This is a picture from before we left, and I'm glad we took it then, because we never got around to doing one like it at Disneyland. We bought these sweatshirts (for us and the kids) and Nate's mom embroidered them for us. Each one is personalized with our initials.
Jedi Training. The kids were very excited about this. Natalie and Kelton both got picked the last time we went to Disneyland and they still remembered it. This time, Damon was old enough to do it too, but sadly, he didn't get picked. Here is Kelton fighting Darth Vader:
And Natalie fighting Darth Maul
Damon got to be Darth Mickey instead.
This is Natalie and me right before riding Thunder Mountain. It was the first time Natalie had ever been on it because it was closed on all our previous visits. Look at that face. She isn't excited at all. By the way, she loved this ride.
Thunder Mountain again with Kelton. He really liked it too. Damon went on this one, and Nate wasn't sure he really liked it. But later he was telling us it was his favorite. So who knows.
This picture is from one of the days in the later half of our trip. Both Damon and Arie fell asleep in the stroller. Arie's position was great. She likes to sleep on her tummy and being in a stroller wasn't about to stop her.
I still can't figure out how this is comfortable. I sat with the stroller so they could sleep while Nate took Natalie and Kelton on some rides. I saw so many people point and giggle about Arie sleeping in a stroller with her bum in the air. It was pretty funny.
These next few pictures are of the kids watching the parade.
Damon and Arie loved the Teacups. I don't think Arie was old enough to understand or express what her favorite ride was, but I think this would probably be it. When it started, she immediately started laughing. And if we were anywhere near them, she would shout out "Teacups!" The three of us rode this ride a lot over the course of our five days. When Nate had the older kids, this was kind of our default location. Fantasyland is somewhat central to everything and this ride pretty much had no line ever (meaning less than about a five minute wait).
I like this picture. I think Arie is checking out the lanterns that hang above the teacups.
By the way, it is very hard to take a picture in a spinning teacup. Especially when you are trying hard not to drop a small, expensive phone.
The two of them really would laugh the whole time the ride was going.
We managed to get in all of the rides in Fantasyland on the same morning. Peter Pan was closed the whole time we were there, which was really sad because that's arguably the best ride in Fantasyland. (Just a side note, Splash Mountain, Soarin' Over California, and World of Color were also closed.) But it was fun to go on all the other rides, especially some of the ones that we've always skipped in the past. Arie did not like the darker rides. Snow White's Scary Adventure really is scary. She didn't scream or cry, but she was very scared. The poor little girl hid her face in her hands and refused to come out. After that ride, she immediately hid her face in her hands on similar rides without even giving the ride a chance. But, she did like this one. This is all of us crammed into a caterpillar on the Alice in Wonderland ride--Natalie was in the front seat with me. I'm not sure if I'd ever been on this one before.
Look at how empty the park is! Not!! The parks were much busier than we thought they would be at the end of February. The first few days were fine, but Wednesday-Friday just got busier and busier. This is us leaving after a long day at California Adventure. Right before the park closed, we rushed to the back of the park to ride Toy Story Midway Mania. We
thought at that time there wouldn't be too much of a line. We were wrong. That ride is awesome. It's fun. It's really popular. It always has a long line. The end. But after getting off, and the park was closed, there wasn't really anyone left in the park. It was kind of strange to walk around without crowds of people, or any people really, all over the place.
Ferris Wheel
Pixar Play Parade
In Bug's Land at DCA, riding Flik's' Flyers. Kelton liked this one.
So did Arie.
The last ride of the day... Autopia. Our kids had never been on this. They of course had a lot of fun driving the cars. Kelton got really worried that the car was "real" and was scared about driving it. Nate explained that it was on a track, but he was still nervous.
Natalie, on the other hand, well... look at this picture. It's worth far more than a thousand words. What else can I say? Let's just say that her father is going to be the one to teach her to drive.
This was Arie's favorite way to travel around the park. A lot of the time she would put her hands down around Nate's chin and put her pointy little chin directly on Nate's head. He was constantly having to stop her because it didn't feel very good. But it sure was cute. I didn't get a picture of that, but his way was cute too. She even fell asleep like this once on our way out of the park.
Later in the trip, Kelton really wanted to go on the Astro Orbiters again. The line for this one can get really bad and we had already done this ride on our way into the park once. But Kelton didn't get to drive the rocket the first time. So we watched it and hopped in the line when it was a bit shorter. He loved being able to control the rocket.
One of our many times on Star Tours. I think this was Damon's favorite ride. I really like this one too.
Teacups... again! They still love it.
Christy, Tennyson, Hudson, and Easton joined us for one day. Christy stayed with Easton until early afternoon. Tennyson stayed all day with Hudson, but we took a hotel break in the middle of the day, so we weren't with them for the whole day.
This is us waiting for the rope drop at park opening, right at the entrance to Tomorrowland. This was when Natalie and I got to be some of the first ones on Space Mountain for the day. Again, it looks like there is no one in the park and that it's not busy. But, we just happened to beat everyone there. They are all packed in behind us. We were just in the very front. Because we are awesome.
Star Tours with Hudson.
Dads with cute 2 year olds. Arie and Easton are only about a month apart in age. This was in line for the Nemo Submarines.
Here's all of us in the submarine. Nate, Damon, Hudson, Kelton, Natalie, Christy (pregnant with Landon), Tennyson, and Easton. Arie must have been sitting on my lap.
Waiting for the fireworks! We were all so tired, but they wanted to see the fireworks. Actually, if I am remembering right, the boys were asleep in the stroller. I think we tried to wake them up, but I don't know how much they saw. This was on our last night, after five long days at Disneyland. I can't blame them for falling asleep. But not Arie and Natalie! I Love this picture of my girls. They are so sweet.
And they love each other a lot.
All week, the castle had been covered up because they were getting it ready for their diamond celebration later in the year. But on Friday, they uncovered it! Disneyland wasn't quite as magical when the castle was under a giant tarp thing. I'm glad we got to see it on the last day.
We were excited to go back to the Animation Academy at DCA. The kids had fun last time and this time they boys were old enough to be able to draw better. We were anticipating many trips to the Animation Academy on our visit, until we learned that they changed the setup. They used to draw several different characters throughout the whole day. But, because of the popularity of the movie Frozen, several places in DCA got taken over due to everyone's obsession with the movie. The Animation Academy was one of the casualties. They now only have "Do you Want to Draw a Snowman" and rotate between two characters...Olaf and Marshmallow. Clever, but a bit boring. Oh well. The kids enjoyed drawing Olaf. I think Arie's drawing wins.
Cute boys trying on hats.
On Route 66 in Cars Land.
Tarzan's treehouse.
Whew! And that's about it. It was a tiring, yet fun trip. I must admit, I am ready for a new vacation. While this is really fun, because of the ages of our kids, Nate and I ended up being split up a lot in order to take older kids on bigger rides. The entire family didn't get to be all together a whole lot. Plus, Nate and I have been to Disneyland five times in the past seven years. (Once was without kids, and there was even an additional short trip to Disneyworld on our honeymoon.) So, we will see what the next family vacation brings! Whatever it is, I'm thinking that all of the kids will be old enough to not need naps/strollers/etc...
On the way home, our car became a senior citizen. 100,000 miles. Yikes. I know it's not that much, but I really don't like high mileage vehicles. Makes me nervous. Oh well. Hopefully our Durango has many more years life left! :)
