I actually started writing this yesterday, but my computer pooped out on me. What a pain...

What an amazing experience I had in California! It's truly difficult to really put into words the feelings and enchantment that I felt throughout my entire trip, but here we go!

My experience actually began several days before CIV as I went to L.A. to visit family there before the convention started. What a whirlwind trip it was, too. I don't think I've walked so much in almost all of my life, but that's a sidenote.

I started my trip staying at my uncle's home, which is right at Marina del Rey beach! It was beautiful and we started my very first night there walking all over the beach and up to Venice Beach, which included Muscle Beach! LOL! Love it as I am a long-time fan of Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello movies as well, including "Muscle Beach Party"! What a sight!

Over the next day, we went to the La Brea Tar Pits, which I'd seen before, but which are, none-the-less, truly amazing!!

I decided to go to Disneyland while I was there, cuz I'm a Disney girl! I'd been before, but you can't get too much Disney! First stop... Jedi Training Academy! I was so excited to have Star Wars before I even got to CIV, I called Mina so she would 'be with me" while I was there! Hee hee! Thanks for indulging me, my dear friend! Anyway, before I even got to see the show, I found a Jedi meal to eat! Woo-hoo!

The show was fantastic! I loved that they brought a bunch of kids (Younglings) up on stage to teach them some lightsaber techniques! Then the younglings had the chance to fight Darth Vader and Darth Maul!! Oooooohhh! What fun! I never wanted to be a kid so much in my life! *I think we need a little "jealous" Yodacon, but I don't know how we'd do it since they're all already green*

Ok, so then it was off to Star Tours, naturally! I had to take in the Indiana Jones Adventure as I'm not only "Hansgirl" but also "Harrison's Girl"! Next, was the Pirates of the Caribbean! Who can go to Disney and NOT get on that ride? I loved the subtle ways they incorporated the new movies with the existing ride features. It was very well done! I did some other things, too, but only had 5 hours total to spend there. I did manage to get some great Star Wars loot from the Star Tours gift shop!

By this time, I was staying at my cousin's home and for the remainder of the time I spent there until the convention. That included the fabulous 6 movie marathon!! Woo-hoo!! What a fun day!! Granny-Wan and I had made arrangements to meet for this event and that made it even more special!! Afterwards, I briefly met up with JP77, GWJ, Deej, JMW and her daughter as I needed to give JP her graduation present!

Finally, it was day one of the convention! I started out by going that morning to meet my wonderful Crew at the airport! I first met Mina and Darth Jazzie at their gate and what a wonderful reunion that was! Love you!! Then, we went to retrieve JediLily!! Next, arrived Viagoangel and E&HF5!! Finally, we met with MO2YP, AS1, and PS77! Our airport squee-fest was complete!!!

We went to check in to our lovely hotel, the Westin Bonaventure and immediately decided it was time for some FOOD!! Luckily, there was a string of eateries right across the street, so we had our first Crew lunch together!!

Finally, we went on to the convention!! Woo-hoo!! What a spectacle to walk in to all those SW fans!! After getting various lanyards, badges, packets, etc. it was time to really see it! The first thing we ran across with a full-size R2D2!! We also just had to see the giant Jabba and it was fun getting PS77 with her Leia costume to sit with him.

Next, it was time to go on up to the Dealer's Room!! So much Star Wars, so little time (and money LOL!)! We went on and went through Artist's Alley first so those of us that wanted to could grab the prints we wanted. That was a ball as we met the various wonderful artists, including Steve Anderson, Joe Corroney, Tom Hodges, Jan Duursema and all the others! What a thrill, especially as I would so love to do my art professionally with them! *sigh*

Ok, so after looking around at as much as possible and diving heavily into the funds for the convention, it was time to go to the Meet & Greet!! Such an absolute blast to finally meet so many of the wonderful bloggers here and interact and get to know people better! We couldn't resist getting a giant group picture together! JP77 delighted us with her fabulous Cantina Jam!! Woo-hoo!! A preview of her contest no less. Darth Kerfluffle was so cool and took pics of all of the feet wearing my shoes! LOL!! It was also fabulous that some of the VIP's came to have fun with us including Abel Pena, Steve Anderson, and Joe Corroney! It was so wonderful of DJMaul to get this event going and hosting it! He did an absolutely fantabulous job! Thanks, Deej!

Ok, so next day it was back to the con fairly early to get done what we wanted! So many people were there, including Cap'n Jack Sparrow?!??!?! Oh well, it was fun!

First, it was off to the autograph lines! We had a wonderful time interacting with some of the wonderful stars of Star Wars including Peter Mayhew (I got him to sign my shoe where I'd painted Chewbacca! LOL!), David Prowse, and Kenny Baker. We also had a chance to see Amy Allen interacting with C-3PO and R2-D2! We also waited to get Carrie Fisher's autograph and that was wonderful! She is truly beautiful (inside and out)! We took a break from that to start the long wait to get into the Opening Ceremonies, but it was worth it! What a blast to have the Trojan Band come and play Star Wars music!! Then there was Steve Sansweet doing some of the hosting dressed as an Ewok! To celebrate the 30 years of SW, they brought a CAKE!! And we all got to share in the cake celebration! Most of the plates even came with little SW rings of Vader, R2 or 3PO. That was fun! They announced the winning stamp and it was great to be one of the first to see Yoda unveiled.

Next day, it was time to start again! JP77 and PS77 both dressed as Leia for the day and they looked so beautiful! I still needed to get Anthony Daniels autograph as Mina and Jazzie had already done him the day before. That's a whole story in and of itself!! (Maybe the next blog...) While I was waiting in line, he came into the line aisles to see people and to check out the cool 3PO helmets that two people had! He was also a joy to meet!

There were many other things to buy, see and do in the Exhibit Hall (dealer's room section) and I found HAN!!! Squeeee!! We also ran into Quinlan Vos! What a heartthrob!! Ok, embarassing moment... the day before when I was getting artists prints and autographs, I was speaking to Jan Duursema about her Quinlan Vos painting and talking about how gorgeous he was and right at that moment, her model for Quinlan Vos, Doug Wangler, walked up to her table. She turned to him and said (because he seemed to wonder what was going on), "She thinks you're gorgeous." Talk about embarrasing!! It was ok, though. He was beautiful and I got a picture with him dressed as the character!! Squeeeee!!!

At this point, because our dear friend M68 was able to finally join us for the festivities, a bunch of us decided to meet for lunch together! That was so fun and chaotic all at the same time. Funny story was that I called JP77 to let her know where we were meeting and got her voicemail. As I was leaving the message, I don't know what happened to my brain, but I called the "Death Star" the "Darth Ball", so from that point forward the DS became the Darth Ball!!! Lots of laughs!! Naturally, group photos again had to be taken! I just thought it was too cute that Mina's, Jazzie's and my backpacks all ended up on the same table and were exactly alike...

We had a little time to go see the Lucasfilm Archives exhibit, where I found Han's Hoth jacket *sigh* before waiting to see our own JP77 compete in the Star Wars Celebrity contest! Let the Princess win!! (She should have, you know...)

Then, it was immediately time to begin waiting for the Conversation with Carrie Fisher event!! Luckily, our dear Jazzie didn't go to Star Wars Celebrity with us, but instead waited outside in the line for the Carrie Fisher event! Love her! That event was one of the highlights of the convention for me. Carrie Fisher is hilarious as well as a fantastic speaker! She even showed us her tattoo!! What a great event!!

Next morning, it was time for our Fan Club Breakfast! Mina, PS77, Deej and I were all set to attend this amazing event!! A great time was had by all as some fun speakers attended including Mary Franklin, Dustin (our Fan Club President), Tom Hodges and Steve Sansweet! Jay La'gailla was also the host of this event and we all had a chance to meet him personally and get his autograph! He was so kind!

It was then off to do some more at the convention! Mina and I spent some time looking at some of the various things in the Fan Fair Hall which included a Landspeeder, fabulous Dioramas and Star Wars cars such as the Millennium Falcon!! Woo-hoo! I need to decorate my car like that!

It was time to attend PS77's Costume Contest, so we all gathered again for this beautiful event and PS77 looked amazing!! She should have won as well, but alas no...

More autographs and pics with fun stars!! We made the rounds to Ray Park (so nice), Daniel Logan (Baby Boba LOL!), Felix Silla (I'll always think of him as Twiki ), WAMPA! (so funny), and Jake Lloyd (he grew up so cute and very polite).

Last day... We began saying goodbyes, shipping all of our loot and doing some last minute looking around! I found another HAN!! We also did a small group picture with the R2 mailbox at the Convention Center!

We had a great time!! To top it off, my hubby had called on the second day of the convention to tell me that I had a package! It was from our lovely Jedi Melinda Wolf and I had won another of her raffles! What a nice thing to come home to!! Thank you!

Once all of my CIV loot had finally arrived, I just had to put it all out to see what I'd gotten!! LMAO! Wow! Plus some fun with all the lightsabers!

May the love of Star Wars never die and may we all see each other at CV!!!!! Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!