Day Two and One Red-Faced Momma!

There was only one must-ride ride at Hollywood Studios that our family really wanted to do: Toy Story Mania. We didn't get to do this ride last year because it was so new and the wait for it was over 2 hours long. With a 2 year old, that's just not doable. Even though it's still popular and has the longest wait times in the entire park, we knew we wanted to try it this year.

There are two wonderful things I learned from the disboards. One is to always do rope drop when the park opens. Basically if you want to ride Toy Story Mania twice, you have to be there at rope drop so you can be at the front of the line and then jump into the Fastpass line to get one so you can ride later in the day with a minimal wait. That was what I really wanted to do.

The other thing I learned was to use Youtube to find out which rides Ann Catherine would be comfortable riding on. If you go to that website and search for a particular ride, for the most part, you'll find a video of it. So we did that with several rides that were questionable as to whether or not Ann Catherine would be willing to get on it and actually be able to enjoy it and not spend the whole ride hyperventilating. We narrowed down several rides this way but once she saw the video for Toy Story Mania, she was hooked and desperate to ride it.

So the original plan was to get to rope drop, try the ride out and then get a Fastpass if we liked it. But given Will's exhaustion-induced temper tantrum from the day before, we thought it'd be a good idea to give up on Rope Drop so we could get a little bit more sleep and instead just get a Fastpass. We eventually made it to the park about 10:00 am and Brian took off running through the park with our tickets to get our Fastpasses. He managed to get four of them but, believe it or not, our return time wasn't until 5:05 that night!

For that day, we had lunch reservations at the Hollywood and Vine restaurant. Luckily, the reservations were early enough that, by the time Brian was done with getting our Fastpasses, it was basically time to go check in for our reservations. We got in fairly quickly and filled up on the buffet before our characters showed up: JoJo and her friend Goliath, and June and Leo from The Little Einsteins. Now, Ann Catherine LOVED JoJo when she was Will's age so that little girl was basically in tears when JoJo came around to her table. She gave her the biggest bear hug and thanked us over and over again for taking her there so she could see her. On the other hand, The Little Einsteins are Will's favorite (besides that big yellow sponge!!) so that child was in heaven getting to talk to June and Leo. Even better, they realized that they were on his shirt (we had gotten him a Little Einsteins shirt before the trip specifically for that lunch) and Leo even wrote "I love the shirt" in his autograph book.

Unfortunately, this was the best part of the trip. From here, we decided to go see the Indiana Jones movie. Both children declared it too scary and wanted to leave throughout the show (which we couldn't do since we were in the middle of a row). From there, the day just went downhill.

After leaving, we decided to try a few more shows. On our way to the Muppets 3D movie (AC decided she's no longer afraid of it and wanted to go see it), we passed by the Jedi training at the Star Wars ride. Sure enough, out walked Darth Vader. Will kept wanting to know why "Darth Mater" was there. Cute! I just wish he had STAYED that cute.

Right outside the Muppets show, as you exit the building, is the exhibit where Mater and Lighting McQueen from Cars is stationed. Will immediately wanted to go over there. One problem: he wanted to climb INTO Lighting McQueen. We tried to explain that wasn't possible and tried to get him to pose for the picture. Not happening. So Daddy went over there to hold him. Not helping.

Melt-down city.

He screamed as we walked away. He kicked and screamed as we tried to put him in the stroller. The stroller became a weapon (not ours - but his). And we decided it was time to leave. Oh yes, my face was bright red all the way to the front of the park. Actually, Brian's was too - not from mortification like mine but from exhaustion from trying to hold the screaming, hitting, bitting, squirming child with 18 arms and legs. Oh yes, it wasn't my imagination this time. Everyone really WAS staring at us!! Finally, at the front of the park, I convinced him to calm down by letting him push the stroller. My children have always been like that - they'd rather push that stroller than actually get in and ride it. That's fine if you know how to steer it away from other people. Yeah, my 3 year old doesn't care about other people and pushes it where he feels like it.

When we got back, Will mentioned being hungry. Now, I know he throws temper tantrums like that when he's tired but now I was starting to wonder if maybe those screaming fits could also be tied to hunger. He didn't eat much at lunch since he was so busy with the characters. So we stopped by the food court at our hotel and got individual pizzas for both kids. After swallowing his pizza practically whole and then spending an hour laying on the bed and watching TV, we decided to brave the park one last time. We REALLY wanted to use those Toy Story Mania Fastpasses and, by leaving then, we knew we'd make it there just in time to use them. So we gave that park one last shot.

Riding Toy Story Mania was wonderful. We had no wait and both kids LOVED it!! Will loved it so much that I had to help Brian peel him out of the seat because he didn't want to leave the car at the end! But outside, he was distracted once again by the toy shop right outside the ride. Yeah, Disney does this purposefully. Right away, Will decided he wanted the entire store. We settled on a large Buzz Lightyear.

By this time, we had time to stop by one attraction to see which characters were in there before we realized that it was just in time for the final show of the night: Fantasmic. Now, originally, Fantasmic was not scheduled to be shown on that night. Disney has made budget cuts and whittled that show down to just two nights a week. We hadn't planned on going even though we really wanted to see the show. We had heard such incredible things about it but didn't have a chance to see it last year because of the crowds and my hyperventilating daughter. This year, with our much braver child, we hoped to get in to finally see it and was disappointed to see that it wasn't scheduled. But at the last minute, we heard that Disney was updating their schedule and had added a few shows to the week. I checked the updated schedule on Disney's website and, sure enough, they had added TWO shows for that night.

Since Will was distracted and happy with his new toy, we thought we'd give it a try. Sure, AC was a little nervous (we had warned her about a gigantic dragon and the other evil characters in it), and Will started getting bored and begging to go home (HOME - not the hotel). But, by now, Brian and I were determined to see this show. And I'm so glad we stayed. The show was INCREDIBLE and even the kids liked it. Brian even cried at the end because a huge boat comes around the corner with a whole bunch of characters and, at the top, steering the boat is Mickey dressed as Steamboat Willie. Now, if you don't know, of all the characters Mickey has ever played, Steamboat Willie is Brian's favorite. So that man had tears streaming down his face as he watched Steamboat Willie drive past.

Of course, I thought he was being silly. Now I realize that I shouldn't have so been cynical...which you'll hear more about tomorrow as we're off to Magic Kingdom. There, we'll also have a lesson learned and one hyperventilating daddy!