Yesterday we took the kids to the "Happiest Place on Earth" (aka Disneyland). My parents wanted to gift us and Dzintars with the trip and we are so grateful! It was such an incredible day, I'm not sure I can even put it all into words! We started at 9:30 and didn't leave till they closed at midnight (that's more than 14 hours, in case you were wondering and it's our new family record)! Did I mention we brought Brennan and Kaelyn as well! It could have been disastrous, they are both running on little sleep this week, but I prayed that they would be little angels and there would be no overly exhausted meltdowns like the previous day! They were rock stars!! I'm not kidding! I love Brennan, but tired Brennan = major emotional breakdowns for him and for me and that would have totally made our Disney day a bummer! Kaelyn napped for 2 hours in the stroller but he was having too much fun to nap and managed to stay awake till nearly midnight and had a good attitude the whole day! Praising God for small miracles:)
Dzintars LOVED Disneyland. I'm so glad, because the kids had such major meltdowns the day before because we've been going non-stop since sometime last week, we almost nixed the whole trip! It's been at least 6 months since our last trip to the Magic Kingdom (our passes expired in January I think) and I had almost forgotten how much I love it! I've been with both our kiddos on their inaugural trips to Disneyland but they were both so little they didn't even realize what was happening. But taking a 14 year old for his first trip was AWESOME!! He wanted to do EVERYTHING, and then he'd get off a ride and want to do it again!! We tried explaining and reexplaining and reexplaining again that there was SO MUCH more to see and that if we did every ride twice we'd never see all that Disneyland had to offer. He just didn't get it! His excitement for what was right in front of him, what he could see and knew to be real was all that he wanted! Isn't that just like our relationship with the Lord? So often I think I know what I want, what will make me happy, what will be best for me and yet I hear the Lord saying "Child, if you only knew all that was out there you wouldn't settle for this one thing!" I was reminded of this verse:
"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror, then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known." 1 Corinthians 13:12
Just an FYI, using Google translate to communicate with your Latvian child AND to text back and forth with your spouse to choose rendezvous points when you've gone on separate rides is not recommended as it will bleed your battery dry by noon and require you to use broken English the rest of the day in efforts to conserve said battery for emergencies! I must have translated at least 10 times in 3 different ways that there was more to see and if we kept going on the same rides multiple times we'd never see it all but he just wasn't getting it! After that, we gave up:) It didn't stop him from asking though ;)
He took great pride in the fact that he was the "big kid" and could go on rides that Brennan and Kaelyn either couldn't or wouldn't go on. He told me multiple times that he was big and they were small and they'd cry. For a child who has spent his entire life being made to feel worthless and unimportant, this meant a lot to him. Luckily, Brennan didn't catch on cause he doesn't fancy himself a baby.
We worked the system to maximize our time there taking advantage of "fast passes" and "stroller passes" which allowed us to take Dzintars on rides that Bren and Kae couldn't and then switch riders for a much shorter wait time. Then Dzintars got to twice on some of his favorite rides with less wait. When he came off a ride with one of us he always wanted to go again with the other one! He wanted to tell us every detail of the ride, it sounded a lot like his rendition of "The Dark Knight Rises" if you caught that video. Lots of broken English and hand motions. Such a crack up! We had a few extra "stroller passes" left at the end of the night that we were able to give away to several very happy people:)
First stop...Jungle Cruise:)
Pirates of the Caribbean...a fave of his. He asked at least 1,000 (not exaggerating here) times to go on "Per-at-es" again!
Tarzan's Treehouse.
Splash Mountain with Peter.
Space Mountain, he was so proud of himself for keeping his eyes open for once. If you haven't been on this ride, it's in utter darkness, no need to close your eyes. But I made sure to tell him how proud I was of him anyways.
We stopped to take pictures with our favorite characters! FYI, Kaelyn feel asleep after visiting with her fairy friends so she's absent from most of our photos for the next few hours.
We scored a great deal on some one day park hopper tickets. So midday we hopped on over to California Adventure for a few hours of fun! If you haven't been yet, Cars Land rocks! They took "Radiator Springs" and recreated it inside the park! Super cool! I was so bummed my nephew Lukey wasn't with us, he's beyond obsessed with Cars and would have been in heaven!! We took a few pictures just for him, enjoy buddy!!
Rather than waiting 2 1/2 hours to ride the new Cars Land ride we took our chances in the single rider line. We waited only 45 minutes and were rewarded with two empty seats in the same car. Plus we got a "stroller pass" so Peter and Brennan got to go as well and only waited 15 minutes. We're professionals people, watch out!
The cars go 45 miles an hour, it was a little too fast for my hair! LOL!
About to conquer the "Tower of Terror"
We did not stop to watch any parades, but did see tidbits here and there:)
He saw this Ferris Wheel and desperately wanted to go. Wait or later are not English words we though to teach him beforehand...so while Peter and the kids waited for Toy Story for 45 minutes I took Dz on the Ferris Wheel which had a very short wait.
Happy to be high in the sky.
Toy Story
LOVE these three boys!
Kaelyn was there but refused to have her picture taken.
Fun in a "Bug's Land"
LOVE this one!
Waiting for Dumbo.
We just had to stop at the "Mad Hatter" store for some fun photo ops!
He embodies "Goofy" to a tee as this picture suggests. It perfectly captures him as he refused to pose "normal" for me:)
Can't visit the Mouse's House without trying on some ears:)
Love this dimpled little boy!
A whole family of Goofs:)
Oddly enough all our Goofy faces were the same. Totally unplanned.
A little Teacup fun.
This one is so fun! Great shot Peter:)
Autopia, a horrible shot, but he LOVED driving his own car. Then told us Peter would be too tired to drive us home so late at night and that he would drive our car home instead. Nice try buddy!
Small World.
And after 14+ hours of Magical fun this is how the kids ended their night! They hung tight until nearly 11:30. Remember,
It was such a great day! There were many "I love you's" said and hugs given and many requests made to stay in America with us rather than go back to Latvia next week. We even got "Stacey, I VERY happy!" I guess Disneyland really is the "happiest place on earth".
Oh your day looks amazing! I am glad you had such a great time and have such wonderful pictures as well! It's nice to see the happiness of the little ones at Disneyland. It makes the heat, crowds and lines all worth it :) My sister and I went (without the little one) yesterday just to ride Tower of Terror (though we did get to sit on California Screaming twice). It was a busy day at Disney yesterday, so the fact you were able to do all that you did is incredible and definitely a blessing from God!!
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