Epcot Food and Wine Festival

Not my best picture ever. My sister took it and she is really tall, so my legs look two feet long. I mean, thanks for taking my picture, Suzanne!

Suzanne and me

Five of my favorite people, and two of my favorite people-to-be. We're all wearing buttons because it was Mike's birthday and Disney gives buttons that say "I'm celebrating!" to anyone celebrating almost anything, except the birthday person, whose button says "It's my birthday!" Everyone we passed said happy birthday to Mike, and someone actually congratulated Cary on Mike's birthday. Welcome to Disney World.

Academia: One of the nicest things about living in the Deep South is proximity to Disney World. On Friday, Cary and I, my sister Suzanne and brother-in-law Mike, and our good friends Jose and Adrienne took the day off and went to the International Food and Wine Festival at Epcot.

For those of you who don't live within a day's drive of Disney, Epcot is divided into two sections: the futuristic utopia world at the front of the park (where the giant golf ball you've all seen is), and the World Showcase in the back, which is like a sample platter of the world's countries arranged around a lake. Every year Epcot puts on the Food and Wine Festival in October. They set up booths for all the countries featured on the World Showcase plus a ton more, and sell tapas-sized plates and alcohol from each country. So basically, you can eat and drink your way around the world.

Which is exactly what we did. It was a perfect day; the weather was gorgeous and Epcot is not so full of awesome rides that you would ever feel guilty about spending a whole afternoon meandering and eating, instead of standing in line. We just moseyed around, which was great for all of us - the pregnant members of our group because they needed to rest more, and the non-pregnant members because it gave us more time to drink our sample-sized beers in between booths.

Sartorial: When I go to theme parks, I dress for comfort over style. There is nothing worse than getting to 3:00 in the afternoon at Disney World and having sore feet, because you paid $80 to get in and there's no way you're leaving before nightfall, even if you feel like amputating your feet would hurt less than continuing to walk around.

I have found myself in this boat too many times, so when I got dressed on Friday morning, I picked clothes that could stand a long car ride and a long day of walking: wide-leg comfy jeans, breezy blouse (it's still in the mid-80s in Orlando), and TOMS. This is probably not my most stylish look ever, but I didn't want to cut my feet off at the end of the day, so I count it a success.