Disneyland 2012 (Part 2)

I had good intentions of having this entire trip posted about five days ago.  Obviously that didn't happen because here we are almost a week after I started & I'm finally just getting around to posting the 2nd part.  But, better late than never, right? So, without further delay, here's some more of our trip to Disneyland...

Day 4

On our 4th day, we drove down the coast about an hour to our favorite place for surf & sand, Tamarack Beach in Carlsbad.  This is the beach that we stayed at for an entire week last summer.  It is such a pretty beach & it isn't ever as crowded as the Orange County beaches.  The day we were there was a little cool & overcast, but we all still had a great time.

As soon as we started setting up our little "beach camp," the boys found this little guy...

They named him Fuzzy or Furry or something like that, and then they proceeded to torture play with this little caterpillar for the next hour or so.  The poor thing kept trying to crawl toward the grass that was growing by the sea wall, but the boys would have none of that.  They kept bringing him back & begging for their little pet to not run away.  Eventually, they lost track of him on one of his escape attempts.  Hopefully, he made it to some yummy stuff to munch on.  I'm sure he was exhausted after "playing" with the boys.

The kiddos had a blast digging in the sand...

Even Viv wanted to get in on the action...

The big boys built an impenetrable sandcastle.  That thing survived the waves all day long & was still standing when we left...

Poppy and Cohen actually played a little baseball--with a paddle ball & racket...

As you can see, everyone just hung out on the sand most of the day.  As I mentioned, it was a cool day...and the water was even cooler, so most of us just stayed on dry land...

Except this one...

Connor is such an ocean kid.  He just loves it, even when it's freezing cold.  He can't resist going in the water.  He was out there most of the day, and would only come up on the sand to check in with us from time-to-time.  Aiden, on the other hand, prefers to stay on dry land.  He worked on that castle almost the entire time we were there...

Here's the "old people" (myself included) just hanging out & reading...

Not a bad way to spend the day.  Nope, not at all...

Viv liked hanging out as well.  She took turns chilling in her stroller...

And playing in the sand.  Ahhhhh, my little beach baby...

Nana started feeding a seagull that came right up to us, and before we knew it, there were almost ten birds hanging out (at a small distance) just waiting for a free handout.  I was scared that this whole situation could have turned into a scene from "The birds" as soon as Nana ran out of food.  Luckily, they never attacked...

Eventually, the sun came out & it warmed up a little bit.  When that happened, a few of us actually dared venture out into the water with Connor.  Aiden, however, only went in ankle deep to retrieve some water for his sandcastle moat...

Cohen, on the other hand, went in full force.  He was covered with sand & salt water from head to toe.  It took forever to clean it all off, and I'm pretty sure he brought at least a pound of sand home in his shorts.  It's currently sitting on my laundry room floor--still.  Don't judge...

Once cleaned off, Connor & Cohen got creative with the beach towels for a little superhero fun...

After that, we said goodbye to the beach & headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up.  That night, we tried to go to our favorite little Chinese restaurant in Orange County.  It's called "Chu's Wok Right Inn."  Classy, eh?  It's this place that my uncle found decades ago.  It's seriously in the ghetto...probably right in the middle of the ghetto.  But, we go there everytime we go to Disneyland.  It's a family tradition, so we *have* to do it, right?  Well, not this time around.  Apparently, the recession hasn't been kind to Chu because his Wok Right Inn has gone out of business.  It was all locked & boarded up, and had graffiti sprayed on it.  So sad.  But, thanks to GPS, we were able to find another Chinese restaurant just up the street.  The food was yummy & they had a huge fish tank that entertained the kiddos...

After that, it was back to the hotel to get a good night sleep.


DAY 5


The next day, we were so excited to get back to Disneyland.  It was Monday, and with how short the lines had been on Friday & Saturday, we figured Monday was going to be dead.  Boy were we wrong.  Actually, the day did start out pretty quiet.  When we first got there, we took the train back to Toon Town & the lines weren't too bad.  They seemed to be a little longer than on Saturday, but not by much.  I thought it was odd that lines would be a tad longer than on Saturday, but didn't think much of it at first.  The kids had a great time breaking out of jail...

And climbing in Chip and Dales treehouse...

Then we went to see Mickey's house...

And "play his piano," even though the cover was down...

At the end of our tour, we got to see the main mouse again...

Then it was off to Minnie's house.  Viv had a good time riding on Dad's shoulders while in line...

Here we are with Miss Minnie...

Notice how Cohen is hugging her for dear life?  When it was our turn to meet her, he ran up & hugged her & wouldn't let go.  It was the funniest thing we've ever seen.  Guess he has a little crush on her, or something.  We practically had to peel him off of her.

After our photo op, we headed inside her house for a little fun.  Viv & Cohen had a little tea party...

And Aiden became totally obsessed with her dishwasher.  Why can't he get this excited about washing our dishes at home?

Once we were done at Minnie's house, we headed to Goofy's house.  His piano didn't have a cover on it & it actually made sound...

Goofy also has a garden where the kids were able to run around & have some fun.  Anyone seen Connor & Cohen?

Goofy wasn't at his house, but Pluto wasn't too far away...

Next we made a stop at Donald Duck's boat.  He wasn't there either, but Cohen had a great time steering the ship...

And Viv had a great time sitting in driving a toon town car...

We finally found Goofy & took a "goofy picture" with him.  Well, except for Cohen who took a grumpy picture with him.  Maybe he wanted to go find Minnie again...

After that, we headed into Fantasyland to do a few rides.  We went on the Storybook Boats & then on the Casey Jr. train.  We sat in the wild animal cage, which I thought was quite appropriate since these guys really are a bunch of wild animals.  Probably the wildest I know...

Even this one has a little (okay a lot) wild in her...

The lines in Fantasy land were getting pretty long.  We couldn't figure out for the life of us why the lines would be so long, so we headed into Tomorrowland hoping that it wouldn't be quite as busy.  Wrong, it was crawling with people--and Storm Troopers--as you can see in this photo...

Why were there so many people at Disneyland on a Monday?  We couldn't figure it out.  It was probably the busiest I've ever seen Disneyland...ever.  What in the world was going on???  As we waited in line for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, we got our answer.  We overheard someone talking about how some yearly passes could only be used a couple of days the entire summer & today was one of those days.  After a little time on Google, we were able to confirm this story.  The two cheapest yearly passes are blocked out for the entire summer, except for two days--this day & the following day.  So, basically we were sharing the park with a gazillion Southern Californians!  No wonder it was so crazy!

So, now you all know that when planning your vacation to Disneyland, you should make sure you're not planning it over these two days.  We decided, since it was so busy, that we would leave the park for the rest of the day.  It was totally pointless to be there since we were now standing in line for hours.  Even with Fast Passes, we waited in fairly long lines.  But, since we were almost up to the front of the line for Big Thunder Railroad, we sat it out a little longer & went on the ride.  I'm pretty sure that Connor is thrilled to have his mom putting his arm around him in public for this picture, don't you?

Mike took pictures of us throughout the entire ride.  Some of them were pretty funny..

That ride shook my brain around like crazy.  I had a headache about 20 seconds into it.  I've never been like that before. I was so diappointed.  Does this mean I'm turning into an old lady?  Sigh...

After leaving the park, we decided to stop in Downtown Disney so that Nana & I could do some shopping, and so the boys (I'm including Mike & Poppy in that group) could geek out here...

They love, love, LOVE the Lego Store.  It is boy heaven.  Thousands & thousands of Legos--that you can play with as you please...

They had a race ramp set up outside so kids could build Lego cars & then race them against each other.  The boys hung out here for over an hour, building & racing, building & racing...

After about 189 races, we finally talked them into leaving & went to a late dinner at Cheesecake Factory.  We didn't get there until about 8:30, so by the time dinner was over, we had some sleepy little kiddos on our hands...

The problem now was that we needed to get them back to our hotel, which was about two blocks away from Cheesecake Factory.  We ended up pushing Connor in the stroller & carried the rest.  I'm sure we looked pretty awesome carrying kids that were passed out through the streets of Anaheim at 10:00 at night. Parents of the year, I tell ya!

DAY 6


On Tuesday, the original plan was to go to Disneyland again.  But, it was the only other day that all the yearly pass holders could use their passes that summer.  None of us felt like dealing with those kind of crowds again, so we decided to bag going to the park.  We thought about going to the beach, but since we had just been there the day before last, we really weren't in the mood for that either.  So, we decided just to have a down day.  It was actually really nice to just have a quiet, relaxing day right in the middle of the vacation.  We went swimming that morning...

And Poppy & the kiddos built some of the Legos that Poppy had bought the day before at the Lego store...

It was such a nice, relaxing day.  The kiddos would swim for awhile...

And then get out & build Legos or play with some of their newly-purchased souvenirs...

Then swim some more...

Oh, and by the way, I'm officially off sunscreen duty.  Remember a few years ago when I put sunscreen on Mike's back when we went to the beach & he ended up looking like he had flames on his back because I didn't get the bottom part good enough?  Well, I did it again.  This time on Connor.  Ouch!  Sorry buddy...

After everyone was sufficiently waterlogged, we got ready & headed down to Fashion Island at Newport Beach.  We love this mall.  There's lots of high end stores that are fun to window shop & they have lots of fun ponds & fountains for the kiddos to play in...

I found a really cute four piece (jacket, skirt, pants & shirt) Ralph Lauren suit. It's regular price was about $500, but I got it for $148! Yay for great deals! We also got some really yummy yogurt for a snack. It was perfect treat for a warm afternoon

After that, it was off to dinner.  We went to Buca du Beppo.  I had no idea it was a chain?!?  Anyway, look what happened...

Yep, the kiddos fell asleep on us--again.  Luckily, we had the car with us this time, so we only had to carry them out to there instead of all the way to the hotel.  We all fell instantly asleep that night.  It's a good thing too.  We needed our rest because the next day, we headed back to Disneyland--this time *without* all the yearly pass holders.  I'll finish up the rest of our trip in my next post.  --Lindsay