Keiper Family Christmas Vacation: Part IV

The day after we went to the Magic Kingdom, we decided to go to Hollywood Studios. We let Tommy sleep in so we got to the park a little late.  The problem with getting there late is the parking lot gets full.  We  thought the park might be full but it was not.  Instead they gave us free parking passes to go park at Epcot.  So we drove over to Epcot and parked.  Then we got on the tram which took us from the parking lot to Epcot.  Then at the entrance to Epcot, we got on a bus to go to Hollywood Studios.  That took awhile. 

Here's Grandma and Tommy looking too cool for school in their shades waiting on the tram. 

 We get to the park after all the convoluted logistics.  We pass by some unruly teens smoking dope RIGHT OUTSIDE of the park, not far from this Christmas tree.  We were like HUH??? Is no one else seeing this??? Or smelling this??

We walk in and head toward the ONE RIDE we wanted to go on (Toy Story Mania) but alas there was no Fast Passes left and the wait was 2.5 HOURS long all day. (That's what we get for getting there late.)  So we decided to see what else we could do that would be fun.

We found a character named Mike Wazowski (which I find hilarious that is his name) aka Billy Crystal from the Monsters Inc movie and got our picture with him! "You won't believe your eye!"  I thought Tommy would be terrified (look at that thing!) but he was pumped up! Monster! Cool!

Then we walked around the corner and found the Muppet Vision 3D Show.  There was a 5 minute line so we went to see it.  I tried to wear 3D glasses during the movie.  Tommy kept turning around and pulling mine off my face though.  And since he didn't wear the 3D shades, he probably thinks every Muppet has two heads and is blurry.  Proud parent moment: Tommy made it almost all 22 minutes! He got kind of antsy around the end but that's when it got loud so no one heard him! WHOO HOO!

Outside the movie, I took this cute pic of Tommy in front of the Muppet fountain.  He wasn't happy about it but he sure was cute!

 Then we found the second best part of the park. Life-size versions of Lightning McQueen and Mater!
Sad part is right before we got up to get our picture taken, he lost his shit.  He just started throwing a terrible fit when we were "on deck".  We had stood in line for 20 minutes and he just then decided to throw down.  So I just picked him up and said, "YOU'RE GOING TO LIKE THIS!" He did end up liking it, thankfully.

 Can't you tell how happy he is? At least Mater is jazzed.

 He was totally excited about touching Mater though.

After seeing Mater, we met my parents, Adam and Steph to go see the Beauty and the Beast stage show.  We felt so cool because we got there late and all these people told us "They're not letting anyone else in!!" We walk up and Adam is standing there with a nice gentleman who opens the gate just for us three.  Talk about VIP Disney Royalty, folks! We waltzed right in must to the dismay of all the rejected.

 We had to do a lot of Tommy-wrangling during this show.  Beauty and the Beast was just not his gig.  He's not really into talking plates and candlesticks.  But I, on the other hand, was totally into it.  I remembered ALL the words to all the songs.  I wanted to sing along but realized what a dork I was.  "There goes the baker with his tray like always!" :-)

 After the show ended, it was mass chaos trying to make it through this crowd.

Mass chaos crowd + Toddler = Long Island Iced Tea in the stroller.  Probably my favorite part of Hollywood Studios is how available the alcohol is all over the park! Sweet!

 The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights is on the Streets of America part of the park.  It was awesome.  There was a show every 10 minutes I think.
You can see the whole show here (since I didn't feel like uploading my short video).

Gotta love the Trans Siberian Orchestra. 

In between shows, there would just be random things lit up all over the place.

The toy soldiers were very cool.

So was the tree.

Here's a view from the opposite end of the street.  Pretty cool.  I'm kind of interested to know how much Disney paid the Osborne Family for that light show.   Here's the Wiki entry on it if you're interested.

We figured out that while the light show was on, we could weave in and out of people like we stopped the Matrix because everyone was just standing around staring in awe at the lights. We rode the Great Movie Ride with no wait.  There are a few scary parts (Alien being one of them) where my dad was trying to keep Tommy's attention on the phone (Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, of course) so he didn't freak out seeing an alien fall out of the ceiling.  He didn't cry once.  Neither did Tommy!! Hardy-har-har!

We went to see Fantasmic too.  You can see a video at the link but basically it's a real-life version of Fantasia. With splashing water, fireworks and all kinds of characters, it's loud and wild.

But Tommy fell asleep half way through.  It was getting late.  It was also the second day without a nap so he crashed. 

He missed the ferry that floated by with all the characters! It would have been the closest he would have been to Mickey all week! Oh well.

After the show, we decided to head home.  It only took an hour to catch a bus, to catch a tram, to find our car.  But we missed the tram so we walked across many parking lots to find our car.  Whoops.  

 We got home that night and we were ready to party! Brandon and Desi and fam got home from Gatorland and they were ready to party too! We played 31 and A-hole in our onesies! I like this picture because Adam is totally creeping in the corner.  What's he doing?? :)

 That's a Gator head from Gatorland... and a middle finger. I should make this my cover picture.

We posed "Lilli-style" for this pic. :-)

Then it was time for massive amounts of panoramic pictures.  Boy were these pictures ridiculous. A little scary even.

 What goobers!

This is probably my favorite.  Notice Adam is in it twice.  It's just like the panoramic pictures that they take on your school trip to DC.  (Maybe that's a Rensselaer-only reference.)  It's also cool because it looks like Adam skidded to a stop on the right side.  Too funny. 

This is only part of the remnants from that night.  There was one person that didn't feel so hot the next day.  But we won't name names.  :-)   That was ONE FUN NIGHT! 

Keiper Family Christmas Vacation: Part III

Yeah, this is going to take so many posts. I have way too many pictures. So Part III...

We went to the Magic Kingdom the day after Christmas.  Thank goodness we decided not to go on Christmas Eve.  That would have been horrendous.  It was so crowded that week and the holidays are the busiest.

 So we made it to the Magic Kingdom.  We took our time and didn't get there until after lunch.  It rained as soon as we left.  But like rain in Florida, we knew if we waited a half an hour, it would clear up.  It did.  The Christmas decorations still looked cool in the rain.

The entire park was decorated for Christmas.

We snapped a quick pic in front of the castle before heading off to Tomorrow Land.  Tommy wasn't quite sure what to think just yet.

When I went to the gift store to buy a poncho for Andrew, Tommy started eating his pretzel snack.  You can bet your ass we packed ALL his food for the day after the Rain Forest incident (see Part II).

Tommy had his pretzels but we had Mickey Pretzels from Tomorrow Land! Yum!

We rode our first ride of the day in Tomorrow Land called the People Mover.  Tommy loved it! Look at his cheese face! :) (This was after the ride by the way.  It wasn't a people mover like in an airport. That was just how you got off the ride. It was actually a slow moving train ride.) 

After that, we found a DJ playing "Today's Hit Music"and Goofy came out to dance.  Andrew and Tommy cut a rug with him in the center the crowd.

 We stood in line for the Dumbo ride thinking it wasn't actually going to be an hour long wait but it was.  We ran out of ways to entertain Tommy after about 20 minutes so we got out of there.

 We decided, instead, to go on It's a Small World.  Took some time to take a quick "Selfie" of the group.  Look at Tommy making his best goofy face. Gawrsh!

 The sign when you go through says "Welcome to the Happiest Cruise That Ever Sailed!"

 It definitely was the happiest cruise for Tommy.  He really enjoyed it.  We pointed out all the animals and things he would recognize.  He even started to jam out to the music after awhile.

Then we went to get pictures taken with Goofy and Donald.  We had to stand in line for this, OF COURSE! Before we saw Goofy, Donald made a special effort (when he was waiting for the next kid to come up) to walk over to the line where we were standing and give Tommy a high five and 'knuckles'.  It was so cool!  Tommy was completely enchanted after that happened.

So when we actually got up to meet and get a picture with Goofy, he was cool as a cucumber.  No big deal.  A giant quirky dog in his face was no problemo! :) He wasn't scared at all.

 Then we met Donald after that.  Giving him a high five the second time was totally old news! :)

 I had set my purse down in front of this little set up and Donald accidentally tripped over it.  I almost took Donald DOWN on his FACE!! YIKES!! I felt horrible! This picture is of Donald recovering very gracefully.  Heehee!! The people in those costumes are definitely professionals!
(I do love the look on Tommy's face in this picture.  It was like he had something to do with it!)

 Here's a nice family picture after the Donald Duck Drubbing Debacle.


Our next stop was the Haunted Mansion.  Before we went on that ride, we stopped to get a bite to eat. It was the saddest thing in the world.  We ordered 2 plates of chicken nuggets and fries and drinks (which was an astronomical $32 or something ridiculous).  Tommy sat there going, "I want chicken nuuuugggggeeets!" We had to tell him No over and over again.  It was awful because here we were scarfing down our nuggets while he whined for some.  So finally I said, "Tommy, these nuggets will make you puke."  He seemed to understand that.  But we had to use a little reverse psychology to get him to eat his sandwich.  Poor kid. :(

 I didn't get any pictures of the Haunted Mansion but this is a picture of Tommy playing outside of it.  It is definitely different riding the Haunted Mansion with Tommy.  We kept telling Tommy "Oh look at the silly ghosts dancing!" "Look at the kitty cats! They're so nice!" or "See the nice woman talking?"  HA! Poor kid.  He was a little scared but just from the darkness.  He did really great.  We were so proud.

That evening it got dark and pretty darn cold.  I think it was in the 50s.  Which isn't that bad considering our blizzard weather in Indiana.  But with just t-shirts and shorts, we were freezing! 

 Some of us didn't prepare for that kind of weather (most of us), so we had to buy the overpriced gear in the gift shop.  I wanted to buy a freaking blanket. It's the same one the little girls are sharing in the pic above.  It was $18.95 according to the sign.  However I didn't read the fine print.  You had to spend $40 to be able to buy the blanket for $18.95.  WTH?? I did, like a fool.  But other people in our group were able to sweet talk the cashiers and they only had to buy the blanket.  No fair! :)

On Main Street at a certain time, it started to "snow".  It was so cool! It was actually tiny little soap bubbles when you could examine them up close. Not really sure how they did it.  But it was safe to get in your mouth and eyes (or at least it didn't burn I guess).  This picture looks like Tommy is reaching for moon.  Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down. :-) 

My mom took this picture of the Keiper Kiddos.  She put it on facebook and didn't realize until the next day that Lilli is accidentally flipping off the camera.  Heehee!! We laughed so hard.  So did the kids.  

Here's more Main Street Christmas decorations.  You can almost see the snow in the picture.

Our main goal in going to the Magic Kingdom together was to get a family picture in front of the castle.  It took us until 7:30 pm to finally get everyone together for a picture.  It was taken by professional photographers at the park. I captured the preview pic online for the blog.  Ssh, don't tell!

We walked up closer to the castle and we found out they had professional photographers about every 20 feet.  We got another picture closer to the castle when they lit the lights before the Christmas show.  We really had to squish together.

We watched the Mickey Christmas Show where all the Disney characters come out and sing Christmas songs.  Tommy LOVED that.  He didn't take his eyes off the stage the whole time.

It was also getting really late and really cold.  He was wrapped in a blanket and getting tired.  But he didn't take his eyes off the stage.

 After the Mickey Christmas Show, there was a light show ON the castle.  It was soooo cool.

 It was like they kept repainting the castle right in front of our eyes.

 Magical! How did they do that??

Our day at the Magic Kingdom, although we didn't ride many rides, was really fun.  Tommy did amazingly well.  Especially for a kid who was recovering from sickness and an allergic reaction AND hadn't had a nap all day.  Way to go, Tommy!

Part IV coming soon!