Disneyland!

We took the kids to Disneyland for part of their October Break this year. It was so much fun! I've never been to Disney during Halloween-time and we will for sure be making it a tradition. Halloween is my very favorite holiday, it was so much fun to see the park all decorated in Fall leaves, pumpkins, spider webs and skeletons. Even the characters wore Halloween costumes.

We spent three full days at Disney and California Adventure. On our first day, we decided to check out California Adventure. We had never been there before so we were excited to experience it for the first time. We were feeling pretty lucky that day, it was cloudy and it actually rained quite a bit but it was such a fine mist rain that it didn't get in our way at all. Rain is something we treasure in Arizona so we really enjoyed it. The reason we felt lucky was because there was absolutely NO lines for the rides! We rode just about every single ride at California Adventure, ate lunch, met the characters and played games in just under 4 hours. I'll take rain over lines any day!

Some of our favorite rides were the Soarin' California ride, Monsters Inc, and the Ferris Wheel. Our least favorite....Tower of Terror. Yes, we took both boys on that ride. Big mistake. So scary! Can you believe Andrew was brave enough and tall enough for that ride? Ugggh, makes me scared just thinking about it! You get into an "elevator", it takes you 10 stories up, opens the doors so you can see how high you are and then drops you 5 stories, opens the doors and drops you again. Just when you think it's over......it takes you to the top again and makes you re-live the terror. Okay, it was a little fun but I'll never do it again! Another scary ride was the California Screamin' roller coaster. I'm not a big roller coaster person but it was fun too! Bryan and his sister really enjoyed it!

The following day, we got to the park bright and early. Beautiful morning, clouds were pretty much gone and the park was once again, dead. No lines! We got to meet tons of characters and we took Taylor to meet the princesses too. Connor got to ride Indiana Jones for the first time. It's one of my favorites and he really enjoyed it too. He went twice, once with Bryan and me and once with Grandma. Taylor really loved the carousel, Pirates, Winnie the Pooh, and Small World. Drew's favorites were all of the rides he couldn't ride last year because he wasn't tall enough. Splash Mountain, Thunder Mountain, Space Mountain and of course, the Matterhorn. My favorite is the Haunted Mansion. They decorated it in a "Nightmare Before Christmas" theme, which I loved. It really helped to get us in the mood for our "Trick or Treat" night!

Later that night the kids dressed up in their costumes and we took them to the Trick or Treat event at the park. We had to buy a separate ticket for the event but it was SO worth it. We rode rides, went trick or treating, saw an awesome Halloween parade and a fireworks show. The kids had a really fun time dressing up as Buzz, Woody and Minnie Mouse. They got SO much candy, it was ridiculous! By the end of that day, we were all exhausted!

The next morning, we slept in a bit and had breakfast at the hotel. Grandma and Aunt Heather decided to skip Disney that day and head home early. We were sad to see them leave but it didn't stop us from going back for more Disney fun! That day was pretty rainy. We all wore our panchos to stay dry. It's funny because kids really don't care about weather like adults do. My kids never complain about it being too hot or too cold, too wet or windy. I never once heard them complain about the rain. They were just so happy to be at Disneyland and so were Bryan and I. That day we went to all the rides we missed the first day, then we decided to have each of us pick our favorite ride and then we'd go back to the hotel. Connor picked the Rockets (Because they were the closest), Bryan picked Pirates, I picked Haunted Mansion, Drew picked Splash Mountain and Taylor picked Winnie the Pooh. My favorite moment of that day was watching Connor and Andrew hold Taylors hands and help her walk up a hill. They were all three so happy. I'm so lucky to have them.

Now we're home.......just cleaned the house and finished all the laundry. The worst part about vacation. I can't wait until next summer when we can do it all again. I think we're renting a beach house though. Nice and relaxing!