Day 4 - falling behind on the journal

As usual, I'm falling behind on my journal and the days are starting to run together so I'll just write about the highlights and fill in the details as I remember them. Max is still in a power struggle about going on rides. At this point he's even refusing the most kid friendly rides they have. He even refused to go on the Little Mermaid ride, which he went on the day before and liked it. And then at the same time said that he wanted to go on the Indiana Jones ride, which Jacob already backed out of. Max wasn't tall enough so I didn't get to call his bluff and see if he'd really go on it, but he probably would have. On Tom Sawyer's Island there is a cave called Dead Man's Grotto that had skeletons and booby traps and he just loved it. He would even touch the treasures on purpose to get the traps to go off. This is the same kid who walked off of the Winnie the Pooh ride and said, "I'm never going on that again, too scary". Ella is having a great time dancing every time she gets the chance. She loves the parades and had a lot of fun dancing at the Phineas and Ferb dance party. When she did the limbo the stick was way over her head, but she still arched her back way. Back like the big kids were doing. Ella loves the rides and hasn't found any that she doesnt want to go on. Shes really irritated when she isnt tall enough. Zoe is enjoying this crazy new world. She loves all of the comotion and attention, but she's often startled by the unexpected events going on around her. Her other complaint is that she doesn't get to crawl around enough. She's eating everything in sight though and is irritated that we won't give her any of our desserts. Jacob is just having the best time. He loves to plan out what we are going to do next and there are very few rides that he isn't willing to go on at least once. I think Tower of Terror is the only one so far. I really like our hotel room. Even out of the other Disney Vacation Club rooms that we have stayed in, this is one of the nicest. I really like the decorations and having a view of the park is great. It's neat to see all of the activity that takes place in the middle of the night, or at least early in the morning when whichever kid decides to be the early bird that day wakes us up.

Day 4 was great! We did so much which is why the details run together for Marc. But I have my 1400+ pictures to remind me! We were up bright and early again today. We were ready long before we needed to be to enter California Adventure which was the plan for the day. So Marc went to Ralph Brennan's in Downtown Disney and got a bag of hot bengeits for us to share. We at them on the balcony since they're heavily coated in powdered sugar and made a terrible mess! Then we headed for the line to get into CA via the private resort entrance. It was twice as long as the other days at this same time because today was Friday and the weekend crowds were showing up. As usual the line started moving at about 9:20am. We were in a short line for Soarin' which opened at 9:30am. This is one ride that Max doesn't miss. He was also looking forward to Toy Story Mania. As soon as we got off Soarin' we headed for the rope at Paradise Pier. They drop the rope when the park opens at 10am. EVERYONE scrambles over to TSM and the line builds quickly. There is no fastpass for it here like there is at WDW.

Toy Story Mania is always a blast! Next we went over to California Screamin' to let Marc ride and got a child swap ticket for me to use later. I took the kids on the King Triton's Carousel while we waited.

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Next, we all got in line for Mickey's Fun Wheel. At first Marc and the boys were going to go on the crazy swinging cages, but the boys backed out of it and we all went on the still one. It was really windy and cold up there, but Max enjoyed the view and Jacob liked trying to take pictures of the new Cars Land that hasn't opened yet.

(Max actually enjoying rides today!)

(Cars Land view)

Then it was time for Goofy's Sky School--the hands down favorite for both Max and Jacob! I got to ride Screamin' while they headed that way. The boys were able to ride Goofy's a lot without much wait. The line wasn't very long anyway, and no one was using the single rider line! Jacob used the single rider time every time! Max isn't old enough to go by himself, so he and I or he and Marc would wait in line or use fastpasses we had from earlier to go several times. We had some corndogs from Corndog Castle which were every bit as big, delicious, and expersive as the ones from the Red Wagon at Disneyland. Marc had the fried cheese stick from there. It looks just like the corn dog but of course there is cheese inside instead of a hotdog. Phineas and Ferb's Dance Party came along around this time and Ella got picked to go out and dance with the dancers. She loved it!

Next, we left the Paradise Pier area and rode The Little Mermaid ride on our way to the Hollywood area. Max refused to go on Monsters Inc.. Too bad; it's a cute ride!

We all watched Muppet Vision 3D and then picked up some really good smoothies at "Schmoozies" before going to watch Aladdin. That turned out to be a great idea. We drank the smoothies while we waited in line outside. Alladin was awesome! The Genie was funny and surprisingly had very current jokes! We missed our afternoon break again today. We tend to just want to keep doing stuff and the kids do well anyway. Zoe can sleep whenever she wants in the stroller or the sling.

It was time to go catch the parade at Disneyland...the one we skipped the other night. Today it was at 4pm. We park hoppped and headed right over to our preferred viewing area for the parade. Sorry, I could tell you but then I'd have to ...you know. But you can probably figure it out from the picture anyway. The parade was great. It's always better than I think it will be!

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We walked through Fantasyland and Max really wanted to ride the Storybook Canal Boats. The line was short since it was closed during the parade.

Then it was time for dinner! We headed right over to Big Thunder Ranch BBQ. I was looking forward to this meal because it's served family style and includes something all of our kids like. Also there is entertainment during dinner. Well, I'll do a separate post about the entire experience and food, but let me just say that we had the worst seats in the house so we couldn't see the entertainment at all. The service was horrible and the food was just alright. Time to go home! We offered to let Jacob and Max go on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad using fastpasses we picked up earlier, but neither wanted to. In fact we never got around to riding it the whole trip. Marc took the girls home while Max and Jacob and I went to Paradise Pier in California Adventure to ride Goofy's Sky School some more! We also rode the other rides in that area with no waiting. We checked out Toy Story but it did have a 40 minute wait. We headed home before World of Color started. I thought perhaps the kids would be awake to see World of Color from the balcony tonight, but as usual they fell asleep JUST before it started.

It was spectacular! I never got tired of watching it from our balcony.