Well, we are home...flew in last night to SNOW and freezing temps. Wow, what a welcome. Kids are out of school which I am excited about because I get to spend the whole day with them and tell them about our trip.
Ok, final day was Magic Kingdom. We got there right as they opened the park (missed the opening ceremony) and decided we would head straight for Space Mountain, get a FP, ride, and then come back to main street and look for Scoop.
I should stop right there and brag on my DH. He is not a pin trader. He's doesn't grumble about it or anything, just doesn't get into it. This sweet man wore a lanyard the whole trip (except when he was running) and I swear he made more trades than I did. Especially at Epcot, I would ask him "are you sure you're ok with this" and he kept telling me he loved to see me light up when I was trading. Such a great guy.
I should also stop and tell you that I have never met Scoop. In five trips to WDW in the last four years, he has never been there. I always ask and we just time our days wrong I guess. Anyway, I had read that Monday mornings were the best time to find him and I was determined.
As we walked through the tunnel and onto Main Street heading toward Space Mountain, I look over and there's Scoop. I about died. I grabbed DH and said, "do you care if I go ahead and meet him" He, of course, didn't care. Scoop was talking to another family and when he finished he started to walk off and I called after him. He walked up to us and I told him, "I have been dying to meet you for 4 years, I'm a pin collector!" He was SOOOO nice, hugged me, took a pic with me and then asked what I collected. I told him Princess and the Frog was our main collection and he said he didn't think he had any of those, but did I want to see his lanyard and trade. He pulled the longest lanyard I have ever seen out of his bag and Jonathan and I both had the biggest smiles on my face. I told him I had brought him a limited edition Princess and the Frog pin to trade and I picked a pin that was just pretty to me, and as he took it off, he said "good pic, you just got an AP pin." DH picked a pin and I thought our time with Scoop was over. Here's the pin I picked:
Pin 79784: Disney's Pete's Dragon - Elliott
That's when he said, "well since you have been waiting 4 years to meet me, I have a gift for you" and he pulls out this set from his bag:
Pin 74071: WDW - Epcot World Showcase Pin Set
and then he tells me it's an AP set! Ok, I about died. Seriously. I hugged him again, thanked him, and then he asked if he could sign it (I seriously wasn't thinking straight to even ask him)
From there, I floated down main street (literally, I don't think my feet touched the ground for an hour) and we did a bunch of rides and traded both vinylmations and pins. I will tell you that I noticed the most scrappers in this park. It seemed like almost every cast members lanyards had junk on them except for the managers. Even the pin books at customer service and the bakery didn't have anything great. We did our best trading at the little shop outside of Splash Mountian. The ride is closed for refurb so I guess no one goes into that shop, but we got a couple of LE's and a few older pins in there.
We haven't counted yet, but I think we traded about 200 pins in total. It was awesome. Plus, we still did everything we planned on doing which was really cool. My pin books are a wreck and it's definitely going to take some time to update pinpics
I actually received several trade requests while we were gone, so I'm excited to continue the trading from home!
THANKS for reading if you made it this far...I will be doing a seperate post about the lovely person that gave me all the scrappers at Epcot.