D - Hollywood Studios

Day #3 was another early start with Disney Magic Hours at Hollywood Studios. Yep. We took advantage of that early morning time every day. It really is the best hour of the park for getting those major attractions knocked out. It was almost worth how tired I was!

After getting our fast pass to Toy Story Mania, we did the Star Wars attraction. Mike had to admit that he was a little giddy. Did you realize there's a little geek in him? Because Noah has never been a Star Wars fan we thankfully got to skip the long line that all the other boys his age were waiting in to do the jedi training. I'm guessing Mike was secretly a little disappointed in that.



Hollywood is a really fun atmosphere. The cityscapes set up throughout are just amazing. Having been in San Fransisco a few years ago, it was really cool to see this view. It looked remarkably real.



Before we left on this trip I made the kids watch the movie Honey, I Shrunk the Kids because I knew there were a couple of different attractions related to it. They really loved the movie's playground adventure set here.



Here we are waiting for the Indiana Jones Stunt show to start. This show was great for Mike and I, but the kids really couldn't get it. They didn't understand that movies are made with actors playing a part and definitely couldn't grasp this show that skipped back and forth between talking to the characters as actors making a movie and then shooting scenes for that movie.

It DID, however, peak their interest in Indiana Jones. Since we got home, they've both watched the movies a couple of times. Katie really loves them.

After lunch we took our fast passes back over to Toy Story and it was another family favorite of all the parks. It was so much fun!

And here is where the Hollywood pictures end. Did I mention that this was a business trip for Mike? He left us at this point and went to a meeting. The kids and I had a couple of unique Disney experiences at this point that were such fun for us.

As we hustled our way to the Beauty & The Beast show, Katie fell and scraped her knee. It was bleeding a little, so I asked some of the people working in front of the show if they knew where I could get a bandaid. They wanted to walk me over to the first aid station, but it would take too long and we would miss the show. I told them that I would just take her when it was over because it really wasn't that bad (but you know about the magical healing properties of bandaids, right?). So, they seated us in the VIP section of the show, and the seats were awesome! Afterwards, they walked us through the backlots because it was a much faster route to the first aid station. It was so cool!

Once we got Katie bandaged up, I realized that we were right next to the guest services office. Because Noah had lost his OU hat the day before at Hollywood, I went in to see if they had it. While we were there, I saw a woman flipping through a book of Disney pins which Noah had been collecting and trading (FUN!). I asked the customer service rep if those were lost pins because Noah had lost one of his favorites a couple of days earlier at Animal Kingdom, and if they kept them we might be able to go back and get it.

She regretfully told me that the book was not for lost pins and that none of the parks had anything like that. Bummer! Then she got out a pad and started writing and told us to hang on for a minute. She gave us a $25 voucher for a new pin! Since pins only cost about $6, Noah was able to get a set of 4 pins with his voucher. He was so pumped! And on top of that, when he was shopping for those pins, he found another one of the one he had lost and was able to get that too. Those are our 2 favorite stories of the awesome Disney service that you always hear about.

And now back to our narrative....This was the only day of our trip that we heeded the advice of our books and went back to the hotel to relax a little. I needed to do some laundry, and the kids REALLY wanted to swim so it was nice. In hind sight, we should have done this every day, but it's just so hard to stop!

After our relaxing afternoon and reuniting with Mike, we went back to Epcot for dinner in the world showcase and the Illuminations show. It was fantastic.

It didn't' start until very late and Katie was so sleepy that she fell asleep in the middle of the loudest fireworks show ever. We love this picture that Mike caught of her as she leaned against her light saber from pure exhaustion.

This was another wonderful day. I really love Disney by night - so beautiful!