Disney wrap up.

Before any more time passes I want to share some final pictures about our great trip to Disneyland.

At our hotel they have a great kids room, that plays Disney cartoons 24/7.  Isabelle loved the room and I think tried out every single chair in the room, all of them have a pretty good view.

Speaking of views, here's a view of our hotel room from Disney's Paradise Pier.  It was so nice staying close, made the walking not too hard (especially after running a half marathon a day or so before).

See that big Mickey  wheel?  Nana is not a fan of heights and I'm not a fan of things swinging back and forth that high off the ground.  Yet we all decided to go on it, as Isabelle wanted to ride if from the moment she saw it and the boys of course wanted to go on the swinging side.  Little did we know that the cart your in (although definitely not strapped into) swings back and forth very significantly.  At one point as we were "swinging" (if felt more like turning over in a circle), I looked up to see Nana, Papa, Isabelle and Michael completely over top.  It was then I think I spent most of the ride begging to get off.  The kids loved it though, so I guess it was good we all went on it. 

On the pier Daddy and Isabelle found the silly mirrors to which we had to stop and take a picture.

On our last day, we tried to soak up every minute of the Disney magic that we could.

A great view of a ride, I will never ride on again!

After leaving Paradise Pier, we stopped back at Disneyland for our last few hours.

I love this picture of Nana and Papa with the Disneyland sign in the back.  I think at this point, we were all wishing we could stay instead of going home.

Too bad the genie was busy or we could have asked him for a wish.

We made our last jaunt down Main Street toward the castle and headed to cross off the last rides/shows/attractions off our list.

Star Tours was one of those rides.  Here the boys are modeling their 3D glasses before getting into the simulator.

Another stop we made was at Innovation where they got to see first hand some cool super hero stuff.  Here they are admiring Tony Hawk (aka Iron Man's) gear.

They didn't think it was at all cool... NOT

One part of the experience is that you get to be fitted for the Iron Man gear.  Here are the boys (and Isabelle) who had to try out the experience.

Another part within Innovation is that they have a video game section.  The boys wanted to spend the rest of the time at the park playing video games . Anyone who knows me knows my love (hate) of video games and so I tried to make sure we could move on as quickly as possible.  Anyway, why pay a ton to get into Disney just to play video games, when they could have done that at home.  I digress.

Another really cool part of Innovations was getting to meet the real life Thor.  Seriously, we waited well over 30 minutes just to get to see him, and while the boys weren't too excited to wait that long, I think in the end, they were very excited we did.

Here Thor is telling them to show off their biggest muscle pose.

Thor kept giving Michael grief because he instead looked either silly or happy.  Finally Michael made a pose that seemed "super hero" enough.

And of course we had to take a group shot, it isn't every day you meet Thor right?

As we were leaving Innovations, we happen to come upon Minnie Mouse to which Isabelle started chasing down.  Minnie seemed to be in quite a big hurry so this is all the time she had so I had to grab a photo on the run.  Isabelle was happy though, she got a hug from her favorite female mouse.

After getting her hug, Isabelle just stepped back and admired Minnie making other little kids happy.  I love the look Isabelle has here.  I can just see the happiness on her face and in her heart.

We decided next to go to the Star Wars Jedi Training Academy.  Jarrett and I had watched this show on a previous trip to Disneyland (before kids) and I have always known this is something Jarrett would want to do with our kids.  Sadly, Jarrett's too old, so he had to live vicariously through Gabriel and Michael.  Jarrett and Papa went early to get a seat and did his best to position the boys in a place that would allow them to be selected to be picked.  We hoped that at least one boy would get picked, so you could imagine our surprise when... both boys were selected for the training.

Here Gabriel, Michael and Jarrett beg to be picked among a sea of other kids.

After being picked the boys were instructed to go over to get their Jedi training cloaks.

Michael was so excited to be picked first.  

And moments later Gabriel got to join him too!  Here they are racing over to each other to share in the joy of being picked.

They were just a tiny bit excited! 

Soon enough they were going through the motions and learning how to use their light sabers to take on the dark side.

Meanwhile Isabelle wasn't the slightest bit interested.  She instead choose to lie on the ground, watch my phone and roll around in what others before us had left behind.  Now, if I wasn't her parent, this might be a good moment to judge our parenting choices (or lack their of), but on the final day at Disney, after less sleep in one night than she has ever gotten and no naps for several days, I decided it was probably best to deal with the consequences of germs, dirt, bacteria, heck, even the measles virus, rather than try to get her to sit on a chair.

And so we just left her be and went on to enjoy the boys having fun in the show.

Soon after the training had concluded, low and behold, Darth Vader and Darth Maul arrived to take on the newly trained Jedi's.

First Gabriel took on Darth Maul and was successful in taking him down.

Meanwhile other kids took on Darth Vader.

Look at that scary face.... I'm glad I wasn't picked to show my Jedi skills, I think I would have just throw my weapon at him and ran the other way.

But Michael wasn't scared and soon enough he too had taken down the dark side.

As the dark side was defeated, they soon retreated and disappeared, with plans to come back a little over an hour later (see schedule below).

Gabriel and Michael were thrilled with the experience and I think it was yet another highlight for them on the trip.

Before leaving the boys begged to go on Autotopia, especially Gabriel, and only because he was finally tall enough to drive the car alone.  So that was where we headed next.

Nana and Papa went together while Dad rode with driver Michael

And I rode with crazy driver Isabelle.  Yes, she drove and yes, I think we still have neck whiplash.

And there is Gabriel driving the car all by himself.  He got to go first before all of us and it turns out he's not yet the best driver.  He wasn't able to figure out you have to push the foot pedal down all the way to get it to go, so needless to say, what he thought was going to be racing fun, turned into a Sunday afternoon Grandpa type of drive for him.  By the end we were all backed up behind him because, "my leg got tired of pushing down the foot pedal the whole way."  

I'm not complaining about his negative driving experience, just pushes off his desire to drive a real car a little bit longer (or at least I hope it does).

Isn't Disneyland such a beautiful place?  How often do you see a snow capped mountain with palm trees in front of it?

With so many things to see, rides to ride and shows to watch, you think there would have been enough to keep the boys entertained the entire time.  And yet the picture below shows that NO matter where you take them, they will always find a way to mess around.

Boys will be boys right?

Our second to final ride was the carousel ride and I loved his picture of Michael and Isabelle.  He really is such a great big brother to her.  He was holding her hand so she wouldn't be scared.

The final ride we went on was the Peter Pan ride.  It is always very busy and while technically a child ride, I think it is the epitome of the Disney Magic.  How often can you sail away on a pirate ship to Neverland?  Well, at Disneyland you can, and I think that's why it is a ride loved by children of all ages.

As we left Disneyland and walked back on our final walk through Downtown Disney, we had to stop and take a picture of the castle.  Just a few days after we left, they put a wall up around the castle for no one to be able to see as they refurbish it for the next big anniversary.

And here's one last group shot as we said good bye and gave thanks for all the fun, memories and quality time we had had in three short but very filled days.

Immediately after taking the group picture, Isabelle ran off to a bench she found just steps away.  She was officially done, waiving her white flag and saying she had reached her limit of exhaustion. We finally reached the car, loaded her into her car seat and before we could even back out of our parking space she had fallen asleep.

What a wonderful trip.  There are some memories in life that are priceless.  I think we'd all agree the memories we have from our trip to Disney are exactly that.  The kids still talk daily about all the fun we had and Isabelle begs, okay demands, we go to Disneyland every other day.  

I take all those things as a trip well spent.  

We look forward to the next time, but until then...

we will cherish the memories and give thanks for all the fun that was had.

Until next time,

Angie