Disneyland

Wade and I have been lucky enough to have taken our kids to Disney World twice. It is seriously the happiest place on earth! The moment I saw Cinderella's castle the first time I had goosebumps from head to toe. I found myself walking around the park with a smile from ear to ear and thinking over and over "we are actually here!" And even tearing up when we had to leave to come home. And then to be there with your children and share that with them is amazing. Nothing compares to seeing your little girl's face when she sees a real Princess or your little boy's face when he gets to fight Darth Vader with a light saber.

The entire experience is magical. Everything from walking down Main Street USA to Mickey shaped chicken nuggets. There is always music playing in the background everywhere you turn like it is the soundtrack of your vacation. The Castmembers (employees) treat you like they came to work that day specifically to accommodate you. They always greet you with a smile and refer to your children as "prince" or "princess". The bathrooms are spotless and seldom do you see trash around or ever smell cigarette smoke. The parades are amazing and I couldn't even begin to describe the fireworks displays because they are definitely "see it to believe it" type events. We love all of the 3-D shows and the live shows with all of the characters. The rides are awesome and leave you wanting to go again and again and again. They add new things all of the time so you can never say you have seen it all.

Wade grew up in Vegas and visited Disneyland several times. That park was a little different than the Magic Kingdom and he always said he thought he liked it better. I couldn't imagine that he would like Disneyland better than Disney world. I always thought they had to have been the same maybe just layed out a little different.

When we found out we were going out to Vegas we decided to surprise the kids and drive to California first to spend a couple of days in Disneyland. They were totally surprised!!

This was on Its a Small World. It is such a cheesy ride but you have to do it according to Macy and Lucas. They both got their first mouse ears. The twins and Gage got theirs a couple of years ago. They are a little too "cool" for them now. Besides, I don't think they would fit over Gage's hair!

Doesn't Lucas look so natural standing beside explosives!! scary! I hope this isn't a preview of a later post! These pictures were taken in toon town. The first picture at the top was in the "dog-pound" and apparently we picked up an extra puppy at the pound.
We had a blast at Disneyland and spent an entire day riding rides and seeing shows. We played and played until our legs wouldn't let us anymore.

***Interesting note... a lady came up to me and asked me if we were here for UEA. I told her that I didn't know what she was talking about and she said "I'm sorry, I just thought you looked LDS". huh???????? I know I look 19 and have several children but if she heard me open my mouth I'm sure she would have known right away that I was not from Utah. Of course I told her I was LDS (she has good radar) and she explained what UEA was and we had a nice conversation. And then I remembered that I had seen BYU t-shirts and ball caps on people all day. Now it all made since. Definitely not something that would have happened in Memphis.