A Few of My Favorite Things

Well, we're home from our trip, but I thought I'd bore you with a daily update anyway! I was finally able to update the previous post with pictures, so make sure you take a peek at that one again!

So California Adventure, here we go!

When you stay at one of the Disneyland Resort Hotels, one of the little known perks is early entry into California Adventures. If you're planning a trip to Disneyland in the near future, I highly recommend that you read the disboards for all sorts of tips, or just ask me, I read them all! LOL! Anyway, there is a secret entry to the park through Disney's Grand California Hotel - this hotel is amazing, so it will give you a good excuse to check it out. We went over early (9am) expecting a line, but there was none so we toodled around the hotel for a bit. The "secret" entry opens at 9:30am and only the "Condor Flats" area of the park is open, but "Soarin' Over California" was open as well, so we went straight there. This ride is one of Scott's favorites, I like it too, but it makes me a little queasy! You feel like you're flying over different areas of California and the air is scented too, so when you fly over the orange groves, it smells like oranges, etc. Really fun!

We were able to ride pretty quickly and were still able to get to the ropes before the rest of the park opened. We were at the front of the line and headed straight for "Toy Story Midway Mania". This is one of the newest rides and my new favorite! You wear 3-d glasses and spin through the ride "shooting" at a variety of virtual midway games. When you pop the water balloon, you get wet, when you toss the ring on the rocket it flies at you with a big gust of air, REALLY FUN!

We then hit the midway games where everyone won a prize except me! Oh well!

Next it was on the the "Bug's Life" area of the park. (yes, we're dorks!!!) Years ago we waited for an hour to ride the lamest ride ever...Heimlick's Chew Chew Train. (Whoa boys, hold on!!!) I swear it doesn't even last 30 seconds. Since there was no waiting this time (surprise, surprise) we decided to ride it again. Cute, but boring.

Spencer's favorite ride of the day was "Grizzly River Rapids". It's a fast moving water ride and I got SOAKED! (seriously - worst photo of me EVER, but it's all I got!) Once was enough for Hailey and me, but Spencer and Scott went on it two more times that day.

We left the park for dinner and went back to watch Disney's Electric Parade that night. This is still my favorite parade ever and if anyone knows how to make the music into my ringtone let me know! :)

Well, I think that's the end of day 2. Thanks for reading!

Once again my blog has been lacking on the updates, but this time I have a real excuse, lol! I've been spending my spare time planning our trip to Disneyland! I thought I'd take a little break from talking about scrapbooking and give you a little trip update!

So we arrived yesterday, into LAX at 10am, grabbed the Disneyland Express Shuttle to the Disneyland Hotel and were checked in by 11:30. Our room wasn't ready, so we left our bags with Bell Services and went to lunch by the pool . We had burgers and fries at Croc's Bits and Bites, typical Disney fare.

The hotel is beautiful, while standing in line for lunch, Cinderella's horse and carriage went by with a couple that were just married. :) After lunch we drove the remote control jungle cruise boats that are next to the pool, Spencer loved them, so I know we'll be going back!

We decided to take the monorail into the park from Downtown Disney, we checked in quickly with the park tickets I had purchased online. When we arrived at tomorrow land, we had our plan and were headed to pick up our Indiana Jones Fastpass when we spotted a 20 minute wait for Buzz Lightyear . We were already ahead of the plan, so we rode that first, fun ride, one of our favorites from Disney World. We spent the next few hours riding Pirates of the Carribean, It's a Small World , Indiana Jones (yikes!), the Jungle Cruise, Haunted House, and Winnie the Pooh. We hadn't been on WTP before, it was cute, but we miss the COuntry Bear Jamboree that used to be in that building.

We then went back to the hotel and got our room assignment before dinner at ESPN Zone. The food was great but the service was a little slow.

We went back to our room and were able to see the Fireworks from our balcony . I'm sure they will be WAY better from the park!

Today, we're heading to California Adventure. We've only been there once before and it was just a quick walk through, so we're excited to see what it has to offer.

Will likely be a long day, and an early morning again tomorrow, but I'll try to update when possible!

Have a Happy Day!