the paquettes

The night before Disneyland…

On Monday we went to Disneyland to see it at Christmas time.  We made a couple mistakes.  1.)  We had only 1 day to go to two parks.  2.)  We went at Christmas time.  We will never again go at Christmas!  It was the most crowded I have ever seen, and I grew up going to Disneyland a couple times a year!  We went on a Monday, when school was still in session, but it didn’t help!  I felt like we didn’t get to go on hardly any rides, especially at Disneyland.  And the kids didn’t get any character’s autographs this time.

This is our kids third time to Disneyland, and this time we really wanted to ride the new Cars ride.
Disneyland opens before California Adventure (where the Cars ride was), so we went on one ride there first-Astroblasters!

Then in the drizzly weather, we walked to California Adventure!

Main Street

We walked straight to Cars land and the new ride.

2 HOURS LATER we finally get on! The kids were NOT HAPPY about the wait, and I could not blame them! (The ride was not working for 30 minutes of our wait.)

We thought the ride was fun!! We were not expecting the fast race at the end though, and Ella, who does NOT like fast rides, was NOT happy afterward!

the ride is beautifully done

Then we headed to the Ariel ride, which is Ella’s favorite!

rilyn

We bribed Rilyn (with more money added to her souvenir allowance!) if she went on the Tower of Terror! We were pleased to see that Asher just made the height requirement too!

Here is the picture that they take during the ride! I love Rilyn and Asher’s face! Rilyn is not holding a stranger’s hand. That is my cousin’s wife. 🙂  Asher said after the ride that he almost threw up, but he loved it!

we are in the back row

Then we went to Dancin’ with Disney (characters). Basically, it’s a live DJ spinning tunes with about 7 characters dancing around. Pretty good idea! My girls danced with Cruella de Vil.

Then we headed to Rilyn’s favorite ride-Soaring over California. This was Asher’s first time, and he loved it too!

cotton candy!

After the ride, we headed back to Disneyland to watch the Christmas parade!

Pluto!

mesmerized

Sleeping Beauty and the rest of the princesses

Pinnochio float

Tarzan’s Treehouse had no line, so we let the kids run up and down the tree a couple times!

can you see James and the kids way up there?

It started getting dark at 5 as we went on Pirates of the Caribbean. The kids turned on their light-up Disney shirts. Their Oma found them at Walgreens!

Asher picking his nose…

ella

Pirates of the Caribbean

Next, we went on Thunder Mountain which is Rilyn’s favorite ride at Disneyland. Ella did not go on because she told me “speed is her enemy.” Last year she went on Thunder Mountain, and it is definitely worth a look back if you haven’t seen the hilarious pictures!

Sadly, we did not get to go on Small World this trip. The line was over an hour long and then when we went back to go on it, the ride closed early because of fireworks! 😦

Small World is beautiful at night at Christmas time!

We went to Toon Town while Asher rode Thunder again with James.

sisters

The girls love Minnie’s house!

Minnie’s kitchen

Finally, at 9 p.m. our kids were D.O.N.E and we had to leave the park. The castle looked beautiful at night!