’t have an answer for her because prior to meeting with her, I didn’t set aside much time for meal prep. Lunch making was more of a “throw-it-in-the-lunchbox-5-minutes-before-rushing-out-the-door” sort of thing! She discussed the benefits of carving out that time each weekend to do this. On Sundays, my daughter & I team up to make the shopping list for weekly lunch packing, go to the grocery store, and package and measure out portions of foods that can be done ahead of time. (ex. nuts, cut up cheese, etc.) 
While I was at my appointment with the nutritionist at the Kaiser Permanente location in Irvine, there was a Farmers Market going on. I love shopping at a Farmers Market! 
They offer the freshest fruits, vegetables, and other products that are all locally grown and made. I found a variety of local produce, honey, nuts, teas, beef jerky, breads, and specialty foods there, many of which are organic!
There is also food you can order to eat right then and there, such as gourmet tamales. All of the vendors are very friendly and there are lots of great things to sample before you buy. 
I found a lot of things there to grab for my lunch packing. It’s free and open to the public, every Wednesday (year-round) from 9-1. To find a Kaiser Permanente Farmers Market in Southern California near you, go 
Believe it or not, I actually look forward to packing lunches now. I feel like I have a new perspective and it’s fun to mix it up with non-traditional lunch packing. My daughter even asks to help out more in the kitchen now, since we started doing lunch meal prep together. It’s like a mother-daughter bonding time.
This year I got a head start on making some 
As Fall neared this year, I also decided to add some new vitamins and supplements into my daily regimen because it’s impossible get your entire daily requirement just from food. Nature Made® has a variety of vitamins, minerals and supplements (VMS) to help support nutritional gaps with your health goals in mind ranging from Digestive Support, Heart Health & Function, Energy Metabolism, Women’s Health and much more!†Nature Made® is the #1 Pharmacist Recommended brand for many key dietary supplement categories* I feel confident choosing Nature Made® brand for myself and my family. I also love that I can run over to Walmart to stock up on them because they’re always offered at such affordable prices, even without being on sale! 
Nature Made® vitamins and supplements: An easy, convenient way to help your body get the nutritional support it needs every day, whether it be to support bone health, immune health or energy metabolism (helping convert food into energy).†For more information on Nature Made® vitamins and supplements available at Walmart and to enter to win one of 60 Walmart gift cards (each worth $50) by taking part in the sweepstakes on the site, visit 
Kaiser Permanente strives to promote wellness and preventative care to its members and its employees. I have seen 100% buy-in to this program from the doctors, nurses, and staff who have been there to assist me on my visits to
Here’s an overview video of the Get Fit Festival: 
Open enrollment for Kaiser Permanente kicked off November 1. If you’re looking for a new provider, explore plans with Kaiser Permanente Orange County and you’ll have the ability to select from many services for you and your family including primary and urgent care, emergency facilities, labor and delivery, pharmacy, and lab all housed under one roof. Find out more today at: 
I absolutely adore my 31 first graders this year! They are the cutest bunch of kids and are so sweet and eager to learn every single day. They also like to give me tons of hugs and even share their snacks with me
.It’s a sweet gesture when one of them hands me a snack and I’d never want to crush their spirit so I kindly thank them…and dispose of it properly when they walk away. 
It’s extra important to be on top of your health when you’re a teacher because if you’re sick and have to be out of the classroom, it affects everything. (We all know what can happen when there’s a sub.) I’m very fortunate to be a “seasoned” teacher because a brand new teacher is likely to get sick more often, suffering from up to 2 colds per month. I remember those days!
With cold and flu season upon us, I set up an appointment with Kaiser Permanente Orange County Physician Dr. Eric Troyan to chat and get his his best advice for keeping healthy in the classroom. He had some great tips and advice for me, which could be valuable information for anyone who has prolonged contact with children on a daily basis and works in a school or daycare like me. 
Here are some of the great illness prevention tips we talked about:
Keep Your Immune System Optimized
He really stressed the importance of this one for people like me who are around children. He also explained that the flu vaccine this year will be more effective than the one last year and told me that it’s considered a “killed version” vaccine as opposed to a live one, which you would hear about people actually getting sick after receiving it. The best time to get a flu vaccine is before Halloween but if you don’t do it by then, you’ll definitely want to get yours before Thanksgiving! Flu season tends to peak after the New Year in California, so why not go into it well prepared to fight it off?
Teacher wellness is essential when it comes to a successful school year. Do you or someone close to you work with children? What kinds of things do you do to help fight off illness during the school year?