Disneyland

Grant, me, Matthew, Anna, John and my Dad on Splash Mountain

Grant wanted to be in the front.  Scott was in a log behind us.  He had run off to get a fast pass for something and come back in record time.  We rode with him later.  Once when I was younger my friend and I rode a log on Splash Mountain right in front of a log carrying Michael Jackson and some of his entourage.  True story.

Emma was too short for Splash Mountain so she got to go on The Winnie the Pooh ride a lot

John also opted out of a second trip on Splash Mountain.

Matthew and Grant rode again.

We warmed up later

Some of us were able to go on Indiana Jones after that and then Jungle Cruise.

Pirates of the Caribbean was closed.  :(

I love Jungle Cruise.  It never gets old.

Grant and Emma were really excited for Autopia

Grant took me on a wild ride that involved not steering very much.

He's almost 6 so we've got 10 years to straighten out his driving habits.

On the Storybook boats

Ready to get eaten by Monstro

Prepping for teacups

My mom took the younger kids - the low spin teacup

I was in the high spin teacup

They had a plan to keep the teacup spinning as fast as possible.

I can only ride that once a day.  The other ride guaranteed to make me sick: Star Tours

On Space Mountain.  Or Hyperspace Mountain.  It's now Star Wars themed.  The first time we rode it the audio on our car was broken so it didn't make a lot of sense.  But it worked the next time.

Grant, Scott, John, me, Matthew and Anna.

This might be in the Tiki Room?

Scott and Matthew got us Dole Whips.  Hooray!

We watched most of the Main Street Electrical Parade!!

And everyone was tired.  We made a list of everything we went on the first day and it was pretty substantial.  We did lots in Fantasyland and even made it to Toon Town and Small World.  John and Emma liked Small World.  Emma said "the dollies are singing!"  She was cute.

These two boys rode in the stroller a lot.  We carried Emma.  And I ended up carrying John a lot too when it wasn't his turn in the stroller.  He is so big and even now, a week or so later, my arms are still very sore.  I definitely overdid it.  Mom and Dad I hope you don't have super sore arms from carrying kids!!

Another day at Disney.  Dumbo!

Casey Junior

Winnie the Pooh again.

We went on almost everything we wanted to the first day so we were able to do some repeats the second day.  We went on everything we wanted to except the Monorail.  The line was always long.

Trying to pull the sword from the stone

We couldn't pull the sword form the stone, but it wasn't for lack of trying.

John agreed to sit on a carousel horse but changed his mind just as the ride started.  He spent the ride trying to unbuckle himself and shouting that he wanted to get off.  I'm afraid I have scarred him for life.  :(  Sorry John.

Maybe he forgave me later when I let him have some churro

On the Alice in Wonderland ride.  The line was sort of long but I love that one.

by the Alice ride

This might have been Small World

So it was a fun and busy two days.  The kids slept deeply at night.

More SoCal adventures to come.

California Adventures

The kids had a week off school last week (mid-winter break).  Scott was able to take some time off from his very busy job and we went to Southern California for the week.  My parents made a last minute trip out to California and met us there for a few days.  The drive down from our house is about 5 hours.  Everyone did pretty good in the car...except Emma.  She had a few tantrums in her seat but we made it.  Poor Emma.

We got to our hotel room in the early afternoon and the kids loved the bunk bed in there.  

We swam at the pool at the hotel and had dinner at Panera by Disneyland.

Anna lost a tooth on the drive down.  The tooth fairy even found her in the hotel.

Here we are after breakfast and ready to head to our first day at the parks.  

First stop:  California Adventures.

We went on Midway Mania and then the Ariel Carousel.  Grant and John like riding on the bench on carousels for some reason.  Grandpa sat by them.

Emma on the carousel with Grandma

Scott and Matthew went on the big rollercoaster that goes upside down.  We watched them.  

Matthew, Scott and I went on it again later in the day.

Can you spot Scott and Matthew?

Here is my mom with the kids near the Cars ride.  The ride broke down just as my mom and some of the kids were finished riding...and they had to wait a little before getting out.  But we got to ride it.  It's lots of fun.

We waited a long time to go on the bumper cars in the Bugs Life land.  Bumper cars give me anxiety. I'm always worried about getting stuck.  It wasn't so bad this time.  Grant did the driving and I could just blame it on him.  Anna was a bit anxious when she got stuck going the wrong way for a while.  We had fun though.

Scott with (probably) John on the bumper cars.

I think this was on Mater's Junkyard Jamboree.

Just before starting

And during the ride.

Emma did have fun...I think.

Grandma and Grant on the Junkyard Jamboree

And Matthew and Anna.

They got to go together a lot because they are old enough to go alone (without an adult)

Just before getting on the dancing cars ride (Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters).  I'd never been on that one. It was really fun.  The cars just dance around - no track so you don't know where they're going and towards the end they form up and do a line dance.  It's cute.  We also enjoyed Ghirardelli ice cream at the park.  So that was day one of our trip.  The next two days we were at Disneyland!!