Our Awesome Vacation - Day 5

Day 5 was our final day.  That morning we once again got up, loaded up the van and headed out as early as possible.  Then we headed off for the San Diego Zoo.

We were planning on heading home after the zoo, so to make our zoo visit go a little faster and more relaxing we took the bus tour.  It was a double decker bus and we got to sit up on the top.  (It was very exciting)

The tour was great and we got to see a ton of animals.

The Polar Bears were super fun.  One of them was eating carrots (which the kids thought was very funny) and the other one was in  the water playing with a ball.  He kept throwing it at the glass over and over again.

After the tour we said goodbye to these wonderful people and decided to check out the zoo a little more before starting our very long drive home.

We decided to check out the reptile house and the Children's Discovery Zoo.  You should have seen Logan.  He was so excited he couldn't help but dance and skip around.  We also let each of the kids have a turn with the camera.  Emma chose to take pictures of the porcupine and Logan got a great shot of some mice.  Kids are silly.

Scott took the kids into the petting zoo and I took pictures from a safe distance.

OH and I didn't get a picture of it, but while we were walking around looking at animals, some zoo keepers walked past with a leopard on a leash.  It was pretty cool.  They warned us that it was not safe to get to close to it, but it was very cool.

Then after stopping off at the gift shop and a grocery stop we started the drive home, which seemed to go on forever.  I think it was because we had a couple of long breaks on the way and driving at night through the desert is crazy.  You just drive on and on and nothing ever changes.  It is just you and the darkness and the lines on the road mile after mile.

When we got home we were totally exhausted.

As soon as he was awake, Grandma and Grandpa brought Bryce home.  We had all missed him so much and I was especially glad to see my sweet baby again.  Bryce on the other hand seem glad to know we were back, but also seemed a little mad at all of us, especially me, for ditching him.  In the following days I also realized the extent to which Bryce had been spoiled at Grandma's house.   He now expected that if he was sitting in the family room playing, someone would be sitting there playing with him at all times, and if he was in his high chair eating, someone would be sitting next to him just watching him eat.  I humored him for a few days, but then slowly he got used to the idea of me being able to do the dishes and stuff while he was eating or going in the play room to play with out me and he forgot all about our betrayal of not taking him with us to Disneyland.  Next time we will let him come too.

And possibly I should have just sat by him while he ate.

Our Awesome Vacation - day 4

Looking back through the pictures I realized that I didn't take any pictures at the hotel.  To bad.  I think the biggest reason why was because we didn't ever really spend much time at the hotel.  We where just go go go everyday and our hotel room was just somewhere to crash and then shower before going again.

Day 4 we were in Sea World.  What a fun place!  It was a first for ALL of us.  We started the day over at the Arctic Adventure area.    Emma and I kinda got separated from the pack because Emma wanted to ride the Helicopter Adventure ride (or whatever it was called) and Logan was too short to ride and although Alan's mysterious fever had not come back we didn't want to push him with a ride warning against possible motion sickness.

We met back up with everyone at the Shamu show.

Guy, Kristin, and Adam where right up front.

We spent the rest of the afternoon catching a couple of shows and checking out aquariums in between.

I think our favorite where the Sharks.  There is this tunnel that goes through the shark tank.  So cool.

The boys and Logan especially really loved the Piranhas.  They were so pretty and sparkly.

We all played together at the sesame street play area.  The kids love the rides and Logan was like a monkey or something climbing through the nets.

There were tons of cool aquariums and open tanks.  All the kids got to pet some stingrays and other fish and pick up star fish.  They thought it was so neat.

The drive home from Sea World was also quite the adventure.  We found ourselves in some serious need of gas, Scott cell phone was dead (due to the weird reception or lack there of we had in Sea World), mine was near dead, and we didn't pass any gas stations on the way back to the Hotel.  Lucky we made it back (the gas gauge reading like 1 mile or something) and got directions to a gas station and a cell phone charger before heading back out to meet up with Guy and Kristin at Claim Jumpers for dinner.

Our Awesome Vacation - Day 3

Day 3 was not as perfect as day 2.  We planned on heading down to San Diego after we left Disneyland that day.  So before heading off to the park for the day we loaded up the van and checked out of the hotel.

Our first stop when we got into the park was the Mad Hatter for some mouse ears.  It was there that we realized Alan had a fever.  That's right, here we are in Disneyland, we have checked out of our hotel and don't have another hotel until that night, and Alan has a fever.  I had brought medicine on the trip, but it was back in the van at the hotel parking lot.  Luckily, Disneyland has fabulous first aide.  It is more like a mini hospital and it was free.  So we were able to get Alan some Tylenol without even leaving the park.

Since Alan obviously wasn't feeling well, he sat in the stroller and went with Scott to go pick up some fast passes to use later while Emma, Logan and I rode a few rides and went through Sleeping Beauty's castle.  I love disneyland, but one thing I don't like is that unless you have been there with little kids you never know when something is suddenly going to be scary.  For the most part it is okay, but sometimes it can cause a little panic to a 3 year old.  Sleeping Beauty's Castle was one of those places.  Poor Logan, we were about half way through it (with a ton of people behind us) when Logan and I realized things were going to get a lot scarier before they got better.

After the castle we met back up with Alan and Scott and headed over to Toon Towne.  First up.... Meet Minnie and Mickey.  We let the kids pick with one they wanted to meet.  No surprise that the boys wanted to meet Mickey and Emma wanted to meet Minnie.

There was a picture of Logan meeting Mickey, but I can't find it on my computer.

We spent quite a bit of time in Toon Towne.  It was kinda the perfect low keys fun for our poor Alan Boy.

While the boys and I played around Emma and Daddy went on the roller coaster.

You can tell which ones are Scott and Emma.  Scott has his arms up.

Toon Towne was also fun because the characters were out all over the place.  After a very healthy lunch :) we played a little more and ...

Alan decied he was feeling up to a ride so we went on the Roger Rabbit ride.  Logan spent the whole ride hiding his face.  Warning: Even if you child can handle Space Mountain that doesn't mean he can handle Roger Rabbit or a walk through a castle.

Next we met up with Guy and Kristin and took turns going on Indiana Jones (Logan was too short and possibly it would have been the last scare he could take.)

Alan decided he was feeling up to riding and he got to drive the Jeep.

Logan Cried and Cried and Cried because he REALLY wanted to ride the Indiana Jones Ride.  Poor kid.  Sometimes it is so hard to be little.

Then we hung out a little and the kids had fun taking pictures.

We decided to head back over to Fantasyland, or what ever it is called, before calling it a day.

I think the long days were starting to wear on poor little Logan a little.   While waiting in line to ride Dumbo he decided he just wanted to be alone.  At this point we also had Adam with us.  We kept getting weird looks.  I could tell people were trying to decide if Emma, Adam, and Alan  were triples or may be Adam and Alan were twins and we had 4 kids all relatively close in age.

I think this picture pretty clearly illustrates how we were felling by the time we rode the Casey Jr. Train.  It was getting dark and it was time to head out.

On the way out we let the kids each pick a souvenir and with that we were on the shuttle and our time at the Happiest Place On Earth was over.  As you can see Emma got an Eeyore pillow pet, Alan got a Mickey Mouse Light Saber and Logan got a set of Toy Story Figurines.  I hope I never forget how cute Logan was talking about his Rexy and Widdle Woody and all his widdle guys.

Day 3 definitely had a lot more hiccups than the perfection of day 2, but it was still a great day. And the kids were still so good and sweet.

Our Awesome Vacation - Day 2

January 4, 2011

Tuesday was our first full day in Disneyland. We got up, got ready, got breakfast at the hotel and got ourselves to Disneyland.   For some reason the shuttle to Disneyland took FOREVER to come.  We got there just as the park was opening so it wasn't too crowded and a lot of the characters were out and about.

Emma and I let the boys go have some fun and we went to meet some princesses.

Meeting the princesses was SO MUCH FUN!  We were like third in line so the wait time was not bad at all and then they gave Emma plenty of one on one time with each princess.  

I am sure they are nice to everyone, but I was really impressed with how nice then interested in Emma they all were.  I know it made her feel really special.

All the princesses really liked Emma's princess skirt, but none of them liked it as much as Tinker Bell.  There was actually a kinda long wait for Tinker Bell, but we needed to kill a little time while we waited for the princesses to switch over.  Away Tinker Bell LOVED Emma.  She talked to her for a really long time and totally loved her skirt and sparkly zebra print shoes (she said they must be animal talent fairy shoes).

Emma meeting Aurora was the cutest thing.  When Emma first came over to her she was just in the middle of her little area and, but then she had Emma come sit over on the bench with her and they talked for a while.  Aurora also told her that her mommy was better than having fairies (I always knew Aurora was my favorite) .

Sadly the only princess that we didn't meet was Cinderella and she was the one Emma wanted to meet the most.  Emma was a little disappointed, but she has met her before so it was okay.

After the princesses we met up with the boys and Guy, Kristin, and Adam.  And did just about all the rides in Tomorrow Land.  Logan was brave and rode Space Mountain and I kicked everyone's butt at the Buzz Lightyear  ride.  I am still not sure how I did it, but I think it was because I kept shooting for all the kinda not obvious targets and those must be worth more.

After lunch we headed over to California Adventure to catch the Playhouse Disney show.  I am a little sad to say I think Emma and Alan are getting old for Playhouse Disney.  But they still had fun.

While Scott ran over and got fast passes for Soarin' Over California the kids and I met Lightning McQueen.  This was possibly Logan's FAVORITE part of the day.  He was ridiculously excited.  It was almost impossible to get him to hold still long enough to get this picture.  He just kept wiggling and touching the car.  I wish I had had the camera on video. It was just that funny.

Next we hit some of the classic rides on the midway area.  The kids also saw Woody and Jessie over there. We didn't wait around to get pictures, but the kids were happy enough just to be a few feet away from them.

After about 10 straight hours in the park we quickly rode a few rides in A Bug's Land  before calling it a night.

After leaving the park we made out first trip ever to Balboa Island for frozen bananas.  Going to Balboa Island is a tradition for Guy and Kristin, but this time we were lucky enough to be with them.  I think Scott wants to move there just so we can eat frozen bananas everyday.  I don't think the kids would mind.

It was another very late night.  But the kids were SO good and nice and happy all day.  It was pretty much as perfect as a day could get.