Worth it? heck yeah . . . .

Last Saturday, I spent an hour each way on the Max with a 3 yr old who asked at EVERY stop if we were there yet, stood in lines, paid $12 for lemonade, $9.00 for popcorn, and $18 for a strange-looking Ariel sword? Wand? Whatever. Crammed my not-so-petite self into a seat at the Rose Garden where my very short legs were too long (knees actually touched the back of the seat in front of me. How on earth does someone over 5'2" sit in these things? )

And why did I do this? So I could watch Josie's face when Mickey and Minnie came out at the beginning of D*sney on Ice. And then "DONALD!" " GOOFY!" "LOOK MAMA!" "HI MICKEY!" "HI DONALD!" She waved and clapped and was utterly enthralled. I think she went without blinking for the whole first half of the show.

I'm pretty sure I was her hero at the moment-for bringing Disneyland to her. In case you didn't know-she STILL asks to go to Disneyland again several times a week.

I only have a vague idea of what the first 15-20 minutes of the show was about-Mickey and Minnie had some sort of car trouble and then the cast of CARS came out-"CARS! Mama! CARS!" I've only seen the movie once-so I really only remembered Lightning McQueen's name . . . . . They drove around awhile, talked some, I don't know-I was too busy watching Josie's face and reactions to pay attention. Oh yeah-and taking a MILLION horrible pictures trying to get a good one of her.

Then a bunch of skaters came out with scarves to mimic the sea and the music from the Little Mermaid started. She started out just staring, but as the music went on, she realized what was going to happen and this little smile came on her face and got bigger and bigger as the music swelled and then "SEBASTIAN! MAMA! SEBASTIAN! LOOK!" and then OMG "ARIEL! LOOK MAMA! IT'S ARIEL!" And then she was singing so loudly the people in front of us started turning around and smiling at her. They were very nice because Josie kept smacking the woman in the head with her sword, wand, scepter thing because she wouldn't sit down for the whole show. She sort of leaned on the chair and me for the whole thing.

Does anyone else cry just because their kid is so happy? I'm a sap-I truly am.

The Lion King condensed story didn't make any sense but the skating and music was good. At intermission Josie finally took her eyes off the ice rink long enough to eat some popcorn and share a Kit Kat with me (Lunch of champions!) I would have gotten us real food but didn't want to take out a home equity line of credit for a hot dog or chicken strips. And thankfully Josie didn't need to use the restroom because we were smack dab in the middle of a row and I didn't feel like a repeat performance of "Scuse me, pardon me, oh-was that your head? Sorry if my bum's in your face . . ." just to get in and out and go to the bathroom.

The second half was devoted to Tinkerbell and was pretty good-even had "pixie dust" confetti at the end.

Josie passed out on me before we even hit the tunnel on the Max. She had a wonderful time and so did I. Thanks Grandma!

Hope you wanted to see some pics!


Riding the Max train.


Standing in line at the Rose Garden.


The weird Ariel wand, scepter, sword thingie. It lights up and plays music.












The Pixie Dust


What? It's over? Already? Note: Can you see that the battery cover is missing on the "thing"? Yeah-wish I'd noticed it before we waited forever to get into the procession to climb back up the stairs and then get out in the main area only to discover it missing and the "thing" not working. Back down the stairs, to our seats where we scoured the floor and some guy collecting trash asked us what we were looking for. "Oh-hey, I think I just picked that up." Digs around in the garbage bag and hands me a yogurt?-covered battery cover. EWW! But i found some napkins and cleaned it off . . . .


Waiting for the train home.