Disneyland: Day Two

Our second day at Disneyland is the day we regretted not heeding the advice of a friend. You see, each park does an early open "Magic Morning," where a select number of people can get into the park an hour early if you have a special pass. Enticing, right? My friend told me that they let way too many people into the park for early opening and to go to the opposite park. But, feeling very special and select, we joined the literally THOUSANDS of people that had magic morning passes. As we arrived at the gates of Disneyland and they were totally packed with people, we should have jumped ship and headed to California Adventure instead! But we didn't. Even though we got in by about 8:30, Disneyland was already packed.

I thought it would be a good morning to take a picture of my parents with the kids in front of the castle. Nope. Hundreds of people speed walking to their selective ride lines. So frustrating! This unfortunately is our only castle picture.

Snow White's fountain was a much better place for a family picture.

Thankfully, the line for the carousel was short. We found carousel's to be a great "bang for your wait."

Here is Seth

Sammy

Titi and Josh

Next, we headed to "It's a Small World." Notice the look on my Dad's face: he's not a fan and humored the kids by going. Notice my mom's smile in the row behind: she LOVES the ride! The kids loved it too!

Look at the wonder on Josh's face.

Another place where the crowds were manageable was Toon Town. It's towards the back of Disneyland and not as popular as other places.  

 There were fun places to explore and all of the character's "houses."

 Before we went to Disneyland, I had given the boys their Mickey Mouse shirts. Josh was very excited about his and told me one day before our trip, "I'm going to wear my Mickey shirt in Disneyland and go poop in it." That dream indeed came true.

The boys loved "Goofy's Gadget Coaster." This is Ben and Seth.

I wanted the boys to find a hat for a souvenir, so we spent some time in a shop trying on silly hats. 

 Joshy quickly became attached to his "Donald Ducky" hat. Of all the hats to pick out, this was the only one Josh wanted. He wore it the whole rest of the trip and we didn't see one other person wearing it. The overly large bill constantly smacked us in the face as we were holding him. 

 Next we went over to Tomorrow Land, which is total madness because of all the Star Wars stuff. The kids all really enjoyed the Buzz Lightyear ride, though. Then we had our fast passes for Space Mountain. Me, Josh, and the Donald Ducky hat waited for everyone else to get out of Space Mountain and ate lunch.

 Sam didn't love Space Mountain because it was so loud. Seth loved it though and went on it again with Ben and I with our stroller pass.

 We left the park after eating a packed lunch to rest and swim. Ben took Josh back to put him down for a nap and I let Seth and Sam play at the Lego Store for a bit. They made cars to race and Seth's won. It was a nice, calm non-ride thing to do. 

 I loved the hat that Sam picked out!

 Seth's was pretty cute too.

My parents and I then took the twins swimming at the amazing Disneyland hotel pool. It's designed to look like the monorail and had slides of three different sizes.

Small slide

 Medium slide

 And large slide! (This was the boys on their way up to the top of the big slide).

 Having already done big slides at Great Wolf Lodge, the boys were pros and bravely went down.

Swimming was fun and a great break from the parks. 

In the late afternoon, we switched parks and went to California Adventure. It was noticeably less busy. We spent some time in Bug's Land doing some little kid rides for Josh. The kids all really enjoyed the Mater Ride with grandparents while Ben and I watched "It's a Bug's Life," in 4D.

Then we walked through Radiator springs, which was absolutely amazing! We couldn't wait to further explore it on another day. This is one of my favorite pictures of the trip! (Seth, Sam)

And I know this next one isn't a great picture, but I had to include it because I have such funny memories of Josh being totally wired and crazy while waiting for our dinner. He kept running in circles and laughing. Sometimes you just have to embrace your kids craziness when you know they are tired and hungry! I'm sure the people around us were too impressed!

After dinner we went on a couple more rides as a family.

The big boys loved the Goofy roller coaster in this park too. We quickly learned that they loved the fast rides! (Seth, Sam)

After going on "Soaring Over California," my parents went back to the hotel for the night, and we decided to head back over to Disney to try to catch the parade and fireworks. We arrived just before the parade started and that was kind of a disaster. We couldn't find anywhere that the kids could stop and watch because the walk ways all have to stay open. We were all getting frustrated until a really nice lady let the kids stand in front of her to get a glimpse of the lighted up floats. Thankfully, it ended up being a pretty good spot for the firework show over the castle and we were able to stay and watch that. It was an absolutely amazing show, complete with a couple minutes of Frozen's "Let it Go," song and real snow coming down on us. Truly magical.

As we slogged back to the hotel after fireworks, we were all absolutely exhausted! Remember, we had started the day at Disney, then went to the hotel, went swimming, went to California Adventure, then back to Disney. So. Much. Walking. The kids were troopers and it was a great day! Least to say, everyone slept amazing that night!

Disneyland: Day One

We've been home from Disney for a couple weeks now, and the further away from the trip we get, the sweeter the memories are. The trip was truly wonderful. The Disney experience is kind of magical.

 Immediately after the trip, while we were feeling absolutely exhausted, it was easier to remember the crowds, lines, expensive food and overstimulated kids. Now, however it just the good stuff we think of! We're so thankful for my parents for taking us to Disneyland and for the experience we got to have together.

Here's a picture of the kids ready to leave Monday morning. We  had booked a flight that wasn't too early, so we left for the airport around 7:15. It was Josh's first time in a jet and the twins were so excited for him to experience it! We borrowed a small backpack from a friend for Josh for the plane, and he was so proud of his "red backpack." 

The airport with kids is always such a fun experience of seeing new things!

Ben got to be Josh's flying companion. We all loved watching his excitement as we took off!

Dad and Seth were flying buddies. Thankfully (and surprisingly) Seth didn't spill his drink on Papa. They were a great team.

That left me, Mom, and Sam. We purposefully put Sam next to Titi because he loves to speculate and analyze details of everything, so had been asking millions of questions about what Disneyland would be like. And mom, well, she loves answering and telling details. It was a match made in heaven! I was on the end, so I got to take the twins to the bathroom multiple times. They were afraid of flushing with the door closed, so the whole flight got to hear their loud flushes!

We were blessed to stay at the Disneyland hotel! Staying right next to the park was absolutely amazing, and the atmosphere was unbeatable. Upon arriving at the hotel, there were characters outside to greet us! Here's mom running off with the boys to see Chip (or Dale). 

I had expected the kids to avoid the characters. Instead, they loved them! Look at the smile on sweet Sam's face below:

The lobby chairs were teacups. Here's Titi and Sam:

Seth and Josh:

And all the boys. Having them matching was very helpful in keeping track of them!

The next character we saw was Goofy. When I complimented the twins about how brave they were walking up to goofy, Sam told me: "Well, I figured I had to get used to it sometime, so I may as well start now." Good thinking Sam.

Goofy even watched some cartoons with the kids in the lobby.

Sam and Seth with Pluto

Josh wasn't too sure about the characters, but I got him to come into this picture by encouraging him to touch Minnie's ear. Meeting Minnie was my favorite: she was so little!

The rooms were so great! The head board lit up and played a little melody. Seriously magical.

Since we had ate a packed lunch on the shuttle on the way to Disney, we were all ready for the park by the time we checked into the hotel. We were through the gates by 2 pm!

I ran and got everyone a fast pass for Thunder Mountain Railroad. While we waited for our fast pass time, the kids tried out the shooting range. They loved it. We also went on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Sam really didn't like the ride, not necessarily because it was scary, he just thought the boat went slow and it was boring. He didn't hesitate to tell us the entire trip that Pirates was his least favorite ride.

Joshy didn't nap this day. But he still did pretty great.

The twins with Papa...ready for their first of many roller coaster rides.

After Thunder Mountain, we decided it was time to find a ride for Josh. We picked Dumbo because the line looked reasonable. Forty five minutes later we were on. (If this was a "low" crowd time for Disney, I shutter at what a busy summer day must look like!)

Ben was a trooper in holding Josh while we waited.

All the kids loved Dumbo. Seth and I were riding buddies this time.

Daddy and Josh

Titi and Sam

My handsome hubby

That evening we had a little mishap with accidentally eating flour tortilla chips (gluten) for dinner. So I rushed back to the room with my dad to take some medicine to minimize the reaction. Ben and the big boys went on (and got soaked by) Splash Mountain, while Josh and Titi discovered the Pooh Ride. The Pooh Ride had no line and by the end of the night, Josh had gone at least five times, and with Ben, me and my mom. He LOVED it!   I love his face in both these pictures!

So that was Disney Day One. After the boys went on Splash Mountain and got absolutely soaked, we decided to turn in for the night. It had been a very fun and exciting day! All travel went smooth and praise the Lord, none of us reacted to the gluten!