Today is my 30th Birthday, and in honor of this milestone in my life I will be starting a new series of posts called Photo of the Day.  It's an idea that I am stealing from both Danielle (who did it when she turned 30) and Sarah (who is currently doing it on FaceBook).  I am going to attempt to take a photo of something every day.  Maybe it will be something I do, something I see or of some sort of event in my life.  I'm not entirely sure how it is going to work out, but I think it might be an interesting retrospective on a year when I am finished.

My photo for today is a shot I took of myself with some lovely flowers that arrived at my office today, bearing 21st Birthday wishes from Phlip and Colleen, and a warning not to get too wasted!  I am planning to keep them in my office to enjoy for the rest of the week.  Thanks guys!

So as a lovely little surprise today, Ray took me out to brunch at our favorite breakfast place, Sneakers, and five of our best friends were waiting to eat with us!  Danielle, Jami and Tonya did the tough work - showing up an hour early to secure a table for seven!  It was a wonderful meal, and the company couldn't have been better.  Happy early birthday to me!   

Sadly, today is our last day of Disney.  This morning we packed up and checked out of our hotel, well, not before Ray left me have ice cream for breakfast!

We checked our luggage with the Magical Express folks for our later trip to the airport and then we hopped the shuttle to The Magic Kingdom!  Upon arrival we were instantly greeted by a parade!

Now if that doesn't make Disney feel like magic, I don't know what does!  After a little parade time we headed straight for Tomorrowland - I wanted to share Space Mountain with Ray, first thing!  Unfortunately, Space Mountain was closed!  Boooo!  As a consolation we hopped in line for the Tomororwland Speedway, which turned out to be anything but speedy.  Today is really the first warm day we have had at Disney, and since it was a Saturday the park was rather crowded with hot, tired kids - and it's not even lunch time yet!  But we made the most of our wait in line and the hopped into our tiny little race car, and Ray took the wheel to drive us around the guided track, doing a very good job at not hitting the very slow child in front of us.

Next we shot clear across the park to Adventureland for the newly famous Pirates of the Caribbean ride!

When the first movie first came out I was struck with how many elements from the ride they had managed to pull into the film.  Now it's gone the other way around!  Davey Jones, Captain Barbosa and Jack Sparrow pop up at unexpected times!  But no flash photography allowed - sorry for the blurriness!

Next we headed for Frontierland for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad Rollercoaster and Splash Mountain!  The folks getting off Splash Mountain actually looked pretty wet, and we had a plane to catch later, so we decided to skip it.  Thunder Mountain had quite the wait - so we opted for our first, and only, use of the Fast Pass.  We relaxed and ate lunch as we waited for our Fast Pass time to arrive.  We ended up in the first car on the coaster and had quite the wild ride!

After Thunder Mountain we enjoyed the Haunted Mansion ride, that left both Ray and I wondering "how did they do that?" with many of the special holographic effects.  On our way our we ran into Dr. Facilier, the witch doctor for the upcoming Disney movie The Princess and the Frog.  He suggested we follow him down to the bayou, and while it was a tempting offer, we opted instead for Liberty Square.

Here we were able to see The Hall of Presidents, a show much more moving and interesting than I remembered it - well, that sort of thing generally means more when you can vote.

It's even been updated to include our current president!

At this point we realized we needed to be heading out of the park to catch our flight.  We stopped for a great photo of Cinderella's Castle and then magically found ourselves in the middle of another parade!

Before we left Disney I was determined to eat something Mickey Mouse shaped - don't ask me why!  Maybe it had to do with all the amazing sweet treats we had seen shaped like that famous head or maybe it had to do with Ray going on and on about an amazing rice krispy treat he had eaten his first day here, and I was anxious to see for myself, but before we left the park I purchased myself something yummy to remember the trip by!

We arrived at Epcot Center with a bit of time to spare before our 6:00 pm dinner reservation at Restaurant Marrakesh.  Since Ray had been here two days before, he took me on a quick tour of the World Showcase, pointing out where the Champlainers had eaten dinner in Japan and the awesome indoor (but looks like its outdoor) Mexican Marketplace.

After strolling around and doing a little bit of window shopping we made our way through the winding streets of Morocco and found Restaurant Marrakesh.  Our hotel concierge had recommended this restaurant to us, and we were both interested to see what the experience would be like.  Dinner was amazing!

There was a very cool Moroccan band that played and a family-friendly belly dancer (who Ray refused to take a picture of, I think he was afraid he'd look like a perv).  Apparently when the resturant was built the King of Morocco sent his artisians to do the interior tile work - it's so beautiful! 

The food was unbelieveable!  We shared a small carafe of Moroccan wine, and started with Goat Cheese and Crispy Bread for Two, which I cannot describe because it was just too yummy!  Then I had the Chicken Bastilla for dinner, which is actually an appetizer.  Bastilla is a pastry filled with spiced minced chicken and almonds covered in powered sugar and cinnamon.  Actually, they gave me Chicken and Beef Bastilla, since they didn't want me to be hungry.  It was awesome - and I was even able to share with Ray!  Ray had roast lamb (which he loved) and couscous flavored with orange, which he let me have a bit of and I nearly finished for him.  We loved the food so much we actually purchased the cookbook... now I am dreaming of couscous at home...

After dinner we did a bit more exploration of the World Showcase.  We stopped in at China and saw an amazing 360-degree movie called Reflections of China that certainly made us both want to visit!  In Japan we watched pearls being removed from oysters and valued and we even stuck our heads into Germany's Oktober Fest.  By about 8:00 pm we found ourselves out in front of Norway.  As we had been directed by our concierge we staked out an unobstructed spot to view the IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth music and fireworks display.  Ray had seen it on Wednesday, but wanted to share it with me, so we staked out our spot an hour before the show began.  Good thing to, many folks lined up behind us, and because of our excellent spot we were able to sit, relax and enjoy the show!

By the time the show was over, the park was closed for most of the guests.  As everyone headed for the exits, Ray and I headed to Future World for some rides!  Our first stop owas Test Track, a wicked fast "test drive" in a GM car which took us through all sorts of twist and turns, quick stops and even a short burst outside!  This was definitely Ray's favorite ride at Epcot.

Then we stopped in at Mission: SPACE where I decided we would do the "intense" ride.  It's a family theme park right - we're  not little kids, we can handle it!  Well, I was TOTALLY wrong!  While the experience was really cool (we got to be part of a 4 person space team), and we got to experience ACTUAL G-FORCE it also made us rather ill.  The best piece of advise we were given, don't close your eyes and look straight ahead.  While we didn't get physically ill, we both felt rather sick and headache-y afterwards.  So I thought some soothing slow rides would do just the trick!

We headed over to The Seas with Nemo & Friends for a slow ride (which was a bit of a review of Finding Nemo) and some time staring into the huge and amazing aquariums.  We saw all sorts of fish, sting rays, sharks and plant life.  I even found Nemo!

At this point we weren't feeling any better, so I decided some sugar was in order.  Since we couldn't find a place to sell us a soda or some ice cream, we opted for immitation Swedish Fish from a gift shop, and it did just the trick!  Within 10 minutes our headaches were pretty much gone and we were feeling much better.  At this point it was getting late, so we decided to head back to the hotel.  Another amazing day, but I wish it wouldn't go by so fast!

Since Ray had already been to Epcot Center with the other Champlainers on Wednesday, we decided we had time to revisit Disney's Hollywood Studios to do the two things we had missed out on yesterday.  First on the list was to head back to The Magic of Disney Animation and actually take the drawing class.  While we had seen the video the day before we weren't able to stay for the class since we needed to get in line for Fantasmic.

While Ray waited in line I took the chance to look around a little bit - and saw this amazing display of all of Disney's Oscars!

We were the last two people let into the class, and due to a bit of a mis-count, there weren't actually enough seats for both of us.  Since Ray is the real artist in the family, he took the seat at the drawing table and I got to document the event!

The class was really interesting - after deciding which character the class wanted to draw (in this case, Minnie Mouse) the instructor showed everyone how to create the basic shapes that made up Minnie.  No erasers allowed!  Everything was done with light sketching and followed by dark lines when you got things just right.

Not too shabby!

After drawning class we headed to the Toy Story Midway Mania, the 3D Toy Story ride we had missed the day before.  I think this might be the most popular ride in the park - and it certainly was our favorite!  Fast passes were already long gone for the day, so we waited in line for well over an hour - but it was totally worth it!

I think this might be the perfect ride for Ray.  It's a 2-person car, and each person has their own "gun" - you are spun around to various 3D screens where you get to experience a Toy Story-style shooting gallery!  They even keep score - while I held my own, Ray beat me solidly!  It was awesome and amazing and we laughed the entire time!

After the Toy Story ride we decided it was getting late and we should head over to Epcot Center for the evening.  Instead of taking the regular shuttle bus, we opted for the International Gateway boat.

The weather was gorgeous so we sat outside on the back of the boat and enjoyed the slow progress and sunny skies.