Disneyland!

Since Dad is available again - my first request was getting back to Disneyland!!!  I love that place!  Remember we got annual passes for Mason's birthday, so it was a completely free trip minus the gas.  We left on Thursday night to hopefully have some sleeping kids for most of the trip.

We take the toll roads into Orange County and every time we are approaching them, we start complaining about getting the Saqajuia dollars as change for the toll roads.  What are we ever going to do with Saqajuia dollars?  I am so self conscious about that stuff, they also end up in our coin jar at home, never to be used again.  I guess one of these days we should go cash all the coins in.  Anyway, so we are driving up and happy that we at least have a $5 bill so that we will only get 2 Saqajuia dollars in change.  Steve puts his hand in to get the change and IT WAS FULL!  Someone had left all their change from a $20 bill in the change thing.  SCORE!

We immediately said we should play the lottery with that money.  We always talk about winning the lottery and what we would do with the money and how it would so not ruin us like you often here about from other winners.  Steve says that when he is trying to fall asleep at night he thinks about organizing his dream gun room.  Then we always say, well you have to play the lottery to win - which we have never actually done.  So, here was our chance to actually play the lottery with LUCKY money.  (I will skip ahead now...On our way back home we made a point to stop by some run down 76 station (because you never here of someone winning from a nice place in Orange County) and bought our $17 worth of quick-pick lottery tickets.  I had no idea what I was doing, but I managed to do it, and then we spent the next 3 hours on the road dreaming of things to do with the money).  Oh yeah...didn't win.  poop.

Back to Disneyland.  I always try to go on days when Disney opens at 8 am since we have kids that wake up at the butt-crack of dawn.  Actually that is giving them a lot of credit.  I would be thrilled if I woke up at the sunrise.  No, we usually beat the sunrise by at least one hour.  So we drive into the parking lot just before 8 and we are the 4th car in line.  I roll down my window to fork out the $15 freaking dollars just to park  before an average family is about to drop $500 in the park - a little bitter - and the parking attendant says, "sorry the computers are down, I can't take your money."  SCORE!!
Heck yeah!

Since we were so early we had the run of the place for a good two hours.  We rushed to the Matterhorn and didn't even have to wait for one person.  The ride was actually waiting for us.  I told Mason that it would be scary, but he would be safe.  He seemed excited, but kept asking about the monsters.  I told him that there would be two white snow monsters inside.  The ride was fun - one of my favorites - but Mason was pretty scared.  He asked me over and over if the monsters were real.

(Mason distraction - he just walked up to me (when he was supposed to be sleeping) and looked very guilty.  He had his hand up his shirt - Mason - what do you have in your shirt.  He pulls out a bar of soap, and immediately says "sorry, but I won't put it in my mouth."  He is so weird.  Does any other kids like to play with soap?  Whatever.)

Back to Disneyland - we then headed over to Star Tours because that is a great ride and usually has really long lines.  We waited for about 10 minutes.  Mason doesn't quite no Star Wars yet - and really neither do I.  I think I saw one of the movies when I was 10 or so and have never had a desire to see the rest.  Part of me thinks that I am really depriving my son of this whole genre of movies though.  I could see how little boys would be so into Star Wars.  Anyway, he loved it.  You know how there really is a R2D2 in the "space shuttle" (sorry if I am butchering these names); he saw that and he turned to me and said, "This is REALLY REAL!!!"  Nice touch Disney.

Then we headed over to the Buzz Lightyear ride - which I had never been on before.  Steve had a blast with this one because you shoot a laser gun at targets all around the ride.  He had like 100,000 points and Mason had like 13,000.  I thought they were going to give him a prize or something at the end.

We almost got in line for Space Mountain, but decided against it.  I don't want to push Mason too far.  He probably would have liked it, but the darkness is pretty bad in that one.  I still remember the first time I went on that ride.  I was 6 and I still remember how excited I was when I found out that I was tall enough.  My dad took me on, and that first part when the lights go zooming by you in the tunnel will forever be imprinted in my memory.  I honestly believe if I ever see "my life flash before my eyes" this scene will surely be part of my life.  Then I remember hearing my dad curse for the first time in my life because he was scared.  Then I came bounding off the ride and tattle telling on him that he said a bad word and he was scared and I was not and I probably talked about that for the rest of the day.  Rumor has it that I was a very talkative little girl.  I think I used up all my words because I am relatively quiet now.

Then we headed over to toon town - and went on Mason's favorite ride "Goofy's Go Coaster" about 4 times.  Again, no line.

Toon Town is the best!

Then we hopped on the train to go on the Haunted Mansion.  This was the first day of all the Halloween decorations up at Disneyland, so the Haunted Mansion was a must see.  They change it out during the holiday to be based on "The Nightmare Before Christmas."  It was really neat.

I always get a kick out of these

This is my favorite.  Look at how worried Mason looks.  Steve always makes that stupid face when I point a camera at him.

Then we headed over to California Adventure - which I had never been to yet.

I really wanted to ride this ferris wheel, but really - not worth it.  It looks a lot more fun than it is.  Time is of the essence when I am at Disneyland.  The flagship ride was not running this day (the big white one in the back).  We went on Soaring over California - which I loved. Then we hit the boardwalk games.  These are usually a waste of money, but I thought we should do a couple of games.  The first one was my favorite where you shoot the water into a bullseye.  There were six players (Mason and Dad and 4 others) so we were playing for the big Dumbo.  I helped Mason keep the stream steady.  Guess what?  He won!  Of course, now we have to carry this big Dumbo, but he was so excited to see that he won, that it was worth it.  Then we went to the skee ball one.  Guess what? Dad won a Woody doll!  Then we went to the fishing won - this is one where everyone is a winner, but it just depends on what fish you get to see the prize.  Guess what!  Mason got the biggest Mickey doll you can get!

Mason fishing

Mason winning

 We should have stopped right there, because the only game left was a baseball throwing one, and I knew this was too hard for Mason.  But we had money left on our card and he really wanted to play.  He didn't win, and he almost had a melt-down.  I can't believe how competitive he is.  He would have thrown balls all day until he won if we let him.

You can get a glimpse of the winning loot on the left.

All said a done, a dumbo, a woody doll, a Mickey mouse, and a lobster (Dad's consolation prize for fishing) for $20!  We would have spent $20 for one of those in a gift shop.

Almost had a meltdown. Needed to take a deep breath and Dad had to gently explain why he can't win everything.

After the near-meltdown, we thought it was probably time to leave.  This would be a great time to head back to the room, take a big nap, and get back out there.  The rooms are like $250/night right there in the park!  Crazy!  And never going to happen when Grandma lives 15 minutes away.  We hit a couple more rides on the way out - still very little lines at this point - and Mason got to dance with Goofy a little:

Cotton Candy (Yuck!) But he loves it!

Asleep within 10 minutes

Grandma's surprise cake - isn't it great!

Well that was Disneyland.  The next day we went to the beach, but I am tired of writing, and you probably already stopped reading, so I will just add some pictures.  Alex LOVED it and had not one ounce of hesitation from running right into the ocean.  Most kids find it at least a little bit intimidating, not him!  I was WORN OUT by the end of that excursion.

And, I can barely ever get a picture of him, because he is always running away from me as fast as he can.