Our Big Disneyland Vacation

Every August for the past 5 years we have had our family vacation.  Sadly we couldn't make our normal trip to California last year and vowed to make this years trip the best ever.  I had been dying to go to Disneyland but we wanted to wait until the girls were old enough to really enjoy their first time.  With Madi being 2 we finally decided that she and Zo were big enough to know what was going on. I was probably more excited about this trip than anyone in the family.  I was finally taking my baby girls to the Happiest Place on Earth.  And unlike our last two trips to Disneyland (the first time we took Donnie was a complete surprise to me, orchestrated by David's parents and I left with an engagement ring on my finger, and the second trip was a last minute decision during a beach trip).  This time I had lots and lots of time to plan every aspect of this trip. I could go on and on about the details of this vacation, all the crafts I made, and everything that I learned this past week, but honestly it would go on for pages, so instead this post will just highlight the the vacation itself (mostly with pictures) and I will be writing a series of posts about all of the super cool money saving tidbits I picked up, ways to make your vacation sparkle, and a couple cool things I learned at the park this time around.


First stop was Downtown Disney, we actually went there the night before our first Park day to save precious time.  In our opinion the best part of Downtown Disney is the Lego store.  The amazing Lego Engineers built some really ridiculous lego statues for this store and I keep reminding Donnie that his love of Legos can someday turn into a dream career! If you have never been there it is worth spending 15 minutes to check it out.

                          

One of the great things about the Lego store is that they had bricks to play with out side of the store, you can build a Duplo tower or a car and then race it on the track.  Its free to build (and then leave for the next kid to play with).

Before our vacation  I took a few of the kids stacking rings and sewed them together for the girls to hold on to as we walked through the park, they loved them, it made them feel like they were playing follow the leader and they also had a bit of "freedom" to walk around without actually holding an adult's hand.

 David, Disneybounding as Goofy, hanging out with Goofy.

Day one was Disneybounding day, I was Ariel, David was Goofy, Donnie a Stromtrooper, and I will let you just guess what the girls dressed up as

My little Princesses and their castle

Scribbling in her autograph book as she waited patiently to meet Tinkerbell

 Silvermist is my new favorite fairy, when she saw the autograph books that I made she called me Tinker Fairy!  Hooray...I'm a Tinker Fairy!!! 

Here she is, Tinkbell herself, at the Teapot house she tinkered! What a great experience!!

Little miss Diva had had enough of picture taking!!

 First ride of the day was a dream come true for Zo, she had always wanted to ride a carousel.

Here we are in the morning of Day 2 on our Mickey and Minnie day.

Grandma and Grandpa joined us on day two.  The kids had even more fun showing them around California Adventure

Mommy's favorite Classic princess

Madi loving her Bahpoo

Donnie got to build his own lightsaber (which he had been saving up to do all summer) and was happy that they had purple.  He was testing it out while we sat and relaxed for a minute.

Not taking a nap started to take it's toll

 There are 3 main things that I go to Disneyland for (beside the obvious magically happy time) Turkey Legs, Churros, and FIREWORKS.  No Disney experience is complete without watching Tinkerbell fly over a sparkling castle, listening to the tear jerking music and message about dreams coming true.  Makes me cry every time.  When I asked David what his favorite part of our vacation was, he told me that it was when I took this picture of him holding our baby hearing her screams and laughter when Tinkerbell appeared in the sky.  The Disneyland fireworks always reminds me that all of my dreams HAVE come true and that just being in that magical place is a dream.  I am so happy and feel so blessed that we had the opportunity to share this experience with our little family, I pray that we have many more family vacations just like this one because family time makes us stronger (but more about that later).

This was my last picture at the end of day 2, both girls knocked out in the stroller, one missing a sock and the other missing socks and shoes!

I have literally hundreds more pictures that I will be methodically sharing over the next week or so, but so far these are my favorites.

Have a Magical Day,