I'm not sure how Nikki sleeps with hair all in her face. At night when she's asleep her face is so covered I have a hard time telling which direction she is facing. Last night I braided her hair I was worried she would suffocate.
I'm sad to see it all end. It's been one of the best vacations I've ever had, despite the three tickets I lost and had to get reprinted so we could hop over to the other park.
It was another jam packed day. I just think Disneyland is so clean and beautiful. The details in each area are incredible! It's beyond creative. I loved the cars and the bugs life zones. I couldn't get over all the details from the Popsicle park benches to the vintage gas station pumps. I left early with the little ones, as their exhaustion level hit their max and Nikki was starting to not feel well. We took the evening easy and the little ones got good rest. Aaron stayed with the big kids and they partied until closing.
This weather, well, it's perfection! You would never know that Christmas is just days away. We went to the beach today and played in the sun. Then when we returned home, left the kids with the teenagers, and went to the Cheesecake Factory with and some wonderful So Cal friends and Anna/Amadeo. It was yet another fantastic day.
We started the trip with some family pictures, wanted to get that out of the way. One of the best things we did was get the Disney photo pass. Every professional photographer will take your picture and give you a card. You pay 100 bucks and all your pictures with characters, on rides, etc. are consolidated together on a CD. It's the best thing ever. These pictures are from our phone, so there are better ones than these. We got a lot of comments on our Disney shirts. They were pretty cute. After our group shots we split up into age leveled groups. I stayed with the little people group, along with Grandma and Grandpa.
Disneyland was very busy. When we decided to go on the trip we looked up when the least busy times of the year and this was supposed to be one of those weeks, but it was very crowded and I imagine it is because of all the beautiful Christmas attractions and decor. The It's a Small World ride was entirely Holiday themed and the lights and trees everywhere were incredible. I loved the Christmas parade; Cameron was dancing the whole time. the fireworks and fake snow falling overhead were just magical. This really is the happiest place on earth.
The good news is school back home is still cancelled due to icy conditions, so they haven't missed a thing yet. Also, our neighbor got our pipes flowing again last night. I'm feeling very overwhelmed with gratitude.
We pulled into the Rapunzel Tower, an amazing home rental just a half mile from Disneyland. The rooms are themed with Disney characters and decor. We quickly unloaded and threw together a delicious spaghetti dinner with the groceries we bought last night after our trip to Denny's . It was so nice spending no money today and visiting the Merced First ward this morning where Jared's old BYU buddy lives. Sarah had put together bagged lunches last night in the hotel, so we didn't have to stop and eat out. After our dinner we let the kids swim in the beautiful pool.
The only thing that made today not so perfect was that our pipes at home froze last night when our city's temperature dropped to 3 degrees!!! So crazy how cold it is there. Lucky for us we have a very kind and very talented neighbor who worked today to get it thawed. It still isn't working, but there's hope since he is there and the temperature shouldn't be as cold tomorrow.
It's been a wonderful start, can't wait for more.
