The "weekend" began on Thursday morning. Mom and I headed out and made a pitstop at Millenia to go into Lululemon. Big mistake. I love this store, but really need to stay out of it. I inevitably spend money. I use everything I buy, and its great quality, but I need to ground myself from there. We stopped in the food court and had these delicious salads. After that we headed out to the Wide World of Sports to the Health and Fitness Expo to pick up our packets and shop some more. The expo was already crazy crowded when we got there, and it was maybe 1:00 in the afternoon. I think we had to walk almost a mile from where we parked the car! We went in to packet pickup and got our shirts and bibs without any issues. Then we shopped. This is the first time ever that I have been to a Disney race and not bought one single Disney item. I was so beyond petrified that I was not going to finish the race that I did not want to jinx myself with any extra merchandise I may have to get rid of later. I ordinarily am not this superstitous, but I was just feeling less than prepared. Normally, my Disney philosophy is "if you think you may want it, buy it, because it will be gone later". There are so many runners and not that much merchandise, so thinking about things and coming back later is never a good idea. Mom was looking at the "In Training for 2012" shirts but decided to just wait and think about it for a while. We went back to the Expo on Friday after the 5K and there was not a single "In Training" shirt to be found. I strictly adhere to the "rule" of never wearing anything race related until after I have finished the race, but sometimes you just have to buy it and hide it in a bag or something!
I was pretty good at all the other booths as well. Actually I do not think I bought anything until we got to the Running Skirts booth. This is another one where I have no self control. I just love their skirts and compression socks (which are a lifesaver when it comes to keeping my shins happy). If I am going to run and there are going to be photographers on the course, I want to at least look somewhat decent. And after running any distance, I am guaranteed to look rough, so anything I can do to somewhat help the situation is always a plus in my book. I have also gotten mom hooked on them, so we both did some damage, but we will be dressed beautifully for all of our races :-)
After the Expo we headed over to Hollywood Studios (which I still catch myself calling MGM, even though it has been who knows how many years since it has been changed...oh well). We had a dinner reservation for Mama Melrose's. This was the first time I have eaten there and it was pretty good. We split the gnocci and penne ala vodka. Both were good, although I would have been much happier if there were no onions at all in the penne, but it was not the end of the world to eat around them. We also treated ourselves to a bellini cocktail...always a smart idea the night before a run :-) It was small though, and we had plenty of water to go along with it. All in all a pretty successful dinner! (Note to self: take more pictures...even of food)
We finished eating just about the time the sun was going down, which meant it was time for the Osborne Family Lights to be turned on. I have no idea how I have lived in Florida for all of this time and somehow have never seen these lights! They were so awesome. I must admit, that I am a sucker for anything Christmas-y, so they of course made me very happy. At certain times they play music and make the lights dance to it, which is fun. And they even have snow falling from...well falling from somewhere. Of course the analytic nerd in me is dying to know how many workers it takes and how long it takes for them to get those lights up and down. Knowing Disney, it all happens in one night, but as far as the rest of the logistics one can only imagine!
We walked around a little bit more and then headed to the Caribbean Beach Resort to check in. This was the first time I have stayed at this hotel, and it was pretty nice. Although, the last Disney resort I stayed at was the Grand Californian, so this was obviously no where near the amazingness of that one, but it was still nice.
After unloading all of our things and whatnot, it was early to bed for a crack of dawn wake up call for the 5K. Well it was early to bed for me, mom is a night owl, and she eventually fell asleep with her iPad on her pillow and her head on her iPad. Which could not have been comfortable, but I have woken up to find her in much crazier positions!
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