OK, sorry to leave you hanging! Well, not really, but you get the point.
There we were on the loading platform and Katie had gotten cold feet. So what did I do? I dug deep......... called on all my sympathetic motherly intuition........... and did what anyone else would do........... I SHOVED her into the ride vehicle and told her it would be fine!
OK, before you decide I'm a horrible person, I need to mount my defense. RnR and California Screamin are really just about the same ride. And she LOVED California Screamin. And I did what I thought was best for her........
So how did it go? I really was nervous as the ride progressed, feeling an ever growing sense of guilt......... or was that my stomach turning upside down??????? As we neared the end and I looked over at her, she asked "Is it over?" When I said that was it, she gave me a big thumb's up and said she loved it. WHEW! I hadn't scarred her for life. Well, at least not THIS time!
It was still sprinkling outside, so no photopass photographers were out, but I couldn't resist taking one of my own:
At that point, it was time to get to the Animation Building for Character Palooza! We were not disappointed and were happy to get photos with Genie, Aladdin, Jasmine, Mary Poppins, 2 Penguins, Stitch, Pluto, Minnie, Mulan, Captain Hook, Mr. Smee and the Queen of Hearts. And all within 45 minutes! Character Palooza remains one of my favorite things at Disney. I really wish theyd do more of it.
And my favorite shot:
Katie had really wanted to eat at the Sci-Fi Diner this trip. Since we were supposed to eat at the Brown Derby for lunch, I didn't think I'd want another sit-down meal. But I found an ADR late in the game for dinner time at Sci-Fi and grabbed it. I figured if nothing else we could get off our feet and just have milkshakes. Well, since missing our nice table service lunch, we both enjoyed having a full dinner.
After dinner, it was dark, so we headed for our last stop of the day
.. the Osborne Lights. I knew it would be busy that night since it was EMH with no Fantasmic. It was in fact pretty crowded, but I managed to get my tripod set up a few times and we soaked in the Christmas atmosphere!
This last photo was from photopass:
I asked Katie if she was done for the day, and she was. We did still have fastpasses for TSM, but neither of us cared enough to go do it. So we had fun picking someone in the crowd at the Osborne lights and surprising them with TSM fastpasses they could use right away!
Soon after, we headed out of the park and back to the POP. I had trouble sleeping the night before and was more than ready to call it a day.
When we got back to the hotel, I stopped in at the front desk to sort out our ticket issues. I had plans of hitting the Magic Kingdom early and didn't want a detour to Guest Relations again. It took a while, but they ended up rebooking our entire package and issuing new KTTW cards. To make up for the hassle, they gave us 2 sets of fastpasses to any WDW attraction and a taxi voucher to make up for time lost. Also as a consequence of rebooking the package, our dining credits were reset, so we got 2 extra table service meals! It was very generous, and I was happy with the way they handled it. We also got the Christmas tree and set it up when we got back to the room.
It had been a great first day. Before going to sleep, I checked the weather report one last time. I was more than a little concerned about the upcoming day. They were calling for a low in the 20's, with wind and a high in the 40's. After the record heat on our last trip, this was going to be new territory for us!