Our Disneyland Vacation

Once Upon a Time...As a newly married couple, Jeff and I headed to California for our Honeymoon! Sixteen years later, we were taking our three wonderfully excited children to the Happiest Place on Earth!

There is so much to write about our exciting vacation that we took last month! We took off the first week of October to venture to the west coast and get ourselves to Disneyland! A few years ago, the kids were wanting to go to Disneyland and we told them that we needed to wait for Mack to get a few years older and so we told them that we would finish reading the Book of Mormon and then we would go. After about 3 1/2 years, we finally finished reading it and it felt great to give this trip to all of us as a reward!

We got there on a Sunday night and went straight to the park after we checked into out Hotel. Where do we start????? Geez! You enter the park and are just so overwhelmed by everything there! It was Halloweentime at Disneyland so it was all decorated for Halloween. We took one look at the map and knew where we wanted to start and just got started! We had such a great time getting the kids on the rides and seeing their faces just keep getting brighter and brighter! That night we did find out that Quentin did not like roller coasters. That was okay though. We told all of them that they had to try every ride once-but they didn't need to go on it again if they didn't like it. Space Mountain did him in the very first night! The fireworks were amazing that night. I almost started crying when they were playing the music to the fireworks and Tinkerbell started flying overhead to When You Wish Upon a Star! It really was magical!

The happiest place on Earth they say!

The next day, we spent the majority of the day at California Adventure and WOW did we have fun there! Calli fell in love with the California Screamin' ride and so did Jeff and I!!! 5-4-3-2-1-SCREEEAM!!!! We had to keep fighting over who would go with her next because Quentin wouldn't ride and Mack couldn't ride-he wasn't tall enough! It was really quite sad because he would have gone on it in a heartbeat!!! He pouted for quite a long while after he found out!

We loved everything about the whole day-the rides-especially the one mentioned above, the water ride, the Pixar Parade, chatting with Crush, and Soarin' California! Such a fun day! After they closed, we headed over to Disneyland again to finish off the day.

On Tuesday, we spent the day at the Beach. We went to Laguna beach (great suggestion Jenni) and had such a fun day there. It was a nice relaxing time and a perfect day to go considering that it was 100 degrees! The kids just kept wadding in the water waiting for the next wave and playing all kinds of water games. Jeff stayed on the beach and read his book mostly. He did help Mack out with a sand castle for a while. I just stayed out with the kids taking 200 pictures!

What a fun day!

On Wednesday, we spent the day going back and forth between the two parks hitting our favorite rides! Calli's was a toss up between Space Mountain and California Screamin' and Quentin's favorite was the Matterhorn (He kept calling it the Behemoth!!!), and Mack's favorite was also Space Mountain! I think my favorite ride was any ride that wasn't too dark or too fast so that I could catch a look on any of the kids' faces. What an amazing time I had watching them smile and giggle through everything. Mack's highlight of the whole trip was his Jedi Training where he was picked to go on stage and train to be a Jedi and fight Darth Vader! He got a little certificate at the end and he kept looking at it all day long!!! He was so proud of that! It was fun to watch him do it! He was a brave little Jedi and fought Darth with all of his might!

I cannot wait to go back!!

Riding On the Twilghlight Tower of Terror

On Thursday, we spent the day at Sea World. I thought this would be a highlight of our trip and it was fun, but definitely not as great as I expected (no offense to any Sea World lovers). We had a fun day though and it was amazing what the animals could do. The kids are obviously into rides after Disneyland and were disappointed that there weren't more of them there.

We headed home on Friday and were so sad to say good-bye to California! We all can't wait to go back!! It would be a yearly activity if we could afford it! On the way home, we stopped in Las Vegas to see Jeff's brother and his family who have moved there recently from Mississippi! We are excited to see you more you guys!!