Vacation Part II: The Happiest Place on Earth

Since our California vacation extended for an entire week and we did soooo many things during the week, I think I will break this up into three parts: Disneyland, California Adventure and Sea World.  That way the post doesn't get crazy long!

First up is Disneyland.

We made the 4ish hour drive from Vegas to Glendale (where my sis in laws live) on Sunday night.  Once we arrived we were pooped and pretty much went to bed.  We had a big day the next day planned for Disneyland.  We spent a total of two days at Disneyland, one at California Adventure and one at Sea World in San Diego.  As we were budgeting for our vacation we knew we wanted to buy a three day park hopper, but after looking into it we learned it was pretty darn expensive.  Ella is no longer free at the parks since she's 3.  That means 3 tickets for our family, which can get pretty pricey!  Before we left we did a little research and found out that you can buy discounted park tickets through Costco, so we looked into and it ended up not being exactly what we were looking for.  So I did some more internet research and found a California City Pass.  They have these City Passes for a ton of different cities that offer admission to the most popular attractions in that particular city.  The California City Pass included a three day park hopper to Disneyland Parks (including California Adventure) and one day pass to Sea World  and a one day pass to Universal Studios.  We knew we wouldn't be able to make it to Universal (the kids are too small for that anyway), but it was still definitely worth the money. Much cheaper than buying everything separately.  So that is the route we took to purchase our tickets.  If you google City Passes your should be able to find a list of cities that offer these types of passes.  Pretty cool if you ask me!

Here are our two days at Disneyland in pictures:

For those of you that have been to either of the Disney parks you know they have a daily parade of characters through the park.  We caught the parade both days we were there and it was fantasia each time.  Both girls were memorized by the dancing characters.  

Riding the Finding Nemo Ride--Mia loved looking through the submarine window at the characters in the water!  She didn't budge off of my lap!

Grandma hanging out with the little kids so the big kids could ride the Indiana Jones ride!  Ella passed out during the fireworks show!  

Flying Dumb Bo's

Looking so innocent...after a ginormous tantrum/meltdown

Riding the train--we picked the caged in train car because at this point in the day Mia was acting crazy and we felt like we should cage her in to keep her contained! :)

At Mickey's House

Ella's Driver's License from Autopia! Crazy girl--her daddy helped her pose like this!

Another fun Toy Story Ride with Buzz

Riding under the sea on the Finding Nemo Ride

Riding Autopia with my love...he was not a great driver!  

Mia's face cracks me up...she loved the Tea Cups.

Too bad I forgot to take a  before picture.  I'm terrible at taking food pictures!  This  was the most delicious hot fudge sundae I've ever had.  It came with a warm cookie on top!  Heaven!

Ella was terrified of any ride that went into the dark.  Didn't matter if the ride was a happy ride or not, she was not having it.   This was her face after the ride!  By the end of the second day, she overcame her fear and was riding all of the rides, though.

My advice when planning a trip to Disneyland:

• If you can afford to, buy a multiple day park pass--This is an especially good deal if you are going with small children because you don't feel like you have to make yourself (and your kids) crazy by getting to every attraction in one day!  It is almost impossible to get to everything in one day! We went for one full day and one half day to Disneyland and felt that was a good amount of time.  On the full day Mia napped in the stroller and on the half day she was able to get a pretty good nap in before we left.  Ella is phasing out her naps, but the extra rest was good for her and her mama!  :)

• Bring food with you--They are pretty lenient about checking coolers, etc especially if you have a baby, and allowed us to bring PB&J's with us.  These were great snacks or meals for the girls.We were waiting in a super long line right about dinner time  and we obviously weren't getting out of line, so having those sandwiches were a life saver in line for the girls to eat, plus it kept them both occupied for a good 10 minutes of boring line waiting time!  I brought a bunch of other snacky type foods as well and they were great for Mia to snack on while waiting in line.  Not to mention that we bought them less food at dinner because they had already eaten, so it saved us a little cash as well!

• Bring a sweatshirt or light jacket with you--Believe it or not, it gets pretty chilly in Anaheim at night.  I was glad I had the the sweatshirts for me and the girls.  They were freezing when the sun went down! 

• Have fun and go with the flow--Yes there are rude people sometimes and the lines can be long (unless you utilize the fast pass-genius) but it really is the most magical place on earth and if you remember that you will have a blast!

Ella is the perfect age for Disneyland and loved all of the "fantasy" and characters.  She truly believes in all of it so she had a wonderful time.  I would definitely recommend it for girls her age.  Mia did pretty well considering the circumstances she was faced with...random naps and eating, extreme exhaustion from a couple of late nights and not sleeping in her own bed.  Waiting in line was tough for Mia as she was bored easily and wanted to run around.  Luckily, we had our entire family there to entertain her while we waited in line.  We just passed her around from person to person to entertain her.  The weather was beautiful while we were there in early June and I would recommend this time of year for the great weather alone....but come to think of it isn't weather in CA great all the time??  We look forward to going to Disneyland many more times while Aunt Buck and Aunt Mimi live there!  I'm already envisioning a spring break trip next year :)