This is what it looked like the day before we left for California...
And this is what we just left behind...sniff...sniff...
We just got back from Disneyland on Sunday, and I think my buns just stopped hurting from strolling around that park all week. We spent almost 15 hours there on our last day, Saturday! It was sad to leave, but let me tell you all about it!
Warning...this post is going to be very long, so don't feel bad if you don't read the whole thing!
We decided to make going to Disneyland a surprise for the girls and told them that they got to go on a work trip with Daddy. We tried to avoid telling them where this work trip was, but finally told them that we were going to California. They were so excited just about that because that meant they were going to the beach!
Taylor told all her friends at school where she was going and that she would bring back a seashell for them, even her teacher. She also told her friends that she would miss them and that she would never forget them. So cute.
Since they were so excited just to be able to see the beach, we could not wait to tell them what we were actually doing.
About a week before, Taylor found out that Disneyland was in California, but knew we weren't going there. And the morning we were going to leave, she was up early and came into my room while I was sleeping. She had made a card for Princess Aurora. She said "Mom, I was just wondering if maybe we could just go into Disneyland, we don't have to go on any rides, but can we just find Princess Aurora and give her this card I made her, and then we can leave?" I can't remember exactly what I said, but it was something like "I don't think so." I know that sounds so mean, but I didn't want to give her any hope that we were going there. I thought that was so cute, it made me even more excited to tell them our surprise!
Another surprise we had was when Hannah threw up the night before we were leaving. It turned out okay, she did throw up the next morning and when we were standing at the front of the airport check in line! She was fine after that...thank goodness!
This is them the night before we were going to tell them...clueless, watching a movie on Joe's laptop.
The next morning after we arrived in Anaheim, we got the girls ready, and Joe pretended that he was getting ready to go do work stuff. Then we told them that we had a surprise for them and that they had to sit on the bed. Check out the "We are going to Disneyland" reveal.
I think that was one of the best moments of this trip! I loved their reaction. All week, I just stared at their faces as they smiled and laughed at all the fun and exciting things they were doing.
I took this picture right after we arrived in Disneyland. Taylor looks a bit more excited than Hannah.
Our first day there was crazy and exciting. It was pretty busy there, but it was worth it! It really is the happiest place on earth.
Their first ride was the Merry-go-round in the Fantasyland area.
We went on most of the rides in that area that day. Their favourite was the Dumbo ride. We went on in about 4 or 5 times that week!
I mentioned earlier that it was very busy...
When we booked our tickets to go, we didn't realize it was the same week as Thanksgiving weekend, which is one of their busiest weeks...opps! It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was still SO worth it!
Another ride we went on was the Haunted Mansion, and it was "Nightmare Before Christmas" style!
I love that movie. And so does Hannah, she had been watching it everyday for the last month! So she wasn't afraid to go on the ride. She actually went on it twice. Taylor, however did not want to go on the ride.
We told her she had to try it once, and if she didn't like it she didn't have to go again...
Are we the meanest parent's ever? I don't think so, but maybe pretty close. It really wasn't that scary, but then again I am a little older than Taylor. But then again, Hannah is younger than Taylor.
This is after the ride...Taylor was crying. Hannah was...Hannah.
We had to cheer her up so we went to the Christmas Fantasy Parade. She loved that parade. She asked to go to it everyday, but we only went twice. She would get so excited when any of the characters would wave at her.
Hannah loved it too...
I had to get one picture of me on this trip!
And of course we had to go on Splash Mountain, it was one of my favourite rides! It was one of those rides that neither of our girls wanted to go on, but they had to try once!
As you can see from the look on Taylor's face, she did not like it. And Hannah's face you can't see, but she didn't like it either. In fact, the rest of the week, she kept telling us that she didn't want to go on the "hill splash ride" and made sure that we didn't.
We got to meet Tigger, Pooh, and Eeyore that first day. The girls were so excited! We bought them autograph books that we carried around all week for the characters to sign, and next to their autograph is a spot for their picture.
The next day we spent most of the day at the Princess Fantasy Faire.
First the girls got makeovers at the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique.
Yes. I let Taylor chose her own hairstyle makeover. I wasn't paying attention when they were choosing their hairstyles and they were already half done Taylor's hair when I noticed it. I didn't want to be that "controlling" mom that made her change her hairstyle, even though I wanted to be, and regretted the rest of the day not making her change her hairstyle. Maybe it was just me, but it looked like people were staring at her and how weird her hair looked. I kept asking her if she wanted me to take her hair out, and she would say "no, it's not bothering me." But I swear I saw some people laughing at her hair. It did look like 80's princess rocker hair.
Anyways, we got to meet almost all the Princesses that day. We met Belle, Ariel, Jasmine, Snow White, Aurora, Tinkerbell, Rapunzel.
I love this one of Hannah and Snow White. When Snow White came out, Hannah just ran up to her and gave her a great big hug and wouldn't let go. It was adorable.
And most of you know how much Taylor loves Aurora. She could not wait to see her.
And I love Cinderella, so I had to get a picture with her too!
The girls were so sweet when they were meeting the princesses. We even got to meet Mickey and Minnie. Here is one of the girls in Minnie's house, waiting to meet Minnie.
Princess Hannah on the merry-go-round.
What is happening in this picture you ask? All week, Joe would do coin magic tricks for all the kids waiting in line. Haha! The girls got bored of it after a while, but the parents of the other kids loved it because someone else was entertaining their kid!
Taylor finally said she wanted me to take out her hair! And then I made Joe try it on.
I think she looks much cuter with her own hair!
We went to the Christmas Fantasy Parade again, but at this time at night when all the floats were lit up. Taylor liked it better at night, so did I. And Hannah was pooped!
This is main street all lit up at night before the parade. So gorgeous!
Santa was at the parade! The girls were so excited to see him!
And here is Sleeping Beauty's Castle at night. I love it! So magical!
Later that night we went to the Fantasmic show. It was amazing. One of my favourite things to see at Disneyland.
The next day, we decided to hop over to California adventure and check out the rides there.
The first one we went on was the Grizzly River run.
It ended up being one of Taylor's favourite rides. She went on it 4 times. Hannah was 2 inches too short!
Another cool ride was Soarin over California. We sit in these seats that go high up infront of a huge screen to make it seem like we are flying over California.
We also liked this ride...
We also went to a live show of Playhouse Disney characters. Hannah especially loved the Little Einsteins part of the show.
We also got to see a live performance of Aladdin.
It was so amazing, another favourite!
The genie was hilarious. Check out this video of some of the genie's funny moments.
We also went to an interactive show called...
You get to talk to Crush from Finding Nemo. And after going to the show 3 times, he finally singled out Taylor. He called her Tubular Taylor. Here is the video of him talking to her. She was so excited!
There was also a place called...
There were 3 different rooms. In the first room, you could draw a series of pictures and then put your drawing in a sinning thing and watch your drawings move.
The next room looked like the library at the beast's castle. You could answer a bunch of questions and find out what Disney character you were most like. Taylor was most like...
I was most like...
Joe was most like Hopper from Bugs life, and Hannah was most like the evil queen from Snow White. Haha! The last question was: Do you like to have nice people over for lunch? or Do you like to eat nice people for lunch? Guess which one she chose.
We then went over to the Bugs Life area.
They had lots of fun rides, my kids loved them. They had spinning ladybugs, kind of like the teacups.
They had bumper cars...
They had a Heimlich train...
And they had a 3D movie called, "It's tough to be a bug"
Then we lined up forever for World of Color.
It was pretty amazing. But it would have been more fun to see in the summer I think. It was pretty cold that night, and the show didn't start until 10:30! The girls were pretty tired.
The next day we came back to California adventure and went right on the California screamin' rollercoaster.
It was pretty fun. Taylor even wanted to go on it by the end of the week. But she was about 3 inches too short! So Joe and I just took turns going on it.
We took the girls on some rides that were near the rollercoaster. Like another merry-go-round, a jellyfish ride, and this one...
This was Hannah's favourite ride. Taylor really liked it too. Me, not so much. We went on it 3 times in a row and I started to get queasy.
Then we went to a place called...
It was really cool. You sit in an auditorium, and they give you paper and a pencil. And a Disney artist shows you how to draw a Disney character. We went 3 times that week.
We learned how to draw Piglet, Donald Duck, and Minnie Mouse.
Hannah did a lot of this...
She started to get a really bad cough from staying out too late at Disneyland in the cold! opps!
That evening, we went to visit my Brother Dave, Karen, and their kids, Josh, Nathan, Kaitlyn and Emily.
This is me trying to be taller than Josh. I started to to on my tip-toes, but so was Josh, so it didn't work out! I can't believe how tall he is!
They invited us for Thanksgiving dinner! Yesssss! I love turkey dinner. And it was so good!
Then after dinner, we played this card game called 99, to see who had to help clean up in the kitchen. And Josh showed me and Hannah some magic card tricks.
Then everyone started showing off their cool tricks. Dave had this chair one and the girls wanted to show how flexible they were.
As we were leaving Taylor said "I wish we could live here." And I said, "Do you mean in California?" And she said, "No, I mean in this house." She really liked playing with her cousins!
The next day, we took a break from Dinseyland. It was Black Friday!!! I was kind of scared to go shopping anywhere because I didn't know what it would be like. And I went by myself! I went to an outdoor mall that my sis-in-law Karen recommended called Irvine Spectrum Center. And it was only 15 min away from our hotel. When I got there, I immediately went here and got almost all my Christmas shopping done...
It wasn't that busy either. Well, not as bad as I thought it would be. About as busy as a Saturday at West Edmonton Mall. Here are just a couple of the other stores I went to...
When I got back to the hotel, we decided to check out the beach. So we drove to Newport Beach, about 25 min away.
The girls loved the beach.
They pretty much ran around and picked seashells the whole time.
The next day, Saturday, was our last day. Waaaa! We got up early, 6:15am, to be at Disneyland by 7am. We had an early bird pass that we could use to get into Disneyland 1 hour before it opened.
When we got in, we went straight to Space Mountain to get on before it got too busy.
Taylor actually came on the ride with me. For some reason, on this day, our last day, Taylor became brave. She was willing to try almost any ride we went on, if she was big enough to go.
We also ran and got fast passes to...
And...
Taylor loved this ride! She went on it 4 or 5 times. I think this ride was her favourite.
We also went on...
I kind of remember going on this ride when I went to Disneyland when I was 12. I didn't remember it much, but I wish I had, because it was so long and boring! And the girls were both scared of it.
There was a lot of playing around this day waiting in line. The girls kept trying to pick each other up. At least they were both happy!
While waiting in lines, Joe did a lot of this...
And I saw a lot of this...
Hannah always wanted to be carried while we were waiting in line. She would ask if I could carry her, and then give me this face...
This also happened while we would wait in line.
Since it was so close to Christmas, Santa was there!
The girls got to meet Mrs. Clause
And Santa
He asked them what they wanted for Christmas. Taylor said "A DSi" and Hannah said "A new tutu." Check, and check...thank you Target on Black Friday!
We said goodbye to Disneyland and hopped over to California Adventure to go on more rides. There was one ride we had to wait a really long time for, about an hour.
While we were waiting in line we saw this...
He was singing and dancing. We got his attention and he singled out Joe. He said "You sir, in the green shirt, let me guess your weight." He paused for a moment as he looked at Joe, and then said "I would say about 45 minutes to an hour." Haha! He was right! Hannah had a little nap in line.
The ride was worth the wait. It was a really fun shooting 3D game.
I was with Taylor and I got 98,500 points with 71% accuracy. I thought that was pretty good, until after when Joe told me his score, 248,000, but his accuracy was only 30.%. We are not competitive at all!
This next part was one of the best parts of the whole trip...eating the turkey leg.
It was so good, the best turkey I have EVER had. The girls loved it too.
Then we went on the Ferris Wheel.
But we decided to go on a swinging one.
I did not like it at all! The girls were a little scared, but I think I was the most afraid on that ride.
Later, we watched the Pixar Parade. It had all the characters from the Pixar movies. And bubbles! The girls had fun popping all the bubbles.
After that, Taylor said she wanted to go on the Tower of Terror.
I was surprised she wanted to go on it. But since she was being brave that day, we said, okay, let's do it! Hannah, of course, wasn't scared to go on it. And she was barely big enough to go. Joe and I had already been on the ride once. And it is pretty scary, so we warned them, and they still wanted to go. The ride is like an elevator that goes up and down really fast. It's pretty fun. This picture below is taken when we are at the very top!
After, both girls were a little scared by the ride so before going back to the hotel, we decided to take them to the Bug's Life area again, so we would leave on a happy note. Well, while we were there, riding the bumper cars, it started pouring rain. Luckily this ride was under a canopy. So we went on the ride like 10 times in a row, waiting for the rain to stop. It eventually turned into a sprinkle and we strolled back to the hotel.
It was such an amazing trip, crazy busy and tiring, but so worth it. I know the girls had so much fun and will remember this week forever...
