Grown Women Gone Wild – Disney Princess Half Marathon Weekend (February 21-25, 2014) is in the bag and what an awesome time we had.
This weekend had been in the planning since June 2013 when discussing with my BFF what she wanted to do to celebrate the end of radiation & chemo treatment. She wanted to do a race and I decided it had to be all bling, sparkle and over the top fun.
The Disney Princess Half Marathon was just the celebratory ticket.
And there was no skimping on the bling…from our awesome purple tutu’s infused with glitter (I think I’m still finding glitter in places that there SHOULD NOT be glitter) made by Pattey’s daughter, Candice, to the larger than life tiara’s, to the coordinated tops & socks, to the BEST WINGS EVER – we were blinged out, BABY!
We also maxed out on the activities (well, not really cause EVERY.SINGLE.THING. costs a fortune). We went to the Pasta in the Park Party on Friday night in Epcot, where we ate so so pasta & chicken with a cash bar while jamming to an awesome DJ and watching adults and kids alike dance to the latest tunes. We piddled around watching this little girl make dance moves like the next Beyoncé, and missed our opportunity to take pictures with the Disney Princesses.
- As a side note, from our weekend observations, Princess Tiana gets short 
shrift everywhere at Disney World. We had to scrounge to find even a pin of the Princess character in any store – and we went to plenty. She was not represented ANYWHERE we could see during the race. We saw every single other Princess, villian and Prince Charmings EXCEPT for Tiana. Interesting and a damn shame. They would have gotten a whole lot more money out of me had they had some Tiana merchandise. HUMPH.
We tried to wait for the Epcot Illumination show but we were too pooped to party anymore and decided to go back to the hotel.
The next day was the Packet Pickup at the Expo which they housed at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports.
We got there around 2pm and ended up shutting the expo downt. We worked this madness with a purpose and didn’t miss a booth. Whew Chile. We found our names on the New Balance Wall of Fame. We had our pictures taken at the Lady Footlocker booth with the giant fairy wings and tiara, had our eyes checked (and the lady exclaimed to Pattey – “Do you drive at night?!” I was DONE), tried on every brand of compression socks known to man, bought charms, and almost passed out from starvation.
After the Expo, we grabbed a quick bite to eat, went back to the Wyndham and laid everything out for our 3am wake-up. Had to be in our corral by 5:30am – AKA – OH DARK THIRTY.
Sunday morning came real quick and we were off. We had to carry our tutu and wings with us in the backseat of the car as, well, it was a little to cumbersome to drive in full regalia. We got parked and made the gazillion mile trek to the corrals. I swear 20k people did a 3 mile forced march to get to those corrals. Amazing. We were in Corral I and it took 30 min for our corral to get to the Start Line and begin the race.
We were off and my girl, who 4 weeks earlier had a surgical procedure and hadn’t ran in 15 months ran this race like a gazelle. I would end up catching up to my junior Kenyan when she would stop to take pictures and whatnot. She was just amazing. The race was fun and colorful – filled with supportive, happy people enjoying a run in the parks. We had glorious finishes and hung out with some women in the Self-Check (DIY first aid) who had a 5 pieces of bling. They had done the 10k & Half earning the Glass Slipper Challenge Medal and had done a half marathon in California which also earned them the Coast to Coast Medal.
We were JELLY!
It was decided, right then and there, that we would be coming back and at least doing the Glass Slipper Challenge (10K & Half) next February. DONE!
MUST HAVE THE BLING!
After hobbling back to the car, grabbing a sammich from Panera, and peeling out of our compression socks, we took to the hot tub and pool at the resort. It was most awesome!
We managed to pull it together to go across the street to eat, make it back to the resort and pass out. The FireMarshall skyped me at around 9pm and when he said he wanted to call me before putting Cara to bed, we were like “da hell is Cara up this late for on a school night” –we couldn’t believe it was only 9pm. It felt like we had been asleep for hours.
We certainly got our rest because the next morning we were up and our at the Lake Bonavista Prime Outlet and we did some major shopping damage that ended up requiring the purchase luggage in order to get it all home. Note to self – always put a foldable duffle in your luggage – you know you are going to shop!! 6 hours, 9 bags, 2 pieces of luggage later…
Best time EVER!!! Already looking forward to next year for Grown Women Gone Wild – part 2.
I put together a video slide show from the weekend. Enjoy! – We certainly did.
