Disneyland 2014 Part 4

**I forgot to mention that on Monday in Disneyland there were filming their Christmas special in front of the castle, it was Frozen themed and the stage looked so cool!  There was a huge line already right at opening to be part of the audience so we didn't even consider it.  Then on Wednesday they were filming other parts of the park.  There were signs at some rides saying they were filming and if you didn't' want to be on camera to basically stay away from that ride ha ha.

So here we are, finally I'm getting around to blogging about our last day in Disneyland.  I'll probably miss a lot of details because I waited way too long to get these blog posts done.  (Holy frick on a stick have we been busy!!  I'm so stinking exhausted at night that I barely get anything done and I hit the pillow hard until Quinton wakes me 2-3 times) I've got blogs in the drafts folder for Christmas decor, Jingle, Sibling Date night, Winter Garden a glow, and I could probably do another Instagram update.... ugh!

Day 3-Wednesday

I think they were getting sick of these morning shots ha ha 

Long days, early mornings, no naps make for one cranky Lydibug.  Don't worry this meltdown didn't last long

Magic hour that day was at California Adventure, but we had scheduled our breakfast at Ariels Grotto that day during that time.  (Actually I screwed up and somehow made it for Thursday, but it's Disney and they are awesome and got us in anyway) So we didn't get to do anything else during that hour but we still had lots of fun!

Meeting Ariel.  I thought for sure Natalia would catch on that this was a different actress, but nope!  

We ordered up our food, which was really yummy.  At first Lydia refused to eat her chocolate chip pancake because it looked different than ours at home, but once we got her to taste a bite she ate it almost all gone.  Natalia on the other hand only ate the hash browns and bacon off her plate refusing the eggs.  But we did get some fresh fruit at our table which was really nice!

Girls waiting excitedly for the arrival of the princesses.  

At long last they announced the arrival of the princesses.  Each one would get a formal introduction and then would wonder around the tables getting pictures.  Lydia however had become engrossed with the ducks in the water below us and had started to feed them some fruit that she totally wasn't paying attention during that time.  It was so very cute!  She kept asking for more and more, and finally I had to just stop cutting up fruit for her and tell her no.  ha ha ha

We got to meet Rapunzel, Tiana, Belle, and Cinderella. They were all super sweet to the girls.  Each one of them complimented Natalia on her artwork and it was so cute to see her so proud of her drawings.  I do have to add in that all of them except Cinderella were so careful with their drawings, Cinderella just folded it in half and just went about her business.  Natalia didn't notice but I did!  I know they all probably tossed them once they got back inside, but I'd like to think that maybe just maybe some of them still have those drawings up in their dressing rooms???  =) 



I love how carefully Belle has placed the picture on her dress so it could be part of the picture with the girls!

This is one of only two family shots I got of us!!  UGH!!!!  But at least we're all looking! 

After breakfast we headed over to Disneyland to enjoy our last day.  Exhaustion was at an all time high and we just had to push through it!  ha ha ha.  Right as we were walking by the Buzz Lightyear ride we noticed there was no wait.  Lydia had a sudden meltdown for who knows what reason so Charlie waited with her outside the ride while I took Natalia on it.  We did get stuck on it for a couple of minutes, and later the ride was shut down for a couple of hours, but it was fun and I got a super high score because of it!  

Then we got in line for the Finding Nemo Submarine Ride.  It was a good 20 minute wait, but we really wanted the girls to go on this one.  This ride had changed so many times over the years, I remember when it had Little Mermaid themed stuff!  ha ha.

The park was actually a lot less crowded that day thankfully so almost everything had pretty short waits.  Had the girls been bigger we might have tried to do some of the bigger rides with them (with rider swap because we still had Quinton in the Ergo).  I kept checking my app and rides like the Matterhorn only had 10-15 minute waits!

Then Charlie took the girls on Autopia.  He let Natalia drive which was pretty funny because his first comment after getting off the ride was, "I'm never teaching her to drive after that experience"  Must have been a bumpy ride!

The whole morning my mouse wait app kept saying that the Mickey meet and greet was closed.  I was starting to panic that we had waited until the last day to do this and it was closed!  We can't leave Disneyland without seeing Mickey!!  So while Charlie and the girls were in line for Autopia I went to an info booth and asked the guy there about it.  he had no idea why it said closed because it was definitely open.  So once they were done with that ride we went straight to Mickey's house.  

It must have been that people were relying on that app because we seriously had to wait less than 5 minutes to see him!  We walked through his house and then it was time.  Lydia ran right up to hug him and it was of course heart melting!  (She told me the other day that Mickey didn't give her kisses like Minnie did ha ha ha)

And here is our only other family shot, and Quinton is sound asleep in the Ergo so you can't even see his face.  SERIOUSLY regret not getting more family shots!!

Next to Mickey's house is Gadget’s Go Coaster.  Charlie got in line with the girls and after a few minutes I heard them announce something along the lines that there needs to be an adult per kid... so it wouldn't work for him to take both girls.  So I ran through the line saying excuse me a ton and explainging my hsuband and kids were up there ha ha ha.  Once up front they let us do the rider swap so Charlie went with Natalia while I waited with Lydia and when they got back Natalia and I waited at the exit for them.  Natalia said she loved it, but had a look of fear when she came off.  Lydia on the other hand had a huge smile and said she watned to go back on it! ha ha ha

 I don't have any pictures of it, but after that we went on Rodger Rabbit’s Car Toon Spin.  This one was so much fun only because they told us that Quinton couldn't ride in my Ergo (no lap babies is what they told us) so they told me to just take him out and sit him on the seat next to me.  I also had Lydia in the little car with us and Charlie took Natalia.  Quinton LOVED it.  The little car would spin around and he giggled the whole time.  It was seriously so stinking cute! We wondered around toon town for a bit and then decided to go to Downtown Disney do our souvineer shopping and get lunch.

Because of our big breakfast we were actulaly not hungry at lunch time.  It worked out well in our favor though.  At World of Disney the girls wondered around for a long time trying to decide what to get.  They changed their minds a couple of times and finally decided on Baby Bambi and Minnierella.  I actually showed Lydia the bigger version of this doll thinking she'd totally go for it, but no she was sold on that little one.  Natalia had found it for her and the second she caught a glimpse of it she was in love.  She was sitting in the stroller just snuggling her doll and giving it kisses, it was adorable.  So she wanted nothing to do with the big one.  ha ha.  I picked out a wooden train for Quinton and we found him his Christmas Ornament as well.  (I need to take pictures of those on our tree and post them too ha ha)

We ate at Earl of Sandwich, because it was highly recommended. Because of our late lunch it wasn't busy at all which was nice to be able to just spread out and enjoy the empty sitting area. My wrap was awesome and I would definitely want to try other things there.  Charlie said his was just ok.  The girls as usual struggled to eat anything and we had to bribe them with chips!  

Lydia showing me her cross eyes

After lunch we went to our hotel room to drop off our goodies and to rest for a bit.  I thought maybe the girls would lay down for a bit, we wanted to keep them up later to try to see the fireworks.  Ha ha, they were too busy playing with their new dolls.  Quinton was alseep in the Ergo so I reclined in the bed as much as I could with him on me and Charlie stuck some pillows under my feet.  It was nice to relax for a bit.  we probably relaxed for about an hour and then went back into Disneyland to pick a spot for the holiday parade.  

Charlie was handing me Quinton's bottle right when Natalia was using her ($1 glowstick) wand to turn him into something.  ha ha

Silly girlies!

The parade was awesome and I'm so glad we made the time to see it!  I loved that they had turned their usual parade into a holiday themed one!

This float had a few princesses on it, including Princess Aurora who we didn't get to see while at the park, much to Natlia's disappointment.  She really wanted to give out her pictures!  So we told her we would mail the pictures to the princesses we missed.  I recently saw on Pinteret where you could send them something and they would send back a signed photo.  I really need to get on that! 

A holiday parade isn't complete without the big guy! 

After the parade we took off to see if we could catch a couple more rides.  Charlie tried to take the girls up into Tarzan's Treehouse, but because of the dark I think they got scared.  So we kept on going and came across Splash Mountain.  There was NO WAIT!!  So Charlie took Natalia on it.  I scooted them off in such a hurry though that we didn't set a meeting place (and without a cell phone in Charlie's pocket I had no idea how else to find them)  So I asked around and found the exit for the ride and took the stroller and Lydia/Quinton over there to wait.  Quinton was sound asleep in the Ergo and it wasn't long before Lydia fell asleep in the stroller.  It seemed like I'd been waiting forever and I started to panic that we had somehow missed them so I walked around a bit to be sure, and then there they were coming off the exit.  Turns out because of the no line, that once they were done and at the top of the ride the guy asked if they wanted to go again.  Natalia without hesitation said yeah!  So they got to ride it twice in a row.

After that we tried to book it over to It's a Small World, hoping to ride it once more.  But, they had closed it down for the night and created a really cool lights show.  I had commented the morning we rode that it was covered in Christmas lights and I bet it looked really cool at night, and it really did! 

I felt bad that Lydia had really wanted to ride that one once more and she totally missed it.  I should have left Charlie and Natalia at Splash Mountain and taken her over there to see if we could get on it, but of course like I said the no cell phone thing provided some difficulties.  Poor baby was out cold in the stroller anyway, and you know if she's asleep somewhere besides her bed then she really must be tired!

So then we headed back towards the front of the park to get a spot for the fireworks.  We thought Charlie might as well take Natalia on some big rides now that Lydia was asleep and wouldn't be missing out.  The line for space mountain was still 30 minutes long though!  So they went and got inline for Star Tours.  I had a blast walking through the gift shop for that one and wanted to buy just about everything! ha ha ha.  She said she liked it but had a hard time seeing.  We caught maybe a few minutes of the fireworks, but decided we were just exhausted and wanted to go back to the hotel.  Since we'd had such late meals we weren't really that hungry even though it was past dinner time.  Thankfully there was a Jamba in Downtown Disney on the way to our hotel so we just grabbed some smoothies and then snacked on our snacks in our room.  Then it was time to start packing up our huge mess so we could head out the next morning.  Our room was a disaster and I spent a good hour and a half trying to get things going, but finally gave up and decided to crash for the night.

**So there's our three days in the parks.  Once jotted down it seems like we actually got to do a lot.  And there was still so much we didn't get to do!  We missed out on doing the Peter Pan ride, and I think the girls would have loved that one, but the wait for that was always really long! I would have loved to have taken the girls on Pirates of the Caribbean, but was afraid it might be a little too scary still.   I'm excited to some day go back with the family when they are all big enough for all the rides!  It'll be a whole different trip with a whole new set of memories!

Woo almost done!!  Next blog post just covers our two days of driving home!