Ok, I might have exaggerated when I said that the Dolphin Safari was my favorite part of our Thanksgiving holiday. As anyone who knows me knows, Disneyland is my HAPPY PLACE. I love Disneyland. I just start smiling as I walk in the doors and I don't stop. I made sure my family knew that Disneyland was on my agenda with Helen, Mary and Griffin and if they wanted to come with us we would be there from opening at 8 am to closing at midnight. That's right 16 hours of Disney Magic for me and my kids!!! My family thought I was nuts for leaving so early and told me they'd meet me there at 10ish. Well, low and behold they were all ready to go and we left by 7:30 am for our fun day. (Brad and Lewis stayed behind with Pap, Michael, & Malcolm to swim and cruise the PCH)
We split up into 2 groups once we got there with bigger kids and younger kids. Sheri and I took the younger kids, Anika and Griffin. Grammy, John & Amie took the bigger kids, Helen, Mary, Aleksia, Willow, Cedric and Brax. They were off to Space Mountain and Thunder Mountain while we rode Buzz Lightyear and the Astro Orbitor. As we were getting off of Buzz's Astro Blasters we were greeted by the "year of a million dreams" team handing out Dream Fastpasses. These Fastpasses can be used at any time of the day. We were so excited!! We wished all of our group was with us and not just the 4 of us got the passes! It was a score!!! The fast passes were good for Disneyland and California Adventure so we found a group of 4 going over to Cal. Adv. and gave them that part of our passes since they were only good for that day.
After our big score we met up with the big kids getting off of the Matterhorn and headed to the newly refurbished and reopened It's a Small World. Wow! It was beautiful. Everything was shiny and even the boats got a makeover. Brax loves Small world and he was smiling the whole ride! Of course my picture of him is fuzzy but you get the idea!
Then we split up again, this time adding Helen, Mary and Cedric to our group and we were off ToonTown. On our way to meet the others at Splash Mountain we did see Jackson--Hannah Montana's brother aka Jason Earles, cruising around the park. The girls were excited but too embarrassed to speak to him.
Splash Mountain was lots of fun. I don't think I have ever been so wet on that ride before! I honestly had to go buy pants for me and Mary because we were so wet and frozen, but it was lots of fun!!! :>
At 3:30 we saw the afternoon Christmas Parade with everyone decked out in their Christmas finest and Santa at the end. After the parade, Sheri, Grammy, Anika, Cedric and Griffin all exited stage Newport swimming pool. Griffin and Ani were so excited to go swimming.
The rest of us continued to play play play. We did hit every ride in the park at least once and a few more than once. We did the Indianna Jones ride twice and the girls rode Space Mountain 3 times, Thunder Mountain 2 times, Autopia 2 times etc... We did enjoy our night time Jungle Cruise. Our guide was hilarious!!! He kept us entertained and ended with this..."And now I will finish with a joke for all the psychics in the group." I laughed long and hard. Mary had to have it explained 3 times.
After watching the fireworks we called it a night. No, I didn't stay till midnight, only 10:15 so Brad wouldn't have to come and pick us up later, we just went home with John and Amie. So only 14 hours in the park but we will live to go another day I guess! We--Helen, Mary and I--wanted to watch Fantasmic which was at 10:30 but we were dealing with only 2 cars at Disneyland and sacrifices had to be made! :>
WOW! What a fun trip! You guys sure know how to have a good time! I'm still having a hard time looking past tomorrow with my baby twins but you give me hope that I will emerge from survival mode to have some really really fun times:)
ReplyDeleteSo, the zoo next week? Have an open day?
The trip was amazing. I'm just disapointed we didn't get stuck going on Small World four times in a row.:) Thank-you for making it so fun.
ReplyDeleteLove, Amie