Well, it was the week before Christmas and you know that means just one thing . . . time to head to Disneyland! I know some of you (coughcoughButzcoughcough) have been beefing about the Disney-centric nature of these entries sometimes but . . . well, tough. We had a lovely afternoon and evening at the park the other day. It is done up so nicely for Christmas that it is almost the only place in Southern California to find an abundance of Christmas spirit.
Our afternoon began with Genevieve daring to go on a high-speed roller coaster in California Adventure. She has never gone on a coaster like this, her first coaster experience having been the terrifying backwards Indiana Jones coaster in Disneyland Paris which I assured her would be no big deal. It took her a good half an hour to recover her wits after that thing, her first and only coaster ride. But after a few visits to Disneyland I finally persuaded her to ride Big Thunder Mountain, an exciting coaster to be sure but relatively unfrightening as coasters go. Well, she enjoys that now so much that she worked up her courage to ride the aptly-named California Screamin'’ at Disneyland itself. Microseconds after this picture was taken she was shot off at high speed. Way to go Genevieve!!
Jack seemed relatively unimpressed by Mommy'’s derring-do, focusing his attentions on a small stuffed cardinal.
For our next stop? Well, far more terrifying for most adults than any roller coaster are these four words: It's a Small World.
Lest there be any doubt about the target audience for this ride, parking the stroller was an adventure in itself.
Like Haunted Mansion, IASW gets a holiday makeover, with festive lights and special holiday goodies all over the place. The 50th Anniversary Mickey Mouse ears adorn all the rides, themed to match each one.
Jack was clowning around like crazy in the queue and cracking us up. As usual.
While we were waiting the E.P. Ripley steamed on through. I love the fact that Disneyland still has this wonderful fleet of genuine antique steam engines. Walt'’s love of trains led directly to the development of the parks, and I am a member of an historical society dedicated to these wonderattractionsions.
I mean, how sweet can a Disneyland picture be?
Once inside the ride, Jack was amazed! Blinking and swivelling his head around at the dizzying array of little dancing and singing children, all done up in bright holiday colors. He go a hkickkikc out of it. If you have QuickTimetime 7 you can click here to view a short video of Jack riding IASW and then trying to eat the camera.
So lemme tell ya, this ride is best enoyed with (and by) a little one! I remember when Genevieve and I rode it a couple of years ago, and it stuck at the exit ramp. We spent about 15 agonizing minutes listening to . . . that . . . SONG!!! over and over and OVER. We recovered though. Seeing Jack in such wonderment and pleasure really gave us a big kick.
Well after all that excitement it was time for some relaxation, so we moseyed over to Santa'’s Reindeer Roundup.
Santa keeps a nice little cottage here. We'll be sharing Jack'’s photo with Santa very soon . . .
I couldn't decide which of these two pics to post. They are both so cute!
Mommy and Daddy enjoyed the cookie-decorating they had in the corral. In the background you can see Jack holding forth on some topic of interest. Jack has become MUCH more vocal in the last two weeks. A steady stream of BLAH BLAH YAH YAH BUH BUH BUH in an authoritative voice gushes forth from him nearly constantly. Has us in hysterics!
Yep, Santa'’s reindeer were all rounded up. Cows, too.
The twilight is our favorite time at the park as the beautiful lighting starts to twinle on and the sunset adds nice colors. This picture is totally unretouched. This is just the color everything was, this kind of blue, just for a very few minutes, very beautiful, so I grabbed a shot of it and then got a nice photo of the Mark Twain coming round the bend. Very nice work if I do say so myself.
Then it was off to the Haunted Mansion. This has a huge and fantastic holiday theme each year based on the great animated film The Nightmare Before Christmas. Brilliant idea, and extremely well-executed. Jack loves this ride. Lots of crazy colors and things swirling around. On one occasion he stood up on my lap and was just shaking his head with a big smile on his face. Soooo funny.
Nighttime at Disneyland and it all looks extra pretty, with the holiday lights adding to the usual sparkle. This is New Orleans Square seen across Rivers of America.
At night, you can really see the work that's gone into the Small World Holiday display, just a crazy circus of colors.
Of course, it'’s parade time at Disneyland every night, and we got good spots on Main Street to watch the Christmas Fantasy parade.
These fat, dancing snowmen are Genevieve's favorite part.
At first Jack was having a hard time getting into it . . .
. . . but after a little tickling he warmed right up!
On the way out the Ernest C. Marsh was loading passengers at Main St.
Don'’t let the picture below fool you. When an exhausted Mommy and Daddy got "Mr. Sleepy" home he woke right up and proceeded to go berserk, babbling, rolling around, putting on a show for us for about an hour that had us almost passing out with hysterics.
I was on my way back from the rest room on our way out of the park when I saw Genevieve standing there gazing at Jack all by herself. It was kind of touching so I took a picture.
Backtracking . . . remember that historical society I mentioned? Well, they maintain Walt Disney'’s barn in Griffith Park. This is the actual barn Walt had in the yard of his home that he used as his workshop for his large-scale train that ran through his property. It houses several cars from that train, Walt'’s tools, notes, switchboard, all manner of wonderful memorabilia, and is located in a section of the park given over to model train enthusiasts who each Sunday offer rides on their large-scale trains through a massive layout. A great place. We visited there briefly on our way from seeing King Kong.
Speaking of King Kong, kudos to "“Auntie"” Beth from AFI who bravely volunteered to baby-sit Jack for us while we went to see the big ape. Only folks with a baby who don't have family around to cover for them can tell you how great a favor this was. He was a sweetie as always and Beth took these cute photos for us. What a great person. Thanks, Beth!
We're a bit late with our Christmas cards this year -- so enjoy these festive snaps of Jack's very first visit with Santa, taken at Santa's Reindeer Roundup at Disneyland. While the Santa deal at Disneyland is superb, Santa himself was at the very tail end of his day in this photo -- thus the somewhat hilarious lack of festive Yule vim he displays. But Jack more than makes up for it in his cuteness and smileyness.
