It truly, truly is a magical place!
Nick was already in Anaheim for work so Lucy & I flew down together, leaving the Pullman airport at
6:40am. I had gone back and forth for MONTHS about whether or not to
take our stroller,
use a rental stroller at Disneyland, but a
cheap umbrella stroller to use there and to/from the hotel. I am SO glad that I decided to just take our own stroller. I knew it was comfortable for Lucy, it was comfortable for either Nick or I to push. It has a nice shade and a nice basket for stuff. And we used it SO much! Definitely when we go again I will take my own stroller again. I know you're probably wondering why I started out with THAT, but honestly I can't even tell you how long I deliberated about it, and then once I was there I had the thought SO many times that "I'm so glad I brought my own stroller!" So I wanted to share that right off.
Entering Disneyland for the first time was
amazing. I had never been before so I wasn't even really sure what to expect. I was caught up in the
magic almost as much as Lucy was. The very first day was a bit overwhelming and we took it easy learning our way around, and getting familiar with the park. We started at 8am and by 8:45am we were in line to meet the princesses at the Princess Fantasy Faire. We weren't really sure what to expect, but it's pretty much the only way you can meet the Princesses. We stood in line for just over an hour to walk through and meet 3 princesses. Since we were in line before they opened our wait wasn't even that long considering most people wait 2-1/2 hours once the line is established. You get to meet three princesses and they are constantly being switched out so you never know which three you'll get. Our first visit we met Cinderella, who seriously stepped RIGHT out of the movie! She was an amazing Cinderella and paid a lot of special attention to Lucy. Then we got a quick picture with Pocahontas (who was switching places with Cinderella) and then Snow White and Ariel. Lucy wanted to immediately get back in line again...
We did go back on our third day hoping we'd finally meet Aurora since we hadn't met her yet. I got in line for that at 8am, they opened at 9am. I was the first in line and told Nick to go ahead and take Lucy on rides while I waited. Shortly after they left I was joined by a guy about 35-ish. I figured he was like me and getting in line for his daughter - (
buzzer sound) WRONG! After talking to him for just a short moment I found out he was a local....no big deal right? He comes
every saturday...you're thinking "
So? Get to the point!" right? Okay, here it is...he goes by
himself, every Saturday to meet the Princesses and
then goes home! He was bragging that they
know him by name. I was very grateful that after talking to him for a moment I was joined by a couple from New York.
We spent a lot of our time at Disneyland doing shows, parades, and meet & greets. Lucy was much more interested in these things then the rides. We got to see the
Aladdin Show over at California Adventure which was a highlight of our trip. It's a Broadway Show of the movie condensed to 40 min. It's pretty spectacular! We saw the
Celebrate Parade twice and loved it both times, we also saw the
Pixar Parade once and the
Electrical Light Parade all of which were fabulous. We went to the
Drawn To the Magic Stage Show and the
PlayHouse Disney on Stage, where Lucy said one of the most wise things. . .They threw streamers out in the air and of coarse all of the kids were rushing to grab as many as they could. Lucy grabbed one and came to show me and then looked a little boy with his arms full of them and said "That boy has a lot, but one is plenty." She said it so matter of fact, I felt so proud as a Mom at that moment.
Another big
highlight of our trip was that we were there for the opening night of the new
fireworks show, Magical. It was exactly that too...
Magical. The fireworks were cheographed amazingly well and
Tinkerbell FLEW across the sky as the fireworks were going off. After
Tink was done then
DUMBO FLEW across the sky as well. They fly over and around the castle and it truly was
amazingly cool. 
Lucy saw this closet her first night there and claimed it as her room. She would play and sleep in there. We went on quite a few rides over the three days we were there...including Dumbo, Tea Cups, It's a Small World (which I loved), Mr.Toad's Wild Ride (which freaked Lucy out!), King Arthur's Carrousel, Walkthrough of Sleeping Beauties Castle, Storybook Land Canal Boats, The Railroad, the Monorail, The Jungle Cruise (loved it!), Tarzan's Treehouse, The Enchanted Tiki Room, The Many Adventures of Pooh, Tom Sawyers Island, Big Thunder Ranch Petting Farm, Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage, Gadget's Go Coaster in Toon Town....There is a lot to do there!
This is over on Tom Sawyers Island
This is one of my favorite pictures of Lucy, I just think it's funny. 
There was a little petting farm and Lucy loved petting the goats. She informed us several times that she wants "four goats".
I don't know where we'll put them :) 
This is at Mickey's House, Lucy loved meeting everyone, but mostly loved going into their houses! 
This is at the Rain Forest Cafe. They had a huge fish tank with a "Dory Fish" Lucy was obviously very excited. 
This is on our last day, Lucy had collected all of these leaves, and wanted to take them all home with us...so we suggested she make a house for Tinkerbell and her friends - it worked, we didn't bring home any leaves. That makes me happy. 
Oh, did I mention that on our last day we spent
17 hours at Disneyland/California Adventures! I'm not even exaggerating either! We got there just before 7am, and then left at midnight! Lucy was a trooper too, she didn't even get cranky or mean the
whole day. If we weren't able to pull off the full day then we were going to go back for a forth day, but we pulled it off! The next two days were lazy/catch up days. Lucy slept a lot the next two days and the picture of above is in the airport...she was out cold for 2 hours. I even lifted her out and carried her through security and then put her back in the stroller and she was out again.
It was a great trip and we look forward to many more
trips to Disneyland over the years.
Loading up while Nick & I had our back turned. I thought it was awesome - way to go Lucy!!
Roasting her marshmallows
Notice where her marshmallows are now? Yep, she eats them..all! 
Lucy & I getting ready for bed. 
Playing a game before bed time. She doesn't care how MANY matches everyone gets, it's just who gets the match of Little Bo Peep. 
This is Malley, her "pet" caterpiller. Nick found it when he woke up Saturday morning and she knew it's every move for the next hour and a half! She was in love!! 
