California Vacation-Disneyland day 1

Tuesday, September 6th was our first day at Disneyland! My mom, Brianna & Kyle joined us and it was super fun. We left a little early as we had a magic morning pass, which gets you into the park an hour beforehand to ride certain rides. We arrived at the park around 9:30am, so we've already missed half of the magic morning. Before we went, I had a basic plan of what we would do that day. When we walked inside main street, Kylie saw Goofy and started shouting his name. I went to check it out and he was going on break for about 10 minutes. While looking around, I noticed Minnie, Mickey and Donald! They were all going on break at the same time. We got a quick picture with the Halloween pumpkin Mickey and then stood in the area where the characters would be. When coming out, Minnie took the spot that Mickey had been at before. People jumped in front, but we were still towards the front of the line. Kylie was adorable with Minnie and was showing off her stuffed Mickey to her. We were so excited that we got to see Minnie so quickly! Once we started seeing characters, my plans for the day went out the window. Lol.

In the parking garage! Kylie was so excited.

Fun to see the Halloween decorations up.

Minnie is the only character we got an autograph from. It was too much of a hassle to get the paper and marker out and Kylie didn't really understand the idea of autographs anyway. We'll do those when she's older and we go again.

 

After Minnie, we headed to Mickey, but he was going on another break. It was warm outside, so they don’t stand in line for very long, but at least the breaks are for only 5 minutes. We saw Daisy and headed over to her to get a picture. Kylie showed Daisy her stuffed Donald and Daisy loved seeing it.

After Daisy, I saw Goofy walking and followed him to his spot and we were at the beginning of the line. We saw Donald right next to Goofy, so Scott stood in that line while I took pictures of Kylie with Goofy. While Scott was standing in line for Donald, I saw Mickey and jumped in his line. While standing in line my mom, Brianna and Kyle showed up. My memory card in my camera was messed up and so I couldn’t take anymore pictures on it. Luckily, Brianna & Kyle had their nice camera and were able to help take pictures for me. We reached Donald first and my mom stood in Mickey’s line while I headed to take pictures of Kylie and Jordan with Donald. Jordan loved seeing Donald and was giggling and smiling. Then we all hopped over to Mickey’s line and got a picture with Mickey.

Hugging Kylie's stuffed Donald.

 

After Mickey, we saw Pluto and said hi to him. While waiting for Pluto, I was trying to make sure Jordan didn’t run away while making sure Brianna’s camera didn’t get hit which resulted in me grabbing his arm and him falling. He fell right on his face and got a scratch on his chin. I felt awful and so bad, but luckily it was not on his nose or eye or something like that. It looked better by the next days we went to the park, but I felt bad for the poor guy. After Pluto, we were done seeing all of the main clubhouse characters! I couldn’t believe our luck in seeing everyone in the same place. Any blog I read in preparation said nothing about that happening, but I’m so glad it did as we didn’t have to worry about running around the park tracking them down.

 

After that, we headed to the Royal Hall to see the princesses. The line wasn’t bad at all and the sign said that the princesses to see were Snow White, Ariel and Royal friend. I looked on the Disneyland app and it said that Cinderella wouldn’t be there until 4pm. Well, we got up there and the first person we saw was Cinderella! We were so excited and Kylie was so bashful with all the “real life” characters. She didn’t talk at all, but loved giving them hugs. She ran out quickly on Ariel, but when we were done she said she wanted to talk to her again. Too bad we never got a chance to. While we were deciding on what to do next, we saw that Flynn Rider was underneath an umbrella tent, but Rapunzel wasn’t with him. We debated on standing in line and decided to go ahead and do it since it wasn’t very long. I asked a worker where Rapunzel was and he said that she would be here soon, but was running late as she was all tangled up. Ha, very clever. While waiting, Rapunzel showed up and she and Flynn Rider were excellent being in character. It was fun to listen to them talk to one another.

Jordan fell asleep while standing in line.

Love the way Flynn is looking at Jordan.

After seeing Rapunzel, we got some lunch (corn dogs) and I got fast passes for Thunder Mountain Railroad. After that, we headed to ride Pirates of the Caribbean. Kylie loved being on a boat in the water, but Jordan didn’t like the little dips that happen in the ride.  My mom watched the kids while we rode Thunder Mountain Railroad, which was fun.  After that, we headed to ride Jungle Cruise. On the way there, I saw Aladdin & Jasmine, but they were going on break for 15-20 minutes. So, we headed to ride Jungle Cruise and then see if we could catch them when we were done. Kylie loved Jungle Cruise and in general, liked any ride that was on water. After the ride, we stood in line and got pictures with Aladdin, Jasmine and Genie! What a treat to have him there as well. After that, we headed to go ride Winnie the Pooh, but both kids fell asleep on the way there. Everyone had a bathroom break and I bought my favorite cookie at Pooh’s Corner Bakery. Since the kids were asleep and no one cared to ride Splash Mountain, we decided to head to Fantasyland.

When we got there, the kids were still asleep and Kyle & Brianna wanted to ride Peter Pan’s Flight. While they were waiting Jordan woke up and so I decided to hop in line with them. It was the first time I rode that ride, so that was fun to experience. It’s the one ride that gets super busy right away. Luckily, the crowds weren’t bad and so a 30 minute wait was nothing compared to a normal day. While we were on the ride, Scott headed to the Royal Theater to watch a quick play on the movie Tangled. Kylie woke up while waiting in line and was a little grumpy, so my mom took her and walked through the castle with her. Then she took Kylie on the carousel and the Storybook Land boats. We headed to It’s a Small World with Brianna & Kyle and let Jordan run around while waiting for my mom and Kylie. It was good to just let Jordan run around and stretch out his legs.  The kids loved the It’s a Small World ride! They were just entranced the whole time.

In front of the Peter Pan ride.

This was actually a fun show to watch.

On the carousel!

We didn't ride the teacup ride, but got the iconic picture in one.

 

After the ride, we stopped by the Matterhorn bobsleds since it was such a short line and we all did single rider (except for my mom). After that, we headed to Indiana Jones, but found out they weren’t doing single rider anymore (probably since it was close to closing time), so that got scratched. We looked through some shops and we had to watch Kylie because she wanted to walk out of the stores with everything. We made our way to the big souvenir store at the end of Main Street and on the way we were able to get some pictures in front of the castle. Kylie decided to get a Minnie doll for her souvenir. We got on the tram and grabbed dinner on the way home while the kids fell asleep in the car.

Haha! Love this outtake.

Kylie did so well with going on the toilet, that she didn’t have an accident all day! We did just have to make sure to be diligent in having her go about every 2-2/12 hours. She somehow got over her fear of public restrooms and I have no idea how that happened, but I’m glad it did. All in all, we had a fantastic day with hardly any hiccups. The longest we had to wait was the 30 minutes for Peter Pan. I’m so glad some of my family could join us on this trip. It made it more special for them to see my kids so excited about Disneyland. Scott is the best for being so flexible and going along with whatever I wanted to do. I’m also proud of myself for being flexible and going with the flow as the very start of our day was thrown off by seeing all the characters. It was so special to see the excitement and joy on our kids’ faces.