Family Trip to Disneyland

On Tuesday, after Joel and Kezia finished school, we loaded up the van and drove to Anaheim to go to Disneyland. It's been a bit hectic around here so I only booked the hotel on Monday and packed quickly that same night. Well, that's just life right now.

The kids were pretty thrilled about going to Disneyland. The drive down was pretty uneventful; we are blessed with kids who travel fairly well.

We arrived at the hotel around 6 and pulled out our picnic supper. Afterwards we went for a bit of a walk and went to the Disneyland gates. There were a lot of people walking back for the evening activities so we headed back to the hotel. It didn't take the kids too long to go to sleep, Joel and Kezia that is, Asha took over an hour. She was thrilled she could see Joel and Kezia lying in bed and Carl and I were sitting in the other room watching t.v. So at 9:30 we got Asha up and went to see if we could see the fireworks from Disneyland. They must not have had any that night, because we stood out on the balcony for 15 minutes before going back to our room. It still took Asha another 15 minutes to get to sleep.

The next morning we woke up at 8 and everyone got ready for the day. Joel and Kezia were just about jumping out of their skin. We decided that we would only go to Disneyland and not the California side; plus we scoped out the areas that our kids would enjoy and headed there instead of wandering aimlessly around the park. My mom had given me a guide and recommended certain things.

So our first stop was Fantasyland where all the princesses were....

Kezia was so amazed. We went and saw a little show, heard princesses read stories, waited in line for 65 minutes to get pictures with Jasmine, Belle and Poccahontas. Sigh. We didn't do too many of the rides because there was lines and we decided that 20 minutes was our limit. That's okay, our kids are too young to know what they are missing. But they did have a chance to go on the boat through storyland and we rode the teacups. Joel got a crown from the prince and princess show that he wore the entire day.
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After we headed to Toontown and met Mickey and Minnie Mouse. The kids were so happy that they gave them each huge hugs. Asha was just curious about Minnie's nose.

The highlight of Toontown was the roller coaster. We took the kids twice; once with me and once with Carl. Kezia said that the roller coaster was even better than seeing the princesses. Can you imagine her saying that!? It must have been fabulous for her!

After Toontown, we hopped on the train and rode around the park one and a half times. It was a nice break for our feet and then we could see the Grand Canyon display and all the dinosaurs. That was Joel's favourite part of the day.

We stopped and walked along the cool shops in Main Street USA before heading to Adventureland. Joel wanted to see Tarzan's Treehouse and it was worth weaving through the crowds so the kids could play on it. They had a great time climbing up the ropes and jumping on the hanging bridge.

We headed out to buy a a few souveniers. I thought it would be fun to get the kids Mickey ears, but at $15 a pop, I changed my mind. We got Joel and Kezia a tee-shirt and Asha a tinkerbell hat (she was okay with that because she knows in 2 years Kezia's shirt will be hers...unless it's all worn out!). Carl and I splurged and bought a fridge magnet and $64 later we made it out of the store.

Well, it was getting close to 4:30 and we were all really tired. Asha had a little nap in the morning, but hadn't slept all day. Thankfully she was still pretty happy. And Joel had been fairly cooperative all day....but Kezia had two meltdowns in 15 minutes and that's when we knew we were done. Kezia doesn't usually jump up and down, flailing her arms like a firecracker screaming and yelling over a sorbet cone.

We headed for the gate and just as we were leaving, Mulan was posing for pictures with the kids. Kezia was disappointed that she didn't have her picture with Ariel or Cinderella or Mulan during the day. Her face lit up when Mulan crouched down and posed for a picture with her.

Ahhhh.....so we were done. It was a fairly relaxing day because we only went to half the park. We knew that there was no way we could see it all, and that's okay. We loaded up on the shuttle back to the van and Asha was still making eyes at everyone around her.

For supper we ate at Marie Callender's and then put the kids in their pajamas before we headed out. We left Anaheim at 7:15 and with only one stop for a bathroom break we made it home at 10:45. The kids slept the entire way home, so Carl and I had a very nice visit.

It was a great little family trip; we all had a wonderful time. Though I have been gallivanting all over California with the kids or with friends, we haven't gone somewhere as a family since November. I must say it was quite a Magical Day.