I was so excited to blow Josie's mind when I told her we were leaving for the airport to go to Disneyland. But she pretty much took it in stride. Which just goes to prove my theory-she likes to squash all my fun. Don't get me wrong-she was happy and excited-just didn't seem to be all that surprised.
I was sooooo correct in not telling her about the trip. Because the next several hours, all i heard was, "How long before we get to Disneyland?" in some form or another. She thought the car ride to the airport took too long. She didn't like waiting to board the airplane. She didn't like waiting for the airplane to take off. She didn't like waiting to land in California. She didn't like waiting for the shuttle. She didn't want to bother going to the hotel. She wanted to go to DISNEYLAND, darn it!
So-she doesn't like to wait. And we were going to Disneyland. In June. Yeah. Fun times.
Josie is not the best traveler-she's so caught up in what's GOING to happen that she can't seem to enjoy the moment she's in. She couldn't enjoy the flight, the anticipation, the Starbucks hot chocolate . . . .because she just wanted to get there.
And when we did get there? Holy cow-she drove me and mom nuts! Whatever ride/atttraction we were waiting in line for-she wanted to be in line for 10 other ones. She didn't seem to understand that we would be there for 5 days, we would get to (mostly) everything. RELAX! We threatened to put her with the hotel babysitting service at one point so we could enjoy ourselves without the whining and complaining.
But finally after about a day and a half-she did relax and get into the groove of the whole thing. Josie and I would hit the early entry while mom enjoyed her coffee and do as much as we could. We'd join mom later for lunch and rides and then head back to the hotel for rest and swimming. The D!sne$land Hotel just opened a new little waterpark (they're still remodeling the other pool) and Josie loved it. Me too-I was following her around until another parent clued me in the the SEVEN lifeguards in the area and told me to sit down and relax! So I did. But she did talk me into going down the waterslide . . . .
We waited so late in the spring to go because the new Little Mermaid ride opened on June 4th and we couldn't miss that! The new Star Tours opened on the same day so it got a little nuts. But we had gotten some special (hard won, I tell you) Fastpasses from the hotel so we didn't have to wait in line for the Little Mermaid. We decided to pass on Star Tours (some people were waiting 4 hrs-crazy!) since Josie had developed an aversion to any ride that was in the dark. The Matterhorn was probably not such a great idea our first day there . . . . . We did get her on Pirates though and she really liked it. But oh boy, get that girl on roller coasters, river rapid rides and the (surprising freaky) ferris wheel and she's a happy camper! She loves the thrill rides! Yay! Unfortunately she was too short for the big roller coaster and the Big Thunder Mountain was closed.
We saw the World of Color (which was, just okay . . .considering the hassle of getting tickets/viewing spot). I probably wouldn't do it again. I hate crowds so something has to be pretty amazing for me to deal with craziness.
We also had a couple of character meals-Goofy's Kitchen and Ariel's Grotto. And some meet-n-greet with characters-the Princess Faire, Tinkerbell, and Rapunzel.
Josie's favorite ride (and I say this because we went on it now fewer than 5 times-once 3 times back to back since there was no line) was the Monster's Inc ride. Why? No clue-it's cute and all but I refused to go on it a 6th time! We also went twice on It's a Small World-twice is my limit on that ride. Funny how I love it the first time and the second time seems HOURS long . . .
The new Little Mermaid ride is cute-you're basically going through scenes from the movie while you sit in your little clamshell. What's funny is the clamshells go through on a conveyor belt and they're pretty quick. They don't stop so you can get on-you have to practically run to catch up and leap onto one. I'm sure the attendents can stop or slow it down. But they didn't. So there were sometimes empty shells because folks couldn't jump in in time.
Some pics . ..
