The Parents Visit

My parents were both delayed getting here on Thursday and I say both because they took separate flights. My mom was using her frequent flyer miles and my dad decided he would rather take an earlier flight. My dad came and picked me up at my apartment in a shiny bright red Dodge Avenger. It was quite the sporty rig, he picked it because he thought it would stand out in a lot...it sure did. We went and checked into our resort Disney's Boardwalk Inn. We got a quick bite to eat on the boardwalk, loaded up with beverages at the gas station and went back to the airport to pick up my mom. She was so overjoyed that she had made it she almost teared up or maybe the was some of the heavy rain leftover from earlier in the day. She said that she ran to her plane in Atlanta because she thought she would miss it otherwise and then had to sit on the plane at the gate for an hour...we were all happy that she made it.

We went on a scavenger hunt to find her food when we returned to the hotel but sadly almost everything was closed at midnight so we had to settle for animal crackers from the vending machine...bedtime at last came far later than I was used to and I fell asleep with my parents talking to me I was so tire.

We were planning on going to Animal Kingdom on Friday morning but we awoke to POURING rain. So we did what we do best and went shopping! My dad sat in the car and read because he just is not a shopping kind of guy...hard to believe I know. After a few hours at the mall we headed back for Disney property and went to our favorite park Epcot! We got through a lot of stuff despite the rain. One of our favorites was Spaceship Earth...it was like going to a comedy in the movie theater with my mom---she was laughing so much. I am sure my Grandma will giggle imagining this because she always goes to the movies with my mom when they are together and every time they come home and she tells us how loud my mom was laughing at the movie. At the end of the ride they take your picture and put it on a cartoon body. you answer a few questions and it chooses a little script that your character does. It was great.


We met up with Katie for dinner in Norway at the Akerhaus. Turns out it was a Disney princess dinner so we were immediately thrown in front of a camera with Belle from the Beauty and the Beast. Somehow my dad missed the 300 times that my mom and I watched that movie as a kid because he had to ask Belle who she was. He thought that all the princesses were hitting on him all night...whether or not he realized that they socialize with everyone...I am not so sure. The best was when Snow White came to the table because he actually knew who she was so he put her on the hot seat and started asking her questions about the 7 dwarfs...that poor girl.
We watched Illuminations:Reflections of Earth which is the fireworks show at Epcot and then headed back to the resort for some shuteye and rejuvenation for the next day.

Saturday morning we were up early and arrived at Animal Kingdom in time to see Mickey Minnie and Pluto welcome the masses. While at Animal Kingdom my parents were able to meet some of my work pals and we saw some great animals including the new baby gorilla.

This is a gorilla drinking water from the stream but the baby gorilla look quite similar to a human gorilla, just really furry.