California - Disneyland!!!

DISNEYLAND!!!!!!!  Truth be told I was pretty grumpy on our first morning down in Anaheim.  But as soon as I saw the Halloween Festive gates, everything was 'right as rain' and I found myself bouncing up and down in anticipation for the amazing time that I knew we would have.  

We knew that we would have several days in the park, so we took our time and just went methodically through.  This was my first time in the park when the holiday stuff was up, and it was awesome.  We stopped and took pictures with Jack and Sally, since they aren't very often found out in the park, before heading into the Haunted Mansion.

 

Noah was a total trooper and was willing to try every single ride that he was tall enough to do.  He surprised us and really liked all of them.  Splash Mountain and Star Tours were his absolute favorites.  While he was off riding the big rides, Kaiden chose to ride Winnie the Pooh over and over...and over.....and over.  It was by far his favorite ride.

We of course had to stop for some Dole Whips while waiting for the Tiki Room.  This was an especially important moment for Kaiden since he doesn't get to eat ice cream.  Ever.  He was so excited that we finally let him have some.  Thank you Disneyland for having Dole Whips be dairy free. 

 

Later in the afternoon we headed over to the Blue Bayou for some very anticipated dinner.  The boys didn't really understand how cool it was.  They were just happy to be somewhere cooler with food.  Kaiden literally fell asleep while putting spaghetti in his mouth.  I never noticed before that the best part of the Blue Bayou is how quiet it is in there.  Everywhere else in the park there's constant chatter and noise going on.  It's always happy noise, but it's still noise.  Constantly.  The Blue Bayou is the only place in the whole park where you can really give your senses a bit of a break.  Though it might be a bit of over stimulation on the sense of taste.  Food there is GOOD.

After dinner Kaiden stayed asleep for about an hour.  Noah had gotten his rest while we were sitting there at dinner and he was ready to get going again.  We finished off the evening hitting up our favorite rides all over again, and grabbing the boys their first Disney souvenirs.  Perry the Platypus, and Agent P.  The boys were pretty darn happy about it.

Months later as I'm actually writing this, it makes me all sorts of happy and warm inside remembering the amazing time we had together in that magical land.