Disneyland!!!!

Disneyland was a dream come true!!! I know this sounds silly, but I mean it! I've been to Disney World a million times. We'd go to Florida almost every summer to visit my mom's family, and my dad would let my brother and I choose one theme park to visit. Of course, I always chose the Magic Kingdom. Disney World is pretty much my favorite place in the world, so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to finally visit Disneyland!

Amanda and I drove out last Friday night and stayed at my friend Tricia's for the weekend. Tricia and her fiance are from Chicago, but moved to Orange County last summer. They live in the town that's just inland from Laguna Beach. Beautiful! I never understood what the big fuss was about when it comes to southern California. Now I get it!

We spent Saturday at California Adventure. The highlight of the park is defnitely Soarin'. Okay, here's how ridiculous I am- I actually teared up the first time we rode it. It's just so beautiful! I could go on that ride all day. We also really liked the Toy Story ride.

The World of Color show was also spectacular. It was just a really fun day!


Amanda and I went to Disneyland the next day. I was super excited to get a First Time Visitor pin! (Although I felt like a bit of a cheater since I've been to Disney World so many times.)

We had a magical day! Here are some of the highlights:

I'm terrified of roller coasters, but I gave Big Thunder Mountain a chance. It was pretty scary the first time, but I liked it, so we went on 4 more times! Two of those times were in the dark, and it was like a whole different ride.

The first ride we went on was Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, which I remember going on with my dad when I was little. I was really sad when they took it away and super excited to go on it again at Disneyland. It was so funny to go on it as an adult, because I realized what the storyline is: Mr. Toad drinks and drives and goes to hell! When we were in the hell part, Amanda was like, "I'm actually scared!" I really hope they leave this ride there, even though it's totally inappropriate for little kids.

We rode pretty much everything we wanted to, except the Matterhorn thing, which was closed. I really enjoyed going on the rides they don't have at Disney World; I think Indiana Jones is one of my new favorite rides! And I loved seeing how the rides differed from the ones at Disney World, like how there were two drops in Pirates of the Caribbean instead of just one. (By the way, the Johnny Depp mannequins look JUST like him. It's kinda creepy. If I were Johnny Depp, I'd go to Disney and ask them to let me on the ride, and pose with the scenes, and then jump out and scare people.)

I had a confrontation with a man in line for Peter Pan. We noticed this disturbing trend of one parent waiting in line, then the other parent coming and handing their kids to them when they get to the front of the line. NOT COOL. First of all, way to give your kid a sense of entitlement and make them think rules don't apply to them. Second of all, that's just so unfair to the parents who are working hard to keep their kids patient and well-behaved. So this guy said, "Excuse me, can we just squeeze through here? My wife's up there." And I was like, "No." And he said, "But I was already in line..." and I said, "No, I think that's really rude." And turned my back on him. Amanda said he was watching me the whole time we went through the line. But that jerk waited till his wife got closer to him, then handed his kid over and jumped the rail himself and got on the ride before us. Amanda said he was trying to get my attention and smirking at me. I wanted to punch him in the face. Disney should employ people to monitor that kind of thing.

The best part of the day was when we posed for this picture.

I thought this pirate was pretty hot, and then I realized, he's flirting with us!! As we walked away, I told Amanda, "He totally wants us." Which was funny because after that we stopped in the washroom and realized we looked pretty rough; it was obvious we'd had a long day in a theme park. But whatever, he thought we were hot. So I wrote down her number, and we went back to find him. We stood near where he was talking to some people, and he approached us (which made Amanda feel better). He flirted some more, so I said, "If you're not doing anything later tonight, give us a call," and slipped him the number. And he texted!!!! He wanted to know if we were just in town for the night, and unfortunately, we were, so it didn't work out. Also, we started thinking about it and realized he was most likely a college kid there on an internship. Oh well. He was hot, and he wanted us!!

The next day, Tricia and her fiance showed us around Laguna Beach, and I got to dip my feet in the Pacific Ocean. Actually, a little more than my feet. I misjudged the size of a wave.

I had one of those moments where I was like, I can't believe this is my life. I felt like bursting with happiness and gratitude for the things I get to experience. Actually, I felt like that all weekend. My life is far from perfect, but I feel so lucky and so thankful for the things I get to do.