Disneyland day 2

On the second day at Disneyland I had Mark drop me and the girls off closer to the park so I wouldn't waste as much energy walking to the park and save more for walking around the park. So me and the girls headed in to meet up with my siblings and Mark went to the resort to park the van and then head to the park.

So when we met up with my siblings we got right onto the Snow White ride. Arya sat next to me and I thought she might get a little scared but she was quite stoic through the duration of the ride. After Snow White we headed to the merry-go-round. Talk about traumatic! Arya hated it. I put her on the horse and buckled her in and she started to flip out. I ended up hopping on it with her and she couldn't wait for the ride to be done!

Luckily it's not a very long ride bu we were glad to get off. A panicked one year old on a horse 4 feet off the ground that goes around and around isn't my idea of fun. Obviously it wasn't Arya's idea of fun either :) It was definitely Audree's idea of fun.

Of course we had to try and pull the sword out of the stone!


Waiting around for Daddy to show up

Once Mark arrived we headed over to California Adventure. First we went on the Monsters Inc. ride. It was fun to experience the faint smells that were added to the ride. I really enjoy the full sensory experience. Arya was pretty dang cute sitting so patiently through the whole ride. She's such a little squirt and seeing her so tiny sitting on her own spot on a ride just made me giggle a little.

After that we headed over to A Bug's Land


First we did Francis' ride...the spinning lady bug one. Arya hated that one. At one point we didn't have a good hold on her(they wouldn't let us have her in our laps) and she bonked her head and cried for the rest of the ride.

Becca headed off the Soaring Over California to get us some fast passes and we headed the tuck and roll bumper bugs. Me and Audree were in one car and Chrissie was in one and Carter another. Mark sat out with Arya because she was too little.


After bumper bugs we rode Heimlich's chew chew train. That was also a fun sensory experience and Arya was able to ride buuuuut as we were waiting in line she fell asleep so Becca took her out of the line to put her in the stroller. The ride wasn't anything too exciting, it probably gets a zero in thrill points but it was fun to go on with Audree.

This next ride, whatever it was called, didn't look like my cup of tea so Becca, Chrissie and Carter rode it with Audree. While we were waiting Mark bought me a churro, mmm, and then my mom and dad showed up to take the girls so we could get to Soaring Over California.

While on Soaring Over California I had to keep convincing myself that I wasn't going to get sick. It kept threatening to come but I impressed myself when I got off the ride and was only a little whoozy. This was a cool ride and we got to be on the top :) I seriously kept thinking I would be able to kick the trees and stuff. It was cool.

Then we headed home for lunch. Since we had learned the previous day that the afternoon was an awful time to wait in lines at the park we decided to go to the beach. I had never been to the beach before and really wanted to go while we were in California.
Remember how I mentioned that Arya was either freaking out or pretty stoic on all the rides? Well going to the beach was the first activity we did where she was smiling and loving life.

She seriously love it so much. She loved the sand, she loved the water rushing towards her and I'm pretty sure she loved the openness of the vast sand and fresh air.

Audree also enjoyed it too. This girl isn't too hard to please though. Most things are fun to her and she loves being outside and with her aunts and uncle. At one point no one was holding onto Audree and the water knocked her down. So much for keeping our clothes dry!

We definitely got a lot more wet than we were planning. Chrissie and Carter started off fairly dry but of course by the end they were so far out that the waves were clearing them. Maybe we should have worn our swimsuits...we really weren't planning on getting very wet though. And the weather was pretty mild, maybe 75 degrees tops.

You can't go to the beach for your first time and not write in the sand!
So right up to going to the beach my feet were still killing me from the previous day. They were better than the day before because I had rested and then chosen more appropriate shoes but I wasn't comfortable. The moment my feet touched the sand I started to feel relief. By the time we were finished playing in the cool water and the squishy sand my feet hardly hurt at all anymore. I was baffled by the therapeutic qualities of the beach but it was amazing. Honestly my feet didn't bug me the rest of the day or the following day. Awesome!

After the beach we ate dinner and then headed back to the park to use our fast passes for splash mountain. I think the girls stayed at the resort with my dad and grandma...So we got in line for Splash Mountain and I'm thinking now that maybe we didn't have fast passes because the line took a while....Anyways, Splash Mountain did not disappoint and I am pretty sure I had the best first time experience. Mark was in the front, then there was me then Becca and then two people behind her that we didn't know. So I asked Becca earlier that day how wet she got and she said it wasn't too bad just a little splashed on her face and arms or something. Well apparently having a heavier person in front changes things...a LOT! After the first drop my whole right leg was completely soaked as well as my shoe on my left foot. Already more than I had bargained for but pretty dang exciting. My anticipation for the final drop was ever growing through the ride and I couldn't stop grinning. I loved that final drop! And what do you think happened at the bottom? Any bit of my lower half that was dry no longer remained such. I'm pretty sure the only part of my lower half that was dry was a triangle on the front of my pants where my shirt was covering.

I was excited to see the pictures, this time I knew it was coming and made sure I didn't have a sad embarrassing look on my face. My face was pretty good and I was happy with it and even thought about buying a copy but we noticed the lame-o girl in the very back of the log was flipping off the camera, classy...

After splash mountain we walked home and what a wet squishy walk it was. Seriously our feet were making that squishy wet sound every time we stepped down. Becca got herself pretty soaked too. The park was closing at 9 that night because of graduation parties so as we were leaving we were like a herd of cattle being forced out. Luckily, even though it was packed, it never got too jammed and we kept moving until we left the park. It was a long wet walk home but it was definitely worth it. Splash Mountain definitely makes it to my top 5, top 3 even. I hesitate to say anything was my favorite but if I had to choose one ride it would probably be this one.