Southern California

We finally took our first real family vacation. We spent a full week in Southern California and I had to break it up into a few blogs to make it a little easier to view. There are three blogs about our vacation, so when you are finished with this page click older posts to see the rest of San Diego and click older posts again to see Disneyland.


We decided to visit San Diego area and Disneyland both and try to make the most of our trip to Southern California. We decided to drive which was difficult with small children. We woke the kids up at about 4:30 am and instead of staying asleep like I thought they would they were too excited to sleep. They were giddy and just chatted non stop with each other for like an hour until they finally fell asleep. I couldn't help but enjoy the fact that they were so excited and that all our planning and efforts to make the trip happen would be worth it for them.

The first part of the trip went fairly fast and I really did not mind it, but the part from Mesquite to San Diego felt like it took forever.

We also past a big fire on the way that welcomed us to Southern California. Beck screamed like the whole last hour of the drive and Kiera took her turn on the way back.


We spent the first day visiting Balboa Park, La Jolla Beach and Torrey Pines Beaches and then the evening in Olde Town San Diego. This was probably the most fun for me since the rest of the trip was pushing kids around in strollers, bathroom breaks, snack breaks, waiting in line, bathroom break, waiting in line, snack break, walk, walk, etc.


I loved just relaxing on the beach and watching the kids play. I don't really feel like I needed more time at Disneyland or Sea World, but I could have spent more time at the beach, park and in Olde Town. The weather was beautiful the whole time we were out there and my kids didn't get sick until we got home which were two great blessings I was hoping for since we invested so much in this vacation.


I loved watching their little feet make prints all over the sand.


I am so glad we took time out to have this vacation eventhough they may not remember it all since they are so young.

San Diego

As part of our Southern California vacation, we decided to visit Sea World and the Wild Kingdom Animal Park.
Eli and I both enjoyed watching our kids make memories that we had made ourselves as children at Sea World. I loved watching their faces during the Orca and Sea Lion shows. Beck looks a little disgusted or something, but he was really facinated.

I think their favorite part was feeding the seals and sea lions. They also got to feed manta rays, but I don't think they liked that as much because they had to let them take the food right out of their hands. The also really enjoyed being able to touch the star fish in the tide pools.









For some reason after watching a Veggie Tales episode with Barbara Manatee Eli started calling our kids "Kateness Manatee" Until she would scream "I'm not a tee I'm a princess" and then he started calling Beck "Beckness Manatee". I had to stop and get a picture of them in front of the Manatee statue.

I am glad we decided to go to the Wild Animal Kingdom instead of the zoo.

They were freaked out when we first went to feed the Lorakeets and they all three or four landed on them and tried to drink the nectar from the cups and they both ended up dumping the food all over the ground. Then they cried because they did want to feed the birds, so daddy let them try again. We didn't see everything at the zoo, but we tried to see the more exciting animals like the gorillas, Cheetahs, elephants, Lions, and the little safari ride was nice and relaxing and I enjoyed seeing the animals in a more natural habitat.

Disneyland

We spent three days at Disneyland as part of our Southern California family vacation. This was the first time for our kids and we thought they'd like the special Halloween theme. We accomplished a lot the first day since most lines were a 1/2 hour or less and we even caught the parade and fireworks.

The longest line was the princess fantasy faire and after waiting in line for like an hour Kate had a melt down right as it was her turn to meet the princesses. She got to meet Aurora, Snow White and Belle. She would barely even look at Aurora or Snow White, but Belle finially got her talk. Belle talked to her about how they both loved to read books and their favorite colors and even gave her a flower from the backgroung decor for Kate to keep.

Kate's favorite ride was the tea cups and that beat out Tower of Terror, Splash Mountain, and Space Mountain (which has a special Halloween theme called Ghost Mountain). Beck's favorite ride was the Whinnie the Pooh ride (that was the last one we went on, so I think that maybe why he picked that one).

Thursday I started to get sick and we spent most of the day at California Adventure. I think if I had to do it over I would not take Beck to the Bugs Life 3d movie. Daddy had to close his eyes most of the time. I didn't like it either. I don't like regular bugs much less giant 3d bugs that spray you in the face with air and water.

Later that night was the Mickey's Trick-or-Treat Party and I dressed up as a witch along with Kate and Kiera and Beck dressed up as a skeleton. We got a ton of reactions to his skeleton costume and make-up. Everywhere we went people made comments about how cute he looked. I think my expectations were a little too high for the event because I was kind of disappointed. It could have been just fatigue and irritability from having to walk and push a stoller around all day when I wasn't feeling well, but I also think it is geared more toward older kids. There was trick-or-treating and lots of character greets (if you wanted to wait in really long lines) but there weren't any crafts for kids like I thought. I think the funnest part of that night was the little dance party they had with Sully from Monsters inc. and the Incredibles.

Friday we wrapped up the day at Disneyland and it was very crowded. I think there were a lot of locals there checking out the Halloween theme.

Kiera was a great sport. I had her in the sling most of the time and she got to go on most rides with us. It was a great trip and we got to do everything we wanted to.

The ride home driving straight through wasn't as bad as I thought. I was kind of glad to finally rest instead of spend another whole day walking and pushing stollers around. Unfortunately, Eli finally started to get sick on the way home, but once he got some rest he seemed all better. The kids got sick this week too, but I was just very relieved they waited until we got home so they could enjoy their first trip to Disneyland.