Day 3 - February 9, 2010
Disney Hollywood Studios
Chapter 1 (Otherwise known as the morning I almost divorced my husband!!)
Just kidding of course, but you'll see why in a moment.
We awoke this morning, got ready as usual, and prepared the stroller for our day at DHS! The forecast was iffy today - chance of rain - so Shawn mentioned about taking the rain cover that came with the stroller (we were given a free rain cover since we were a repeat OSR customer). The rain cover was kind of bulky and since we had a couple of blankets stored beneath the stroller (did I mention it was cold) I told him no, we would just bring our poncho and use that if we encountered a quick storm.
We left the Poly and headed to the car to drive over to the Studios. The plan for the day was to spend our day at the Studios with Monica and family and all have dinner together at Sci-Fi!! Woo-hoo! How cute would all the kids be sitting together in a big car at the Sci-Fi, we thought!!
We were ready to endure our TSM rope drop madness morning (did it in 2008 so we knew what we would be dealing with) but this would be Monica and family's first time with TSM!
Here was our plan of attack:
* Get there as early as possible
* Wiggle our way up to the ticket turnstiles
* Send Shawn with all our tickets to get up to the front of the rope
* Kids and I hang back from the craziness and head down Sunset Blvd to meet up with Monica and kids (Dave would be doing the same thing with their tickets)
* We would all meet back at RNRC for the Dads to take the boys on the roller coaster
First up....we arrived around 8:30 and got up in the shortest line we could find. I think I texted Monica to let her know where we were and then we waited. After a short while, the American Idol folks starting coming by and interviewing people and "warming up the crowd"! They were funny and made the waiting seem to go by quickly.
A few camera phone pics:
(Michael was showing the camera his Star Wars/Mickey Bar shirt we made....he loved it)
Then they let us in and we handed off our tickets to Shawn and split up! I find this a much easier method to do the TSM rush. I have no desire to take my kids and stroller and squeeze my way through the crowd in order to get in the standby line for TSM. It's just not worth it to me. However, rope drop is still necessary in order to get two rides in since we go right back at our first return time (9:50 usually) and get a 2nd one (which by then is pushed WAY out into the afternoon) We tried this same method in Oct of 2008 and it worked fabulously!
Only one of us has to endure that rope drop craziness!
So at the rope we waited once again and I entertained the girls by letting them take pictures with my camera. Here are a couple of Emily's:
Then Katie took a few. I didn't see them until much later on when I was looking through my pics for the day. They all pretty much looked like this, so I will just post one for you to see.
(Her lovely self-portrait making some kind of weird face....that girl is so funny)
Me and the kids were not close at all to the rope but we did get to see some funny streetmosphere where we were standing. However, here is the view from where Shawn was standing right up against the rope!
Kind of scary, no?
What I find more scary than the crowd is the glare he is getting from the guy in the burgundy shirt right up front. Creepy!!! 
The guy in the green is smiling for the camera though!
While we were hanging out for the rope drop, Monica at this point had texted me that her Mom had forgotten her park ticket so she was going to head back to the hotel to get it. Dave had managed to get up closer to the front to do the TSM rush with plans to meet back up at RNRC just like Shawn, but I couldn't find them anywhere in the crowd. No worries though since I knew we would be meeting up with everyone soon!
The rope dropped and off we went!
The kids and I took the right turn to make our way down Sunset and in short order we were standing in front of RNRC waiting for Monica and family to join us.
(A nice empty RNRC area....wonder where all the crowds went???? LOL!)
(Michael's playing air guitar I think)
A few minutes later they were there and all the kids were excited to be back together again! Come to find out, Monica's Mom didn't have to go back to the hotel to get her ticket. She went to Guest Services and they were able to replace it for her!
So we talked for a bit while waiting for the guys to get there.
After about five minutes, Dave showed up, breathing heavy, with 5 TSM fastpasses in hand and ready to go on RNRC. But where was Shawn? He was even closer to the front than Dave.
We waited a bit longer, I walked out unto Sunset to look up to see if I could see him, I took pictures of the kids, I talked to Monica, we dwelled a bit on the fact that it was starting to rain, I walked back to Sunset, back to Monica and kids, and then it dawned on me. 
Shawn had gone rogue!!!
Sara
Disney Hollywood Studios
Chapter 1 (Otherwise known as the morning I almost divorced my husband!!)
Just kidding of course, but you'll see why in a moment.
We awoke this morning, got ready as usual, and prepared the stroller for our day at DHS! The forecast was iffy today - chance of rain - so Shawn mentioned about taking the rain cover that came with the stroller (we were given a free rain cover since we were a repeat OSR customer). The rain cover was kind of bulky and since we had a couple of blankets stored beneath the stroller (did I mention it was cold) I told him no, we would just bring our poncho and use that if we encountered a quick storm.
We left the Poly and headed to the car to drive over to the Studios. The plan for the day was to spend our day at the Studios with Monica and family and all have dinner together at Sci-Fi!! Woo-hoo! How cute would all the kids be sitting together in a big car at the Sci-Fi, we thought!!
We were ready to endure our TSM rope drop madness morning (did it in 2008 so we knew what we would be dealing with) but this would be Monica and family's first time with TSM!
Here was our plan of attack:
* Get there as early as possible
* Wiggle our way up to the ticket turnstiles
* Send Shawn with all our tickets to get up to the front of the rope
* Kids and I hang back from the craziness and head down Sunset Blvd to meet up with Monica and kids (Dave would be doing the same thing with their tickets)
* We would all meet back at RNRC for the Dads to take the boys on the roller coaster
First up....we arrived around 8:30 and got up in the shortest line we could find. I think I texted Monica to let her know where we were and then we waited. After a short while, the American Idol folks starting coming by and interviewing people and "warming up the crowd"! They were funny and made the waiting seem to go by quickly.
A few camera phone pics:
(Michael was showing the camera his Star Wars/Mickey Bar shirt we made....he loved it)
Then they let us in and we handed off our tickets to Shawn and split up! I find this a much easier method to do the TSM rush. I have no desire to take my kids and stroller and squeeze my way through the crowd in order to get in the standby line for TSM. It's just not worth it to me. However, rope drop is still necessary in order to get two rides in since we go right back at our first return time (9:50 usually) and get a 2nd one (which by then is pushed WAY out into the afternoon) We tried this same method in Oct of 2008 and it worked fabulously!
Only one of us has to endure that rope drop craziness!So at the rope we waited once again and I entertained the girls by letting them take pictures with my camera. Here are a couple of Emily's:
Then Katie took a few. I didn't see them until much later on when I was looking through my pics for the day. They all pretty much looked like this, so I will just post one for you to see.
(Her lovely self-portrait making some kind of weird face....that girl is so funny)
Me and the kids were not close at all to the rope but we did get to see some funny streetmosphere where we were standing. However, here is the view from where Shawn was standing right up against the rope!
Kind of scary, no?
What I find more scary than the crowd is the glare he is getting from the guy in the burgundy shirt right up front. Creepy!!! The guy in the green is smiling for the camera though!
While we were hanging out for the rope drop, Monica at this point had texted me that her Mom had forgotten her park ticket so she was going to head back to the hotel to get it. Dave had managed to get up closer to the front to do the TSM rush with plans to meet back up at RNRC just like Shawn, but I couldn't find them anywhere in the crowd. No worries though since I knew we would be meeting up with everyone soon!
The rope dropped and off we went!
The kids and I took the right turn to make our way down Sunset and in short order we were standing in front of RNRC waiting for Monica and family to join us.
(A nice empty RNRC area....wonder where all the crowds went???? LOL!)
(Michael's playing air guitar I think)
A few minutes later they were there and all the kids were excited to be back together again! Come to find out, Monica's Mom didn't have to go back to the hotel to get her ticket. She went to Guest Services and they were able to replace it for her!
So we talked for a bit while waiting for the guys to get there.
After about five minutes, Dave showed up, breathing heavy, with 5 TSM fastpasses in hand and ready to go on RNRC. But where was Shawn? He was even closer to the front than Dave.
We waited a bit longer, I walked out unto Sunset to look up to see if I could see him, I took pictures of the kids, I talked to Monica, we dwelled a bit on the fact that it was starting to rain, I walked back to Sunset, back to Monica and kids, and then it dawned on me. Shawn had gone rogue!!!
Sara
Did he go on TSM without you guys?
.
Can't wait to find out what your DH was doing?
