Happy back to school for everyone that wasn't back already! Tomorrow mine return and Chris is thrilled that he gets to start waking up at 6am instead of the noon rising he's been used to the last 2 months lol.
We did a few fun things over Labor Day weekend; had all the boys and grandkids over and did some shopping. Something else I did was find a photo album in Steve's car that he brought from his mom's apartment in July after she passed and had forgotten it was in there. Ended up being a scrapbook of sorts that I'd made her after she came to Florida with us in 2007. It was a.................special and memorable trip with my MIL
but now as I think back to it, we had some good times. I'll post a few of these when my computer decides to cooperate and let me download some more pictures............
Now let's continue the 4th of July!!!
We had gone back to the WL after a morning of Epcot and breakfast to relax a bit before going to our next park of the day, MK. My plan when we first decided to go for the 4th was to absolutely be in MK for the 4th and to absolutely watch the fireworks from there ON the 4th. Then I made that Narcoossee's reservation in case we ended up feeling too crowded at the MK on the 4th so we were going to see how we felt come fireworks time that night. We also had fastpasses beginning at 4ish to use.
First up a little BTMMR for you all:
Non centered picture because I needed to crop my arm out! It looked like it was about 130 lbs. bigger than the rest of me - oh crap I hope it doesn't really look like that!
Our next FP was for Splash and then we had one for 7DMT; however right after we rode Big Thunder all outside rides shut down due to lightning in the area
![Pouting face :rage: 😡](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f621.png)
You all know what happens when all outside rides are shut down?
1. Your outside ride FP's turn to anytime ones - not too bad
2. The FP lines for all open rides get to be like 2000 people deep because everyone is using their anytime FPs for them
3. This is a PITA and sucks
We debated what to do; use one of the anytimes and hope the other rides open soon? Use them both? Eat????
Eat
We had a 6:30 ADR at Skippers and when all rain and lightning broke loose we went to see if we could get in 2 hours early lol!! That was a hard no as people without reservations were now making them. Instead we got on a 12 mile long fastpass line for the HM, saving our 7Dwarfs anytime for later on hopefully. When we came out we were shocked by another 12 mile long line of people waiting to get in to CCH and since nothing had opened and Steve's app showed rains continuing forever we made an executive decision to forego our Skipper's dinner in favor of a quick CCH mobile order so we could bypass the line and be dry and doing something!
Food was great and after our meals I got a specialty dessert they were serving:
Whoopie pies! The Mickey one is chocolate and Minnie was red velvet; my fave. Both were delicious with super sweet vanilla frosting.cream inside. I ate these while waiting for Renee
@ArielSRL who was also in the park to stop by and say hello! We'd met during our EPIC trip in May but we'd be meeting each others' boys for the first time. No pics yet but they'll come; we said a quick hello and left to see what was up outside.
NOTHING was up outside as all rides were still closed. There was only a drizzle of rain but I guess lightning was still hanging around. We all agree to do the HoP as Chris had never done it and Ricky didn't really remember it. When Steve and I did it earlier this year I took pictures of some First Lady Girl Scout stuff for my mom - she worked for the local GS chapter for about 25 years. This time I found FDR's things interesting because they are there on loan from his Library and Museum right here by us in NY!
Hyde Park is about 15 minutes north of me and we've been to his library/museum TONS of times. It's like one of those local field trip places all the schools go to but we've also taken the kids ourselves and I went tons of times as a kid. Probably not interesting to you but I get all stupid when I see or hear any reference to where I live or near it- like when Minnie say's "Where are we, Poughkeepsie?" in "Get a Horse" over at the Pixar Shorts in Epcot lol.
Eventually we were able to use our 7DMT FP but those rides were closed for HOURS which is just a downfall of going during the rainy season. It was about 8:00 when we got off and some of us were fading; Ricky decided to head back to the room. Chris had a friend in Florida off-site who was on his way to the MK for the fireworks and he wanted Chris to wait and watch with him. However Steve and I made a last minute decision to run to Epcot to see Illuminations there so we weren't hanging around. On a normal day we would have been fine letting him stay and then go back to the CR on his own but the crowds had seriously rolled in and between that and the fact that we didn't know this friend we just weren't comfortable with that. I felt kind of bad but he wasn't upset, I think he was tired too!
Steve and I walked with them to the exit and then jumped on the monorail to Epcot. We walked in to WS 10 minutes before Illuminations started so we figured what the heck and jumped in line for a beverage at the little stand in the U.K. Two people in front of us turned in to almost a 15 minute wait as their register wasn't working
![headache :headache: :headache:](http://www.wdwinfo.com/images/smilies/headache.gif)
Eventually we got our drinks, missed the first few minutes but found a really good spot for getting there so late! And now I give you the best of my crappy Illuminations shots; most are of the holiday tag at the end:
I actually like this one below:
Skip the continuation if you're tired of mediocre fireworks pics!