The Happiest Place on Earth!

Beware – long post with lots of pictures ahead.

Yesterday was a crazy day! While my family is in town visiting for their Spring Break, we decided to hit up the Magical Kingdom known as Disneyland.

Of course, we had a lot of fun! We got there bright and early when the park opened, and it wasn’t really that crowded at first. However, once lunchtime rolled around, it was obvious that it was Spring Break. But that’s okay, since we had the little kids with us and we just did a lot of the easy rides. E definitely does not have an adventurer’s heart. It may be because of that infamous Alpine Slide experience, who knows. Nevertheless, I still tried. The first ride we went on was Big Thunder Mountain. Here’s the photo proof that he rode it with me:

You can see from the picture that he was glued to me the whole time with a scared look on his face. When it was over, I told him that we’d have to come home and tell the hubby all about how brave he was and he said, “Mom, I was just half scared and half brave.” I assured him that that was just enough bravery and kept making sure he knew that I was SO proud of him for going on it with me.

The next ride was the Pirates of the Caribbean, and I didn’t remember it being so frightening as a kid. Of course, there are the little hills that you ride down and such, but the skeletons and scary pirates were probably a little too much for West. After the first quarter of the ride, he spent the rest of the time buried in my shoulder. Poor kid. There’s another trauma just waiting to be discussed in therapy.

Here are some random fun pictures from the day. Apparently Angela really likes to recycle.

And Eli really likes Angela.

But me? Not so much. (And please excuse the blurry quality of this photo – I hadn’t yet trained my siblings in how to operate my massive camera. But at least the random chick in the purple shirt is in focus.)

We also visited the New Orleans section, and this is as close as I could get to the ultra-secret Club 33. (Again with the blurry photos, sorry.)

Jeff was really sad that they wouldn’t let him in the door.

Angela, Jeff and my mom decided to go on the Haunted Mansion ride, so I took the boys to Winnie the Pooh’s Adventure.

West loved the hunny pot photo op so much that he tried to eat it!

We went on the Jungle River Cruise. E pretty much didn’t trust anything I said about how easy or slow the rides were for the rest of the day, so this was his face on the boat. Good thing Nana was there to comfort him! :)

W loved It’s a Small World and E did too. He kept asking to go on the one again, but with Angela threatening mutiny if she heard that song one more time, we skipped the second showing.

Oh, and just in case you were also at Disneyland yesterday and happened to see this:

A-little-dude-running-around-in-his-briefs-trying-to-pass-them-off-as-pants-while-his-real-pants-dried-from-washing-them-out-from-an-accident-due-to-standing-in-line-too-long-without-a-bathroom-close-by, then yes, I will lay claim to him. He’s mine. And trust me, he felt no embarrassment or self-consciousness whatsoever -- he would have stayed like that for the rest of the day if we’d let him. But luckily for me and my embarrassment/self-consciousness issues, his pants dried in the sun and he was back to ‘normal’ by lunch.

Good times.

Speaking of lunch, there was a family eating at the table next to us and they kept saying things like, “Yeah, Laurel loves the Teacups!” “Laurel, please eat your lunch!” and “Come one, Laurel, we’ve got to go!” The first time it happened, I actually did a double-take, wondering how in the world they knew! The second time I caught on when I looked up again and saw a cute little girl with the name Laurel sewed onto her Mickey ears. The third time was a while later so I had forgotten about it and I actually turned around when I heard my name. And yes, I know that most of you probably have that happen a lot. But since I’ve only ever known 1 other Laurel and have heard of about  3 others, it’s kind of weird for me.

Anyways, after lunch we hit up Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. That was a fun one, it wasn’t as scary as pirates but still a lot of motion and noise, so E could say he was being brave by going on it. W liked it too, and hung out with Jeff during the long wait. Apparently Ang was brushing up on her creeper skills. :)

After that we went on the iconic teacups ride. E loved it, as long as they didn’t move the wheel at all. Jeff kept teasing him by reaching his hand over to the wheel then E would yell, “No! Don’t touch it!” It was pretty funny.

Jeff was bored though, sitting like a bump on a log the whole time. So once E got to go slow, Jeff, Ang and I went on our own and spun our cup into the stratosphere.

That was definitely a fun time. I didn’t get to go on too many of the bigger rides, so this was my adrenaline rush for the day.

After we went, E liked it so much that he wanted to go again. Angela was the only kind soul who went with him slowly.

He even got his hands up and had time to give me a little wave.

After all this excitement, W was getting pretty tired. Here he is in the line to go on the Toy Story shooting ride. Nana’s shoulder was a good place to rest.

Another fun part of the day was seeing the Star Wars Jedi Training Camp. We didn’t have E go up to do it, as I don’t think he really knows what Star Wars is (other than our pancake molds that we’ve used for breakfast once or twice), but there was this sweet kid dressed up like a padowan, holding up this sign that said “Pick Me!” I thought it was so mean when they didn’t pick him! Just kidding, they totally did.

All in all we had a great day at the park. We rode most everything we wanted to ride, ate most everything we wanted to eat, and had the most magical of times. I’m looking forward to our next visit in a few weeks with the hubby’s company.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about my absolute favorite part of the day! It was when Captain Jack Sparrow and my mom were having a loving photo taken together, I teased her by saying, “Come on, Mom, smile!” He turned to her and (in a perfect in-character voice) said, “Yeah, smile Mum!”

Angela got in on the action as well.

If he hadn’t been rushing off somewhere, I would have gotten a photo with him too. Ah well, just something to hope for on my next visit. :)

Thanks for a fun visit, family!