Disneyland

For our {theme park Wednesday} in California, we did our first ever trip to Disneyland together!!! When we went a few years ago, David, Abbey, and Christopher's family weren't with us. It took about an hour to drive there from the beach house and Tanner snuck in his nap early. 

The first sightings!

We parked and rode a tram in. Tanner was ready!

Someone must have offended Marcie and Austin. ;)

Forgiven!

One of the first things we did was get in line to see the Princesses!! I grabbed some twisted churro things for the wait!

It was truly adorable to watch how giddy the girls were to meet the princesses! And props to the princesses for staying in character! Snow White's little voice was something else!

Olive's favorite princesses are Belle and Ariel. Dreams do come true!

Look who found us by Pooh's Bakery?! Uncle Dwight, Jori and Austin and Stephanie's family were all there too! 

The Moms sort of defaulted to having the little girls at the beginning while the Dads did a couple "big kid" rides with the boys. 

Can you find Tanner in this picture?

I'll give you a minute. 

Yep. There he is. At least half of him. 

Like he wants to stay in my lap for a picture. You're on crazy juice, mom.

The eating continues. I think this was my favorite treat of the day, which I wasn't expecting. It's a peanut butter, graham cracker bar from Pooh's Bakery.

 It is huge. 

Enough for 2 or 3 people.

 I was going to only eat 1/3. 

Then 1/2. 

Who am I kidding? 

It was gone immediately.

Such a wiggly pole!

Space Mountaiiiiinnnn!!!

He sucked that down hard.

Toon Town!

This looks like Tanner, but I swear it's a picture of me. 

Let's get real here. Disneyland was busy. Scratch that, PACKED. Busiest I've ever seen it. 

Chasing around 4 kids was tiring. I  mean, flat out EXHAUSTING. Underlined and highlighted. Tanner was a treat. I mean, NIGHTMARE. I tried to enjoy the brief moments of fun on rides or indulging in food comas, but overall my advice to you is, DON'T go to Disneyland while AZ is on fall break. Or just don't go when you have a 16 month old. Because he will scream and cry and eat all of your turkey leg and throw your slushy on the ground and won't take a nap and will have lots of poopy diapers and have to be strolled around aimlessly when everyone has stopped for food because otherwise he'll be doing all of that screaming and crying again. If you let him out of the stroller, he'll run away and try to get run over by a ride. Or join another family. And you'll be tempted to let him. But then you go get him and he turns into a kicking wet noodle. It's sooooo fun. Trust me.

It also needs to be noted that I had to deal with the meltdown of MELTDOWNS on the Pirates of the Caribbean with Olive. I had just taken her to the bathroom 10 minutes prior, but literally right as we are stepping onto the boat, she freaks. I mean FREAKS. As spastic and feral as I've ever seen her. As I've ever seen ANY of my kids. It was bizarre. She started screaming, "I have to go to the bathroom! I have to go to the bathroom!!" Flailing her arms and convulsing her body like she had ants all over her. There was nothing I could do! We were literally sitting down on the moving ride with the rest of the family getting on right behind us. 

 I tried to reason with her. 

"We JUST went ten minutes ago."

 I tried to calm her down. 

"The ride will be over in ten minutes and then we'll go right after. I promise. You can do it."

I tried bribes.

"We'll get cotton candy if you stop hyperventilating."

I tried threats.

"I will strangle you."

Ok, maybe not that, but seriously I tried alllllll the things. Everything in my mommy arsenal. 

Nothing was working!!! She was actually getting MORE hysterical with every passing second. She was so insistent that she had to go to the bathroom that I slid her off my lap (we were pretty scrunched tight), fearing she would actually go on me!

Do you know how long Pirates of the Carribean is?

16 minutes.

16 of the looooongest minutes I've ever had to endure. 

I actually considered leaning her over the boat and letting her pee in the water. 

What FINALLY worked was asking her to count to 50 with me. I told her the ride would probably be over once we got to 50.

We counted slowly. Methodically. 

And then we were at 50. 

I quickly said, maybe by 100!

We continued to 100.

Then 150.

And then 200.

I think we got to 250 when that da*# ride finally ended!!! I bolted her to the bathroom and was completely amazed that I got off that boat with dry pants. Talk about a pirate miracle.

I'm not sure how late we stayed but I think it was til closing. So midnight. And Olive stayed awake until 11pm. One thing I absolutely wanted to try was a macaron. I had heard SO MUCH about their amazing macarons. Well, we go up to the shop that sells them and they are sold out!!!! BAHHHHH!!!

But wait! The girl says she thinks they might have a couple broken ones they can't sell and reappears with two!!! So I got to try one after all! And hot dang if it wasn't everything people were saying. Absolute, French bliss. Merci, Disneyland!

Lindi is the one getting suffocated, haha!

I'm no detective, but Weston doesn't look to be having too much fun.

I think David and Abbey were on this ride, but no one can be sure. ;)