Hollywood Studios Part 1

On Monday of our vacation, we all went to Hollywood Studios.  We enjoyed seeing a couple characters first before we started in watching some of the shows and doing some rides.

I don't have any of the pictures with Chip and Dale since I was in line waiting for Pluto and Goofy and they were taken on Joy's camera and by the photopass photographer.

Mama in front of the sorcerer hat, the icon of Hollywood Studios.

Joy getting Pluto's autograph.

The Belle Show is a Broadway musical show based off "Beauty and the Beast".  This is always a favorite of ours and I think everyone enjoyed it.

I love this shot that Kevin caught of Gaston checking his reflection in his knife while singing one of his songs.

Joy and Kaelyn in front of the theater for the Belle show.  Kaelyn got chosen to go up and get the rose from the prince at the end of the show.

Joy, Kaelyn, and I waiting to get onto the Tower of Terror ride.  (We don't know the other random faces in the foreground of this picture.)  :-)

Kaelyn's so funny.  She had ridden this ride several times before and then she went through a phase where she decided it was too scary.  She decided that she would go this time but she started getting really nervous as we got closer to getting on.  She was trying to make herself cry when we were waiting to get on.  Anyway, we got through the ride and as soon as it was over, she looked at me and said, "That wasn't so bad.  I want to do that next time."  Crazy girl!!!

As luck would have it, we all got on the front row so you could see all of us when they took the picture.  Every time I look at the picture it makes me laugh.  I am normally a [nervous] laugher on scary rides but I SCREAMED my head off this time the WHOLE time for some reason.  The couple all the way in the back on the right side crack me up.  They look like they're just sitting their relaxing and taking a break instead of being "shot" straight up and down at terrifying speeds.  (Either that or they - the guy at least- are just sitting there watching amusedly the girl next to them with her eyes squeezed shut in terror.)

Kevin, John, and Joy rode Rock'n' Roller Coaster.  The screen that had the picture of John on it had spots over his eyes so you could hardly tell that it was him.  The picture of Joy is priceless!

I think this was how John felt for the first 30 minutes after he got off the roller coaster.  :)

Joy carrying her suitcases on Sunset Boulevard.  ;-)

Waiting for lunch.

The next pictures I have ready to post include a few pictures of the Lights, Motors, Action stunt show that I think my dad in particular might be interested in seeing.

Magic Kingdom Part 2

These are the second half of the pictures that we took at Magic Kingdom.

Mama and Joy after getting off "Small World".  The picture is fuzzy because Kevin was trying to hurry and get the picture before a bunch more people walked in front of them.  (I don't think that Kaelyn was supposed to be cut out of the picture either.)

Riding "It's A Small World".

I just LOVE some of the expressions, smiles and laughs we caught on camera over this vacation.  Everyone seems to be having such a good time and the pictures are priceless to me as I look back over them all.

Yeah... we didn't actually know that we were being photographed here.  We were taking a snack, bathroom, sit-down-and-rest break.  Oh, yeah, and I was trying to fill our insulated water bottles with ice water, thus the lid to the cup hanging out of my mouth by the straw.  When you only have so many hands or clean places to lay stuff, you do what you gotta' do.  :-)

Mama, Joy, and Kaelyn outside of Pooh's tree house by the Winnie the Pooh ride.

I believe this might have been another favorite ride.

Kaelyn in Eeyore's house.  "It's not much of a house but..." 

:-)

Playing in the interactive queue line.  We did the fastpass line for the Pooh ride but the interactive things for kids to do if they have to wait in the regular line are so fun that we went back and did that stuff after we rode.  Besides seeing Eeyore's house, you can knock on Piglet's door and hear him talk, play in Pooh's tree house, jump on circles on the ground to make gophers pop up and talk along with several other fun things.  In the picture above, they are pumping the pump so that "rain" will come down and water Rabbit's garden.  The pumpkins and other vegetables "grow" if you pump it fast enough.

Joy in Eeyore's gloomy place. 

Watching the night parade, The Mainstreet Electrical Parade.  Each float is covered in hundreds of lights and even the costumes of the characters that walk in the parade are covered in lights.

I love this picture.  Kevin took it at the very beginning of the parade.  Kaelyn is intensely waving at [probably] Mickey or Minnie on the first float as they pass by and Joy has a look of amazement at the way everything was lit up. 

Space Mountain - a completely in the dark roller coaster.

After Space Mountain, we all ate some ice cream.  It was between 10:30 and 11:00 at night by this point.  Then... they went and rode the teacups.  I don't do "spinny" things at all and neither does Mama but we happily took pictures and waved.  :-)

 This picture was taken at the end of the night.  We have quite a few good pictures of Mama and Joy and all of us in front of the castle after dark but we don't have the photopass CDs yet and the pictures rarely turn out well on our camera.

We were EXHAUSTED by the time we left.  I don't remember exactly what time it was but I know the park closed at midnight and it was somewhere around there.  Saturday, we had to check out of our temporary location, then we did some shopping until we could check into the timeshare.  After that, it was Cici's Pizza and relaxing back at the resort.

Magic Kingdom Part 1

My mom and sister, Joy, got to come down over Kaelyn's Spring Break last week.  We all stayed in Kissimmee and we took them to all four of the Disney parks.  Kaelyn actually had the Friday off before and then all of last week.  We picked them up from Orlando Thursday evening and then we went to Magic Kingdom on Friday.  These pictures are the first half of the pictures from MK.

Since there was a short line, we waited to see Pooh and Tigger first.

We got fast passes to see Mickey and the princesses but we needed to kill some time until we could use them so we took the train around the park.  It worked out perfectly since it started to rain about the time we got on the train and it had stopped by the time we got back around to the front of the park.  Gotta' love Florida rain showers!

Mama was kind of "shy" and I think half afraid of the characters at first.  :)  We had to persuade her to get in the pictures.

So, as I mentioned above, Mama was all "shy" and so when Pinocchio reached out to give her a big hug, she got all nervous.  :)  Joy had to show her how it's done.  ;)

We saw three of the princesses next.  Joy really enjoyed that part.  This is Joy with Aurora, otherwise known as Sleeping Beauty.

All of us with Aurora (above) and Belle (below).

The girls with Cinderella

Joy briefly considered dressing up as Belle for the day - JUST KIDDING!

Back in Liberty Square/Frontierland.

The five of us waiting for the afternoon parade.

The Peter Pan ride.  The ride is pretty dark so when Kevin took the pictures from the "ship" he and I were riding in, they couldn't really see that he was taking a picture, thus the funny expressions.

Mama and Joy both really enjoyed the Peter Pan ride so we rode it a couple times - we always really enjoy that ride also.