Disneyland Day2

Day 2 began bright and early at Disneyland for their "Magic Morning" hour before the park opened to the general public. We rode Dumbo a few times and then Jarod took Jakob on Star Tours again (Emma was too small for us all to go) while I took the girls on Buzz Lightyear again, followed by my favorite Astro Orbitor!!


Then we passed the crowd waiting to get into Disneyland and went over to California Adventure for the day. Anna was quite thrilled to pose inside the giant "A" of "californiA" since A is for Anna after all.

First on our list was Soaring Over California which none of us had ever done before. Emma was too short for that ride too so I waited outside with her. Jakob was kind enough to repeat the ride with me and it is absolutely awesome. Meanwhile Jarod took the girls to the Playhouse Disney show which they absolutely, totally LOVED (so I took them again in the afternoon). They saw their favorite Mickey Mouse Clubhouse characters, Winnie the Pooh, Little Einsteins and Handy Manny, and had fun dancing.

Jakob humored me with some character interactions while we waited for the show to finish.

It was much easier to get access to the Characters at California Adventure. In fact we hadn't even seen Mickey Mouse the day before so this was our first sighting of him.

Here's a good example why California Adventure is so great - it's bright, and colorful, and Anna is actually smiling in this ride!!!

Here's Jakob in 3D action at the new Toy Story ride - SO MUCH FUN! and speaking of 3D, the Muppet Show 3D was also a big hit and was perfect for our family since the kids were just introduced to the muppets over fall break. Emma loved wearing the glasses and while we waited to go into the theatre, even the preshow was so clever and entertaining.

There was quite a bit of construction going at the park, and all the lake was fenced off - they are putting in a new water show and rebranding some of the old stuff to be more "Disney". The kids rode the jellyfish jumpers - I'm sure it won't be long before it's all rebranded with Nemo! And last time we were here the big ferris wheel was the Sun Wheel but now it's Mickey's Fun Wheel.

I was pretty impressed that Jakob spotted our hotel from Mickey's Fun Wheel. In the foreground is some of the construction for the new Radiator Springs area of the park. They should just call this park "Pixarland - the happier (not scary) place on earth."

We spent the afternoon in Fliks Funfair, lots of fun little rides for the kids and no wait time. Wahoo!

We finished of the day with the Pixar parade, so cool, especially all the bubbles and then went into Downtown Disney to eat dinner at the Rainforest Cafe (we decided to splurge because the kids had been so good about eating their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches everyday, and this was a vacation after all!).