long ago, in a park far, far away

now, i’m not sure if any of you know this, but the reason i skedaddled out of new york so quickly after school ending was star wars weekends. you might remember me talking about them last year, but here’s a little refresher: for the last two weekends in may and the first two weekends and june, hollywood studios is overrun with star wars maniacs. disney brings out lots of star wars characters and there are lots of cool events and meet and greets with actual celebrities (not just chewbacca) and my favorite part: merchandise!

you may be saying to yourself “but kaylyn! do you even care about star wars? i don’t think you’ve ever mentioned star wars in your life! do you know when the star wars began? who is the most famous general of the first star war? which battle won the war for the patriots?” and you’re right! i’m not really a star wars fanatic. i watched the movies a lot when i was younger and i’m pretty sure i dressed up as queen amidala for halloween once but i don’t really geek out over it like i do for a lot of other franchises. but i love space stuff, and i love people, so for me, star wars weekends is just so much fun! all of the fans get really into it and the energy in the park is palpable, especially for the closing event every night, the hyperspace hoopla. this year’s event was especially special because disney just acquired lucasfilm, so everyone was on edge to see how that would change it.

so without further ado, i give you: star wars weekends!!!

my first weekend was just hannah and i, but we ran into friends all over the park! everyone shows up for star wars. i got into the spirit of things by dressing up as my favorite little troublemaker, R2D2, and she wore a lego star wars shirt. one of my favorite parts of sww is seeing what everyone shows up in, from clever t-shirts to full on jedi outfits.

we spent the most time with my main man, chewbacca. he was still in the same spot as last year! i hope they gave that dude a break. he had an ewok pal with him too, and he became a fast friend.

next, we rmet up with some friends who had gone to the big merchandise tent, “darth’s mall,” because when we showed up they had a three hour wait outside! once i heard that, i frantically called everyone i knew so they could pick me up this year’s nametag, which ended up being pretty ugly compared to last year’s, but i got it! together we all traipsed over to the streets of america, where we saw jawas, clone wars stormtroopers, and mace windu.

hannah and i broke off from the group because they had already met darth vader. i was adamant about seeing him again after our romance last year, so into the line we went. i feel like we avoided all of the really long lines. i’m pretty sure chewie’s wait was the longest, and even that was less than an hour!

hannah really loves amidala, so we found her spot and were surprised to see that there was no wait at all! we walked up as she was leaving, but only waited about ten minutes to see her. honestly, she wasn’t very interesting. what was cool about meeting her was that the family behind us in line (the only other family in line at all, to be exact) had the most adorable little girl with them, and our outfits matched! i can’t remember her name, but i bet i’ll see her next year.

this year’s hyperspace hoopla was fantastic, and it ended with JEDI MICKEY! star wars characters and disney characters dressed as star wars characters were never on stage at the same time before this year, so everyone freaked out. i freaked out, 50 year old men freaked out, it was great.

we finished the night in darth’s mall, because everyone else disappeared. my friend kaitlyn appeared, and i made her pose against leia’s backdrop, since she had already left for the night.

visit tattooine today, for all your shopping needs!

the next time we visited star wars weekends, we just had one goal: meet jedi mickey. we ended up seeing darth goofy too, so we were thrilled! leia minnie and stormtrooper donald were there, but like, donald??? minnie??? hello, the big cheese and my father and law are here!

the last time i went to sww, we dressed up again! hannah went with her friends the weekend before and they all dressed up, and i wanted in on the fun so i made them bring me along for the last weekend. hilariously, i don’t have any pictures of any of them. but they looked great, i assure you. and i became really good friends with them, so that’s good too!