Tag Archives: California Adventure

Another Disney Birthday (or Eating All The Foods Again)

Posted on December 6, 2017 | 3 comments

I love getting to celebrate my friend’s birthdays at Disneyland. I don’t really get to do it since my birthday is during the summer blackout for my annual pass. But celebrating someone else’s birthday at Disneyland makes me as happy as if it were my birthday. And this week, I was at Disneyland to celebrate my friend Dani’s birthday!

And not only was it an adventure to celebrate Dani’s birthday, we also wanted to go and try more of the foods at the Festival of Holidays at California Adventure. I had gotten to try several things the last time I was there, but there was so much that I wanted to try. And I still had a lot of tickets left of my Sip and Savor pass and this was possibly the last chance I would have to use it.

When we got to the parks, we immediately headed to the annual pass area for the Festival of Holidays so Dani could get her Sip and Savor pass. We all knew we’d be trying a bunch of food, and the pass really was the best option for us.

Over the time that we were in the parks, we all got to try a lot of food. I personally got the brisket, a eggnog macron, crab salad on polenta, a pretzel, and chocolate pot de creme. It was all delicious and the serving sizes were pretty good. I ate a bit too much, but I couldn’t help myself!

And between the eating, we did get some rides in. We let Dani pick the rides since it was her birthday. She wanted to check out California Screamin’ before it goes down for refurbishment.

And we went on Guardians of the Galaxy where we finally had a new song on the ride! I have now heard 4 of the 6 songs so I’ll hopefully complete that list soon.

And we went on Dani’s favorite ride, Toy Story Mania. It took 2 tries to get on that ride because it broke down right before we rode it, but we returned later that night and we were able to get on before we left.

We usually have a plan when we go to Disneyland, but this time we didn’t. So we ended up doing a lot of walking and going back and forth a lot. It was great because we all got a ton of steps in (we figured we walked about 7 miles that day), but I was feeling some pain.

But when we went over to the Disneyland side, I had a chance to rest. My friend Christopher was at Disneyland with his wife and kids. They were hanging out on a bench waiting to watch the castle light up at night. So we decided to join them and check out the castle. It was a very windy day so we knew the fireworks would be canceled, so this was our only chance for nighttime entertainment while we were there. It was awesome getting to catch up with a friend and we all loved seeing the castle change to the winter look. And while the castle was undergoing its transformation, fake snow was falling which just seemed magical!

The last ride that we went on at Disneyland was Small World Holiday. It’s always so pretty to see all the lights on the facade of the ride.

And the ride is fun during the holidays too. It’s different from the version during the rest of the year and I’m always happy to ride it. I don’t mind the regular version, but the holiday one is much better in my opinion. Maybe it’s all the extra lights that they add inside the ride!

After our ride, we decided to get a nice photo in front of the castle. Michelle’s annual pass includes Photopass photos now, so it’s nice to be able to take advantage of the photographers that Disneyland has. There was a line for the photos, but it went pretty quickly so we were able to get our nice group photo without too much of a wait.

By that point, we had walked back and forth quite a bit between the parks and it was starting to get cold. The temperature wasn’t too bad, but the wind made it feel much worse. We all decided that even though we would have loved to have gone on a few more rides that night, we were ready to head back (and to get into a nice warm car!).

My pass is good for part of next week and then I’m blacked out until the new year. I don’t think I’ll be making it next week but I know I’ll be back in January when my pass is good again. It’s almost time to renew my Disneyland pass and there is no question that I’ll be doing it. I get so much happiness out of my Disney days and I can’t imagine not having them anymore!

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Festival Of Holidays (or All The Food, Some Of The Rides)

Posted on November 15, 2017 | Comments Off on Festival Of Holidays (or All The Food, Some Of The Rides)

After my last adventure to Disneyland, my friends and I tried to plan out when we could go for the rest of 2017. We knew that our winter holiday blackouts were coming soon with our passes and we were limited in how many more days we would be able to go. We made some plans for December but we were also hoping to figure out when we could go in November too. We couldn’t figure out when all 3 of us could go, but Michelle and I were both able to go this week so we decided to go for a Disney day!

The timing was perfect because the holiday stuff just started at Disneyland. And at California Adventure they were doing the Festival Of Holidays which consists of about a dozen different food booths with different holiday themed food offerings. It’s similar to what they did during the Food and Wine Festival earlier this year and we were excited to check out what food we could get! And as Annual Passholders, we could get the Sip and Savor pass which allows you to get 8 items for $45. Since most things were more expensive than $6, it’s a pretty great deal!

Michelle got 4 things and I got 3 things throughout the day. And most of the time we split stuff between us so we could each try as many things as possible. I think the salmon and brisket were my favorites so far. But I’ll be in the park at least one more time before the Festival Of Holidays ends (plus I still have 5 more food items I can get with my pass) so I’ll be trying many more.

And our priority was to try all the amazing foods, we did go on some rides as well. We went on Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout twice in the hopes that we’d get a new song on the ride. There are 6 song choices and we had only had 3 before. But on the 2 rides we had, both times we had songs we had already heard before. Hopefully we will make it through all 6 songs one day!

We also went on California Screamin’ since that ride will be closing for a bit soon. They will be changing the theme of the ride (but keeping the ride the same) so it will be themed to “The Incredibles”. But we still wanted to make sure we got to go on it before it closed and changed.

And they will also be closing Mickey’s Fun Wheel to change the theme so we made a stop over there as well. We were about halfway up on the ferris wheel stopped because they were loading the cars below us. Michelle and I were focused on the fun view and looking at what food things we wanted to try next.

But we realized after a while that we had been at that spot for a while and when we looked down we realized that there was no longer a line for the ride. I don’t know what happened but it did break down so they had to move it so that each car could get off. But when they got our car down to the bottom it kept moving. It was weird and we thought maybe the ride was working again. But I guess they just made a mistake because it started going backwards so we could be let off. But they gave us a pass to use for another ride and we took that to go on Soarin Around The World.

We also got to see an incredible sunset while in the park. It kept changing colors as the sun was setting, but it looked amazing every time we looked at it.

After those rides and our food, we decided to go over to the Disneyland side. It was pretty crowded over there compared to California Adventure but it was still so pretty with all the holiday decorations up.

It felt so late but it wasn’t even 6pm! The time change really threw me off and I was already starting to feel tired. We tried to go look at the castle but they were filming the tv special that will be airing soon so the castle was blocked by various equipment. We kind of could see how pretty it looked, but I’m looking forward to seeing it another time when the view isn’t obstructed.

And we then had our final ride of the day which was Space Mountain. It’s back to the regular version of the ride, but that feels special since between Hyperspace Mountain and Ghost Galaxy it seems like I never ride the regular version.

We debated about trying to go on one more ride to wait out traffic, but we both were pretty close to being done. Even though we didn’t go on that many rides, we did a ton of walking. My Fitbit said I had done about 17,000 steps which is what we normally do in a full day of rides.

But even being tired while we were walking out, I couldn’t help but smile at how pretty Main Street looked with all the lights.

I’ll be back at Disneyland in a few weeks for sure, but there may be another adventure before that or right after before we are blacked out for the holidays. The holidays are so pretty at Disneyland and I want to make sure I experience it as much as possible before I have to wait a year for it to be back again!

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It’s Halloweentime! (or Another Disney Afternoon)

Posted on September 29, 2017 | 1 comment

It seems like it has been forever since I was at Disneyland, but it was only about a month ago that I was there. But since that day was a short visit I felt due for another Disney day. This time, my friend Dani was out-of-town working so Michelle and I went just the two of us. It’s weird to be missing a member of our usual Disney group, but Dani understood that we wanted a Disney outing and didn’t mind that we went without her.

Michelle and I went after I had my Orangetheory workout that morning, which is the usual routine. But that also means that we get to the parks around 1pm. But that worked out well because we didn’t have a big plan for the day. We knew all the Halloween decorations were up and all the Halloween overlays were on rides, so that’s pretty much all we focused on doing.

Right when we got to the parks, we made a quick lunch stop for corn dogs and we found out that our friend Lauren was on her way to Disneyland too! So we waited there for her to meet us before we headed to our first ride of the day. Space Mountain is a favorite of mine in whatever form the ride is in. I love the classic ride, the Hyperspace Mountain version, and the Ghost Galaxy version that they have at Halloween. It was a perfect first ride for the day. We were trying to think of a funny ride photo pose, but I think we all missed what the others were saying. I thought we were going to pretend that we were in a shampoo commercial where someone seems way too happy to have their hair washed.

After that, we decided to go on something a bit slower. The Rivers Of America had opened up the last time we were there, but we rode the train around to see things. This time, we decided to go on the Mark Twain boat to see everything else that we missed. We found the perfect place to relax on the second level in the front and we got to admire what an amazing day it was.

And there were a lot of details around the river that we saw that you can’t see from the train. My favorite was this animatronic beaver that is under the bridge the train goes over. It’s chewed through one plank and is working through another.

I love that Disney adds all those cute details and it makes it so that there are always new things to discover. The ride around was the perfect way to relax before our next Halloweentime ride: Haunted Mansion Holiday.

This overlay is not just for Halloween, but I still think of it as a Halloween thing. They always do a great job for the ride and there are new things added each year. And I love to see what the gingerbread house looks like each year.

After that, we decided to walk over to California Adventure. There was a Halloween party on the Disneyland side and we wanted to switch to the other park before it got too crazy. And our first stop on the other side was our new favorite: Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout.

They also have a Halloween overlay, but they only do it at nighttime. But that was perfect for us since this ride is still so new to us that we wanted to ride it the normal way too. After the ride, we had a decent amount of time to wait before the nighttime version started. So we did some shopping and some artwork.

My Scrooge McDuck is the one in the middle that looks weird and cross-eyed. We then headed over to Starbucks to sit and relax and we ended up meeting up with my friend Christopher and his wife who were in the park that day too! Lauren ended up having to leave after that and Michelle and I headed back to Guardians of the Galaxy to ride the nighttime version.

This version reminded us both of the old Tower of Terror ride. The new ride doesn’t feel as much as a drop ride as Tower did. But the nighttime version was totally a drop ride again! Since it was totally new to us, we didn’t know what to expect. And when we were at the top where they take the photo, it took forever before it dropped so Michelle and I kept glancing at each other while we were in our photo pose.

We had gotten Fastpasses for the Guardians ride again and had some more time to wait. So we headed over to Cars Land to get some dinner and check out the new Halloween decorations they had in that area.

And then we were back at Guardians for another ride. The nighttime version only has 1 song (the daytime version has 6 songs each with their own ride pattern) so we were a bit more prepared for the ride. But being prepared and knowing what happens doesn’t make it any less fun for us. We both had a blast riding it!

And when we were done with the ride, the park had closed. We took our time walking out because it’s so fun looking at everything at nighttime. I loved the exterior of the Guardians ride and how it reminded me of the Tower of Terror.

And once we left, we got to check out the decoration at the gate too. We saw it during the day, but it’s much more impressive lit up at night.

Even though we didn’t do a ton of rides, it still felt like a full Disney day. We got all the rides in that we wanted to and we had a blast. I’m hoping to make it back to the parks sometime in October so that I can see all the Halloween stuff one more time, but if I don’t make it at least I got to see it this week!

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A Quick Disney Day (or Getting Back To The Parks And Onto The Train)

Posted on August 23, 2017 | 3 comments

It’s been a while since I’ve been to Disneyland. The summer blackout for my annual pass is only about 2 months, but when you are used to going to the parks once a month or so it feels so much longer! So when my friends and I looked at the blackout date calendar and saw that we were finally going to be able to go back to the parks, we put it on our calendars so we could make sure we got our Disney day in!

For a while, the train has been closed because of the work going on for the new Star Wars land. I love the train and it’s been sad that it’s been down for so long and I couldn’t wait to be able to get back on it. Plus, Dani had never been on the train at Disneyland! So knowing that the train was open again now made me even more excited to be going to the parks.

We knew it wasn’t going to be a normal Disney day when we arrived. Normally when we get there around lunchtime, there may be some cars lined up for the parking structure but we get parked pretty quickly. But this time, the lines were pretty far back for parking. It didn’t take too long, but we realized that it was going to be much more crowded than we expected. Maybe everyone else was just like us and was excited to finally be able to get back to the parks after the summer blackout?

No matter way, we were ready to have some fun as soon as we arrived. And the first stop was the train. There’s normally not a line for the trains, but everyone was so happy that it was back and they wanted to see the new stuff they added. So we were in line for a little while before we could get on the train. But that was ok because I was just so happy to see that the trains were running and was enjoying people watching everyone there. And when we got on a few trains later, I couldn’t wait to see all the new changes.

I didn’t take a ton of photos because I wanted to focus on enjoying the train, but I love the new views of the river that you get from the train. It’s so pretty and the landscaping looks so good!

They also did some fun work in the diorama section of the train. There are now more moving elements, especially on the background of the mural. I think it added some nice touches while still maintaining the classic look of the diorama that I love so much. I know my mom loves that part of the train too and I can’t wait until she can come with me to Disneyland again so she can see it herself!

After doing the full trip around the park on the train, we headed over to California Adventure to ride the Guardians of the Galaxy ride. We were hoping to get a new song (there are 7 songs and we’ve heard 2 of them already), but we ended up getting one of the same ones we had the last time we rode. But it was still such a fun ride and I don’t miss the old Tower of Terror ride. We were trying to think of a fun photo to do this time and we decide to try to do some sort of ninja/karate pose. You can’t really see it well, but because of where I was sitting I was able to kick my leg up and I got it up pretty high!

After the ride, we were feeling a bit overwhelmed from the heat and the crowds so we decided to take a break to get something to eat. We decided to go to the Trattoria and I didn’t realize that neither Michelle nor Dani had been there before! It’s one of the places I really like so I was excited to share it with them.

I decided to get the Osso Bucco and it was delicious. Maybe a bit too rich considering how the heat was affecting me, but it was so good!

After eating, we went back to Guardians of the Galaxy where there was a little show happening in front of the ride. It’s a dance off thing and it was cute to watch for a minute.

We decided to go back on the ride after that, but Dani wasn’t feeling up for it so she waited in the shade while Michelle and I went on it. Again, we were hoping for a new song but we ended up getting the other one we heard the first time we rode. I guess it wasn’t meant to be to hear the other songs and know what the other versions of the ride were like. We didn’t really have a fun photo and that’s probably for the best since the person in front of us kind of blocked us in the photo.

We were thinking about doing another ride after that, but I think all of us were feeling a bit done. I wanted to have a full day at Disneyland, but the heat was getting to me and I hadn’t slept too well over the weekend so I think that was catching up to me. We tried to take a bit of a break in the shade to relax, but we realized that we were all ready to go home.

Since we all have annual passes, it’s ok that we had a short day at Disneyland. We can go back soon to ride other things that we didn’t get a chance to ride this time. And hopefully when we go back it will be less crowded and we won’t feel as off as we did from the heat. But no matter how long we were in the parks, being at Disneyland makes me so happy and I’m so glad I was able to go back this week!

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Guardians and Ladies Who Lunch (or A Fun Summer Day At Disneyland)

Posted on June 22, 2017 | 2 comments

Every summer, I know that my Disneyland pass will be blacked out. So we always try to plan a really fun Disney day as our last day before the summer blackout. And my friends Dani, Michelle, and I had planned a Disney day for this week about a month ago. We had no clue that we would be there about a week before our adventure, but we still were more than ready for an amazing Disney day!

Knowing that this was going to be our last day in the parks for about 2 months, we worked on what we wanted to do. The biggest thing was to ride the new Guardians of the Galaxy ride that is where the Tower of Terror ride used to be. It had just opened and we hadn’t had the chance to ride it. And originally when I thought I would need surgery, there was a chance that I wouldn’t be able to ride it until the fall. So to know I could ride it this time made me so happy!

We got to Disneyland around 12:30 and immediately started to work on a plan for the day. We had a few things on our list and we wanted to time things out carefully. We first got Fastpasses for the Haunted Mansion and went on the Pirates ride while we waited for our Fastpass time. And the timing worked out perfectly because we were off Pirates right when the Fastpasses were good. We quickly got into the room before the stretching room and it seemed to be taking a bit of time. So we took advantage of that and tried to get a cute group photo in the room.

Unfortunately, the reason we were stuck in that room for so long was the ride broke down. They gave us the option to wait to see how long it would take for the ride to start back up again, but we weren’t able to stay. And that was because we had some lunch reservations that we were looking forward to!

When we were planning this Disney day, we wanted to make sure we did some special things. And to us, getting to eat at the Blue Bayou is pretty special. It’s not too much more expensive than what we normally spend for meals, but it is a bit of a splurge. And you have to make sure that you make reservations in advance because it’s so rare to be able to walk up and get a reservation for some point that same day. We actually made our reservations the last time we were at Disneyland and we got one of the last reservations times for the day!

And even with our reservation, we still had to wait about 30 minutes for a table to open up. But it was worth it because it is such a fun restaurant!

We didn’t get a water front table (I’m sure the wait would have been even longer if we wanted one of those), but you still get a fun view of the Pirates ride from the seats. And we were pretty sure that the last time we ate there we were at the exact same table.

We took our time eating lunch because it was hot outside and nice and air-conditioned in the restaurant. I had the steak (which I think I had the last time too) and it was the perfect meal. I knew this was going to be my main meal of the day and it was delicious! And getting to have a nice, relaxing, and kind of fancy meals with my friends was exactly what we wanted to do.

After lunch, it was time for the other main event of the day: riding the new Guardians ride. I’ve seen so many videos of the ride and I was almost shaking with excitement as we got to the ride. And I think Michelle and Dani felt the same way. We were all smiles as got into line!

The line for the ride was pretty awesome too. The first room that you go into has Rocket Raccoon and it’s so funny. And there are some things hidden in the room that we were pretty sure were from the Tower of Terror ride. And when you are close to the ride, there is a Yeti from the Matterhorn ride up in a display!

And it was exactly what we hoped the ride would be! It’s not exactly a drop ride, but it still has drops. But the ride is almost always in motion (instead of just going up and dropping) and it was almost more exciting to be flying up than to be dropping down. We loved it so much that we rode it twice! There are 6 different versions of the ride, all with their own soundtrack. The first time we rode the soundtrack was Elvis and the second time we rode the soundtrack was the Jackson 5.

And not only is the ride different, the way that the photos work at the top were different too! The first time, it took forever and we were wondering if we were ever going to drop. The second time, we didn’t even really stop where they take the photo so we all have half poses on our faces.

We also walked to the side of the ride where we heard there was an Avengers logo in the ground. There are rumors that an entire Marvel land will be coming one day, and having this next to the ride makes me think that those rumors are probably true.

After those rides, we headed back to the Disneyland side. We wanted to get on Space Mountain before the summer blackout again. And because our second ride photo on the Guardians ride was so funny, we decided to pose like each other. So I posed like Dani, Dani like Michelle, and Michelle like me. I think we nailed it!

After Space Mountain, we were done with the rides. But we still had one more thing we wanted to do before we left. We had said that we really wanted to watch the fireworks show since it’s such a good one. We thought we had claimed a good spot near the castle, but because of the angle of how they shoot off fireworks we had a tree blocking our view (I’m sorry Michelle!).

We did get to see the projections on the castle up close which was fun. It reminded me of the amazing projections Universal had at their show. But it might have been ok that we couldn’t really see the fireworks because in the middle of the show, everything stopped and the lights came back up. The winds had gotten too strong and the fireworks had to be cancelled. It’s unfortunate, but I know how it can be super dangerous if there are high winds. So maybe this Disney day was meant to see the castle projections and when we go back after the summer blackout we can watch the fireworks from farther back.

By this point, we were all pretty tired. We ended up walking through Downtown Disney and checking out some of the stores and then walking back to the parking garage. I was so tired when we got back to the car, but it was worth it. We got almost everything done that we set out to do and it was pretty close to a perfect day. Now I just have to wait about 2 months until I can get back!

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Dentist and Disneyland (or Having Fun Things To Look Forward To)

Posted on May 26, 2017 | 2 comments

After my past few dentist appointments, I’ve tried to schedule a Disneyland afternoon. This helps me stay calm at the dentist since I’ve got something good to focus on. It’s a nice tradition that I’ve started and I’m glad that it seems to help to keep me calm. So when I found out that I had a dentist appointment this week, my first thought was to call my friend Michelle to see if she wanted to go to Disneyland. And ironically, she had a dentist appointment that day too so we decided to go after we were both done at the dentist.

I didn’t have the best dentist appointment. This was the big appointment where I meet with the dentist and get x-rays. And one of the fillings that was done 14 years ago is now chipped and I will need some work done to fix it. Hopefully that will only be another filling, but there is always the possibility that it will be a crown. This isn’t fun, but I have to do it. Hopefully since I’ve had so many more needles lately I won’t react as badly to the numbing shot. But I won’t know until I have my dental work appointment.

My dentist is a block away from Michelle’s house, so I had parked my car at her house and walked to the dentist. When I was done, I walked back over to her place and we got into her car and headed to Disneyland!

Because I had my big dentist appointment, it was a bit later than I usually have dentist appointments. So we were driving down to Disneyland in the start of rush hour traffic. There are some carpool lanes on the freeways that we take, but it still was a bit of a longer drive than we are used to. But since we were both feeling pretty chill about this Disney adventure, we didn’t mind things taking longer for us. And once we got parked, we were able to get onto a tram to the park really quickly!

The only ride we really wanted to ride was Hyperspace Mountain since that will be closing and the ride will be the normal ride again next week. But we also both needed something to eat (I don’t usually eat much before dentist appointments and I was so hungry). We thought about trying to see if we could get into Blue Bayou, but they weren’t doing any walk ups at that time. They told us we could come back later, but we were both pretty hungry so we headed over to Plaza Inn for some pot roast.

I usually don’t get this to eat, but it was pretty good and filling! And it’s always nice to sit down to eat and not feel too rushed. The park was pretty crowded between people being there after work and people celebrating graduations, so to be away from the crowds was good.

After that, we headed over to California Adventure to wait until our time to ride Hyperspace Mountain. The new Guardians of The Galaxy ride will be opening this weekend and the entire park is going to be doing a summer of heroes event. I don’t think anything has started yet, but the signs were up as we walked into the park.

I know I’ll be in the park at least once before I’m blacked out for the summer, so I’m excited to get to see what offerings will be in the park. They’ve already promoted a fun menu and I think that it will be nice to see what else is happening.

Once we got to California Adventure, we did a bit of window shopping and then headed over to the Animation Academy. My biggest issue with drawing is drawing circles. And of course, the character we were drawing was Mickey Mouse, which is all circles! But I think in the end both of our drawing look pretty decent!

We headed back to Disneyland after that to ride our ride, and I got a moment to admire how much my new key chain matches the park!

We had a good ride on Hyperspace Mountain. Our photo didn’t really come out, so I don’t have a ride photo to share (sorry!). But we were both just taking in the ride and enjoying all the fun things they added for the Hyperspace overlay. I don’t know if this overlay will come back, but I hope it will eventually. But I think I agree with Michelle when she said it will be nice to have the regular ride back. It’s had this overlay for quite some time and I think the normal ride is going to feel special again.

Our last ride that day was Buzz Lightyear since Michelle and I have our year-long competition happening with that ride. I guess I’m really lucky that one time I scored a really high score on that ride, because Michelle is always beating me! And this time was no exception. But in our year-long battle, I’m still ahead!

With the park being as crowded as it was and both Michelle and I tired from our dentist appointments, we were ready to head home. And we realized that the parade was going to start so we wanted to rush out before it started and it became difficult to leave. But even with rushing out of the park, I took a brief moment to get a photo of how pretty Main Street looks at nighttime.

It’s always magical at Disneyland, and at nighttime it seems even more magical. After getting out of the park, we made one more stop at World of Disney in Downtown Disney. There were a few things that I had been debating about getting and I wanted to look in the store to see prices and to think carefully about what I wanted to spend my money on.

I’ve been wanting the Disney ice cube tray since I had seen it months ago, and I finally decided to get it. And right next to it was a really cute votive holder that I couldn’t resist getting. And I’ve been looking casually for a new mug (the ones I have are all chipping and are pretty old) and had never found a Disney mug that I loved. But this time, there was a really cool mug that didn’t scream Disney that I had to get!

It’s a bit of a splurge to get stuff at Disneyland, but I rarely do it. And it wasn’t too expensive even with all 3 items so I figured I could find other places I could cut back this week to make it work with my budget.

Michelle and I were only at Disneyland for about 4 hours and we really didn’t do much, but it was a perfect post-dentist outing. I know I won’t be able to go after my big dental appointment since that is so late in the afternoon, but I’ve already got a Disney day planned for June. And there’s always a chance I’ll have another random Disney day before I’m blacked out for the summer!

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Default ThumbnailEnjoying The Lack Of Rain At Disneyland (or Buzz Lightyear and Electrical Parade) Default ThumbnailAnother Year Another Dentist Panic (or One Medications Overriding Another) Default ThumbnailDisneyland Adjacent (or Downtown Disney) Default ThumbnailDisneyland At Christmastime (or An Evening Of Rides) Default ThumbnailSome Disneyland Goodbyes (or Animation, Rides, and BBQ) Default ThumbnailRecovering At Disneyland (or A Never-Done List)

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One More Disney Day (or Yummy Food and Roller Coasters)

Posted on April 5, 2017 | 2 comments

With my surgery coming up in about 2 more weeks, I’m trying to get a lot of fun stuff in before I have to take time to recover. And of course, this list included going to Disneyland. While I’m recovering, I won’t be able ride roller coasters for a while. I might be able to walk around Disneyland and do some of the easy rides, but since I love roller coasters I wanted to make sure that I did my favorites before I had to take a few months off.

My favorite Disney buddies Dani and Michelle were with me this time and we were also joined by Michelle’s friend Lauren (who fit in perfectly with our Disney craziness). All 3 of them knew that I was on a mission to ride the roller coasters I love the most and I’m so grateful that they let me decide most of the rides that went on that day. And besides my mission to ride a bunch of roller coasters, this was the only time I was going to be at Disneyland during this year’s Food and Wine Festival. So we all wanted to make sure we tried a bunch of the offerings that they had this year.

When we got to Disneyland, we headed to the California Adventure side first where we went on Toy Story Mania first. I used to be so much better at this ride, but I think I’m overconfident in my ability to play the games within the ride. I didn’t get that great of a score, but as always it was fun to ride. And right after that we had Fastpasses for California Screamin’ which is one of the roller coasters I love and had on my bucket list for the day. We all wanted to do some great poses for our ride photo, and this photo makes me laugh so much! And thanks to Lauren, who has Photopass on her annual pass, I was able to get great copies of all of our ride photos that day!

Our next ride time wasn’t for a few hours after that, so we decided to take some time to check out the Food and Wine Festival and get some lunch. Last year, I got one of the cards Annual Passholders could buy to save a little money on food. But I wasn’t going to eat that many things so I ended up just paying for each thing I got one by one. I got the deviled eggs, a beef tenderloin slider, and tacos.

The servings are small, but that was fine with me because I could try those 3 things and not feel too full. Each thing was really good and I feel like the food was even better this year than it was last year. And hopefully next year will be even better!

We also did some sightseeing around the park. They have been busy working on changing the Tower of Terror ride to the new Guardians of the Galaxy ride. This will be opening soon and there is a chance I might be able to ride it before my pass is blacked out for the summer. But if not, I’ll totally be going on it in August!

We also made a stop at the Animation Academy where we drew Hei Hei from “Moana”. I actually have not seen “Moana” yet, so it was weird to draw a character that I didn’t know what they looked like. But I think we all did a pretty good job with our artwork.

Our last ride in California Adventure was Radiator Springs Racers. The 4 of us ended up getting a car to ourselves so we were trying to plan something funny to do in our ride photo. Dani, Michelle, and I are so used to just thinking of what we can do with the 3 of us so it took a moment to figure out what could work with 4. And we decided to do the YMCA poses in our photo. We weren’t totally successful in doing that, but again it was an awesome photo!

We headed over to Disneyland after that ride to get in the rest of the rides we were hoping to do. I had a couple of rides on my list, but we ended up just doing 2 rides and riding each one twice. We did Buzz Lightyear twice because Michelle and I have our points competition for this year and we wanted to see what we could do. She ended up beating me both times, but this is a ride that I can go on while I’m recovering so I’m hoping to get some good scores soon.

The only other ride that we did that night was to ride Hyperspace Mountain. This is probably my favorite ride in the park and I am honestly a bit sad that I will have to take a few months off from riding it. One time we rode it Lauren was with us but she had to leave before we were able to ride it the second time. I was wearing my new I’m A Liver Not A Fighter shirt and was hoping to show it off in the ride photos. It didn’t quite work out that way, but that’s ok.

After our last ride, we were a bit stuck in Tomorrowland because of the parade and the fireworks. So we decided to see if we could find a nice spot to watch the fireworks and then we were going to take the Monorail to Downtown Disney to miss the crazy crowds trying to leave the park. But that ended up being a great decision because we found an almost empty area to watch the fireworks from that also got us to the Monorail quickly when it reopened.

Even though we weren’t expecting to be at Disneyland for a full day, we ended up being there for about 12 hours. That really helped me get my Disneyland fix in and while I probably will be antsy to get back I think I’m good for a little while now. It felt weird being there knowing that I might not be able to do a day like this again for a few months, but I’ve been preparing for this and this was just another thing in my pre-surgery countdown.

Thank you Dani, Michelle, and Lauren for making my day so awesome! Thanks for letting me take charge a bit to pick out our rides and being just as silly and ridiculous as me in our ride photos. Now I’m just counting down the weeks until surgery is done and I can get back!

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Default ThumbnailAnother Disney Day (or Gaston And AP Days) Default ThumbnailA Calm Disney Day (or Enjoying An Empty Park) Default ThumbnailEpic Disney Evening (or 8 Rides In 3 Hours) Default ThumbnailDay 2 At Disneyland (or Gardens and Roller Coasters) Default ThumbnailDisney Views and Food (or Rides Were A Low-Priority) Default ThumbnailAnother Dinner And A Show Night (or Classic Musicals And Yummy Food)

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Another Disney Day (or Gaston And AP Days)

Posted on March 9, 2017 | 1 comment

I was just at Disneyland last week, but of course I wasn’t going to say no to going again this week! This trip had been planned for a bit because my friend Michelle and I wanted to see what they were doing for the AP Days at Disneyland and this seemed to be the only time we could go when the event was happening. But then they also announced all the Beauty and the Beast stuff at Disneyland so we added wanting to go to the pop up restaurant on our list and were very excited to have a fun Disney day!

When we got to the parks, we were pretty shocked about how crowded it was. It wasn’t spring break and there wasn’t a holiday so we didn’t know why everyone was at Disneyland. It wasn’t unbearably crowded, but it did surprise us. And since we knew the Beauty and the Beast pop up restaurant was a limited time thing, we were prepared to have to wait a while to get food when we were ready to eat.

But before eating, we had some stuff to do! We started with Hyperspace Mountain. I’m trying to get in a bunch of roller coasters before surgery since I know I won’t be able to ride them for a while after surgery. I’m planning at least one more Disney trip before surgery and I know I’ll be going on this again. And Michelle and I tried to do the pose from the Hamilton poster for the ride, but I turned a bit too much to the side so my arm got cut off. But Michelle looked awesome!

Our next stop was right next to Hyperspace Mountain at the old arcade building. That is where the AP Days event was being held. There were some art projects for kids, special merchandise that you could purchase, and phone charging stations. But the photo ops were what we decided to take advantage of!

There weren’t a ton of people inside of the event, so we were able to get through the photos pretty quickly. Then we went on a quick ride on Star Tours (another ride that I won’t be able to go on after surgery) before heading over to the Red Rose Tavern.

We had heard about the insane crowds there since everyone wants to experience it before it goes away (but there is no end date yet). We were prepared for the worst, but when we walked up it was pretty empty! And it was so cute inside. They decorated it to look like Gaston’s Tavern from the movie and there was a lot of stained glass all over.

We took a look at the menu when we walked inside, but since there was no line to order we just stood off to the side to look at the options. And once we knew what we wanted we were able to walk right up to place our orders.

Since we weren’t sure if either of us would be able to be back before this pop up ended, so we decided to order a few things and share them. From friends who have been there already, I heard that the chicken sandwich and poutine were really good so we ordered those plus the two desserts (lemon cake and “gray stuff”) that they had to split between us.

And it was all awesome! This was so much better than regular theme park food and we were both saying how we think they need to keep this permanently at Disneyland! It was a lot of food and we were both feeling pretty full after eating. But that was ok because we had a quick stop before going on any more rides that day.

Earlier in the day I saw that one of my Orangetheory coaches, Whitney, was at Disneyland that day too! She and I were texting and finally we were able to coordinate meeting up when we were done eating. We were on our way to the meeting spot, but while we were walking we happened to see the Gaston character walking around. He’s a character you don’t see that often and he wasn’t stopping for photos. So I ran in front of him and did a quick selfie as he was walking.

After that quick photo, we walked over to Indiana Jones where Whitney was waiting for us. We just hung out for a little bit while she was eating and it was a nice catch up!

Whitney was there with her family so she went off with them and Michelle and I went on a few more rides. We went to Indiana Jones (another one that will not be ok to ride after surgery) and Haunted Mansion before doing our last ride in that park.

Michelle and I have a year-long competition going with Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters. We have set rules for ourselves, but mainly we have to ride together and we are adding up all the points we get to see who has the most points at the end of the year. I’m winning right now, but that can change so quickly! For some reason, our ride photo left out Michelle’s score, but she got more than double the points I got.

We originally weren’t going to go over to California Adventure, but we ended up wanting to ride on Soarin’ so we headed over there after Buzz Lightyear. But on the way, we did some shopping. We weren’t looking for anything in particular, but I always like to see what is for sale at Disneyland. And about a year ago, I saw a set of dog bow ties that I loved but only came in small dog sizes. But this time, they had them in a large dog size!

I called my mom quickly and she confirmed Tucker’s neck size (these will either just fit perfectly or we will add a little extra velcro to make them fit) so I got them for him! Tucker doesn’t dress up too often, but I figured these could be cute for Halloween for him or just for fun outings.  Plus, I love Disney stuff so I want the dog to have some too!

Our ride on Soarin’ was awesome (as always) and by the time we were done with the ride we were both pretty exhausted. I had a big workout before meeting Michelle and she had been working hard. And even though we were only at Disneyland for about 6 hours, it felt like a full day for us!

I’ve had a couple of back to back weeks with Disneyland days. I have another day planned for the beginning of April and that might be my last trip there before surgery. I’m glad that I’ve been able to go so much lately because I know I will miss it when I can’t be there. But for now, I’m just maximizing each day I have there!

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Default ThumbnailOne More Disney Day (or Yummy Food and Roller Coasters) Default ThumbnailA Disney Birthday! (or Princesses and Awesome Ears) Default ThumbnailCelebrating Villaintine’s Day (or Getting Something Checked Off My Disney Bucket List) Default ThumbnailAnother Disney Birthday (or Eating All The Foods Again) Default ThumbnailAn Easy Disney Day (or Another Eat All The Foods Adventure) Default ThumbnailA Full Disney Day! (or Character Photos, Ride Photos, And Only Being A Group Of 2)

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Disney Afternoon (or Beauty And The Beast And Rides)

Posted on March 3, 2017 | 1 comment

I’m going to write about my Monday this week a bit backwards. I had stuff in the morning that I’ll be writing about next week, but I wanted to write about my afternoon first!

I seem to be getting in a ton of Disney days lately and that’s awesome with me! I know that I’ll have a huge gap of time where I won’t be able to go (I have the summer that my pass isn’t good for and there’s a chance I can’t go between having surgery and summer). So whenever I have a chance to go to Disneyland, I’m going to go!

My friend Erin asked me if I wanted to join her and her daughter Olive at Disneyland when they were there for a girls day on Monday. I let them know that I could join them for the afternoon and I was so excited! I hadn’t been to Disneyland with Erin and Olive in 6 years (almost exactly 6 years to the day!) so I was looking forward to going with them and having a fun afternoon.

I didn’t end up making it to Disneyland until about 3:30 and I rushed into the park to meet up with Erin and Olive. They had been doing a ton of rides, so they were ready to take things a bit easier for a little bit. So our first stop was Toy Story Mania where Olive and I tried to battle each other in the games. I might have gotten a higher score, but Olive had better accuracy so I considered it a tied game.

After that ride, we ended up walking around a bit trying to figure out what to ride next and we went passed the old Tower of Terror. I’m excited that a new ride will be opening up there soon, but because of the timing of it I might not get to ride it until the fall. But it still made me happy to see the sign in front promoting the new Guardians of the Galaxy ride!

That might be the closest I get to riding that ride for a long time, so I have to take advantage of that! After the quick photo stop, we made another quick photo stop for Erin and Olive to take a cute photo together! I love how adorable they look together and was happy to play photographer for them!

Next, we headed over to the Monsters Inc ride. Olive really wanted to ride that, and it’s been a while since I had been on it so I was happy to check it out again. It’s just as cute as I remember it and Olive was laughing at so many scenes in the ride. Sometimes it’s nice to go to Disneyland with a kid who really just loves everything there!

Our next stop was another Olive request. There was a preview for the new Beauty and the Beast movie. In the lobby area, they had a couple of props to check out and that got us all really excited for the preview.

The preview was pretty awesome! I already knew that I wanted to go and see the movie since I usually love all Disney movies. But this got me even more hyped up for the movie! I know a few friends are trying to make plans to go on opening weekend, and I really hope that we can make that work.

Next Erin and Olive went on Soarin’. They had gotten Fastpasses before I joined them at the park so they went on that ride on their own. But it was ok with me because while they were on the ride I got to watch the amazing sunset!

Erin and Olive were back pretty quickly from their ride (the perks of Fastpass!) and we were all pretty hungry by that time. So we headed over to Cars Land to have some dinner at Flo’s Cafe and then ride our last ride for the night. It was another Olive request, but I was more than happy to go on Radiator Springs Racers! We all got to be in the front row of the car and Olive was loving roller coasters so much that she was riding with her hands up. I really love this photo of us all (even if I have some crazy eyes going on).

The park was getting close to closing time after we finished our ride, but Olive wanted to go back into the Beast Library in the Animation Academy. She loves the magic quiz that says what princess you are like. Since it was almost closing time and not a lot of people seem to go back to the Beast Library, the 3 of us pretty much had the place to ourselves!

Olive was having fun doing the quiz as many times as she could and Erin and I enjoyed having some time to catch up. Erin and I usually only get to hang out when she’s doing my hair or I’m babysitting her kids, so it was nice to have a bit of catch up time while Olive was having so much fun.

But before we knew it, a cast member came in to tell us the park was closed and we had to leave. We all walked out to the gates and then we said goodbye (we parked in different parking lots so we weren’t all taking the tram back to the main parking lot together). I was only in the park for a little more than 4 hours, but I think I got a lot of stuff done in that time!

I’m so glad Erin and Olive invited me to join them for their girls day at Disneyland! We had been saying we wanted to do this for a while but schedules never seemed to match up. So it was perfect that it worked this time! Hopefully I can meet up with them again soon and it won’t take another 6 years before we repeat this hangout!

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Default ThumbnailAnother Disney Day (or Gaston And AP Days) Default ThumbnailA Disney Morning (or Dealing With The Heat For One Ride) Default Thumbnail2 Restaurants and 2 Rides (or A Very Low-Key Disney Afternoon) Default ThumbnailEpic Disney Evening (or 8 Rides In 3 Hours) Default ThumbnailA Family Disney Day (or Rain, Cold, And More Rides Than We Expected) Default ThumbnailIt’s Halloweentime! (or Another Disney Afternoon)

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A Calm Disney Day (or Enjoying An Empty Park)

Posted on January 12, 2017 | 2 comments

Since I average going to Disneyland almost once a month (except in the summer when my pass is blacked out), it seemed perfect timing to go to Disneyland this week! And not only had it been almost a month since the last time I was there, it seemed like a lot of other things were saying it was the perfect time to go. It was supposed to rain on Monday, which usually means the parks aren’t that crowded. And, this past Monday was the first day of school for many schools in the area which also usually means the parks might be on the empty side.

I went with Michelle and Dani (as usual) and we took my new car. Dani was with me when I bought the car, but Michelle really wanted to see it. Plus, I need to drive more so I get used to the car! Usually Michelle or Dani drive, so it was my turn to be the driver for the day. And since we went down around lunchtime, there wasn’t too much traffic that we had to deal with.

When we got to Disneyland, we were very happy to see that the parks were empty! It was exactly what we wanted and the rain had already stopped so we were pretty excited to have a great day! We didn’t have a bunch of rides that we wanted to get done, so we decided to take things easy and just go on whatever seems fun to us at the time.

We went into California Adventure and our first stop was Toy Story Mania, where I’m hoping that I can get back to having great scores on the game. I’m not that good at it anymore so I need to remember to read up on the tricks to the various games on the ride to hopefully get the high score in my car. Next, we went right next to Toy Story Mania to ride on California Screamin. All of us were going to go on the ride, but Dani got a phone call she needed to take so she had to skip out on the ride. Michelle and I were able to sit in the front of the roller coaster and even though we didn’t plan our photo together, we had similar poses.

I wish we could have gotten a better photo, but there was a ton of glare on the screens and we didn’t want to spend $39 on the photo. So I used the photo I could access from my phone and that has the writing on it.

After that ride, Dani was off the phone and we headed over to Soarin’ Around the World and realized when we were done it was the perfect time to check out the Frozen show. I hadn’t seen it yet and when it opened you had to get a Fastpass for the show as soon as the gates opened. But now, you could walk in and get into the show. So we decided to take a show break in our day.

We wanted to sit in the orchestra section because I don’t like to do stairs, and we were toward the back of the line. But it ended up being perfect because even though we were in the back of the theater, we were in the center and it was a great view of the stage.

The Frozen show was pretty good! I’m still sad that the Aladdin show is gone (and I loved getting to see my friend in it), but this is a fun show too. The cast was very good and while the sets were almost all digital ones they helped to transform the space. The show is a bit long (over an hour), but it was a nice break for us in our day.

Continuing on with our leisurely pace in a pretty empty park, we had dinner in Cars Land before heading over to Radiator Springs Racers. Since the cars seat 3, we fit perfectly in the front row of our car. The sun had set right before we rode and that’s my favorite time to ride the ride. The outside portion of the ride is so beautiful and we had so much fun.

We walked over to Disneyland after that to ride a few more rides for the night. HyperSpace Mountain is still one of the best roller coasters and we were able to get on the ride quickly. We were trying to think of a good pose for the photo, and we decided on Michelle doing the Darth Vader death grip trying to kill me and Dani. I’m not sure if that’s what the picture ended up looking like, but I love the ride photo either way!

We went over to the Tiki Room for some Dole Whips for dessert and we were just in so much shock about how empty the park was! We could have walked down Main Street with our arms out and not hit anyone! It was a nice change over the past few visits where it was so crowded that I was starting to feel overwhelmed. I know that having it so empty is a rare treat, so I was just trying to enjoy it.

We got our Dole Whips quickly (no line!) and went into the Tiki Room to eat them.

The last ride for the night for us was Indiana Jones and we were all just being really silly during the ride and jokingly yelling at Dani since she was in the driver’s seat. Fortunately, the other people on the ride with us didn’t mind that and we just had a fun time being weird.

On our way out of the park, we went through the stores just to see what they had in stock. We all have different things we have been looking for at Disneyland and Michelle was able to find the mug that she had been wanting. And after our shopping, it was time to get back into my car to head home.

We didn’t get a ton of rides done, but it was the perfect Disney day. My next Disney adventure might be later this month and there’s a chance that there will be no rides that day. But I’ll write about that if that ends up happening!

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Default ThumbnailOne More Disney Day (or Yummy Food and Roller Coasters) Default ThumbnailA Disney Morning (or Dealing With The Heat For One Ride) Default ThumbnailEnjoying The Lack Of Rain At Disneyland (or Buzz Lightyear and Electrical Parade) Default ThumbnailAnother Disney Birthday (or Eating All The Foods Again) Default ThumbnailEnjoying More Food and Wine Festival (or Enjoying A Hot Day At Disneyland) Default ThumbnailHappy Birthday Justin (or The Most Epic Disneyland Adventure Where We Conquered The Park)

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