Well, of course we went to Disneyland as soon as I could wash my face, change our clothes, and get out the door.
We walked out the main hotel doors (which were opened by Ken and friends), went left on the sidewalk, crossed the street (man that's a long crosswalk!), walked down past Paradise Pier Hotel, turned right into Grand Californian Hotel, went in the pretty doors, made an almost immediate left down that long, poorly marked hallway...which ultimately led us out to DTD, and a hop skip and jump to the bag check!
I wrote all that for anyone who might not know that way. And considering how every single day we helped some lost family find their way to the parks without having to go ALL the way through DTD, I'm sure there are people out there!
The first walk I nearly cried when I saw that easy way. When we were at PPH last September, we followed their handy-seeming signs, went out the back, near the parking garage, past DLH, and ALL the way through DTD. Every day. Ugh.
This shorter way was so much nicer.
And we got to see palm trees.
However, I won't ever do that with a little kid again, if I don't have a stroller. If for some reason we have to go without a stroller, we'll just shell out for ART.
We got dropped off at the Anabella at 2:09, and the time on the receipt for waters at that water and fruit cart on main street is 3:13. So it's not far away, not really, at all!
Eamon was courting illness by grabbing ice cubes from the water-bottle tubs at the cart, while I tried to pay. Grabbing and eating said ice cubes. Bleah.
Any possible plans I made for this trip were absolutely blown out of the water by DS's opinions. He was either enthusiastic about things I hadn't yet planned, or vehemently against things I *had* planned. So...my plans were thrown out the window every day. Oh well. Such is life with an opinionated 3.5 year old.
So we wandered, and the only thing he wanted to do then was...Star Tours!
On our last trip, the CM got really tweaky with his height, and passed a piece of paper between his head and the measuring thing, and declared him too short. All the while a tiny girl wearing high-heeled cowboy boots sauntered by with her family...since the important part, IMO, for that ride is the torso, not the legs, I think it's ridiculous that high heeled shoes should be allowed to pass a kid through. I personally think that the rides with height restrictions b/c of the person needing to fit the restraint should have a measuring system based on sitting-down height. Of course, that's self-serving for DS, b/c he has a VERY long torso and would have been allowed on long ago (he was out of his infant seat, by torso length, before he was 4 months old, to give you an idea).
Well, this time he made it! It was an easy walk-on, and I felt pressured to go go go before another CM changed their minds, which in retrospect was a mistake. I wish I had slowed down with him, really shown him the queue. Oh well.
Someone in line with us was excited for him, and told me to keep ahold of him, b/c when their kid was his age and height, he slid under the lap belt, LOL. I did hold him with an arm, but he still slid quite a bit!
During the whole ride (which is my fave alongside of IASW, by the way) he had the blankest, wide-eyed, no emotion expression on his face. He just kept sliding and staring and not overtly reacting at all. I thought OMG he HATES it. I expected tears.
We got out of the ride and I heard some kid saying "I loved that ride, I loved that ride!" over and over. We got out of the crowd, and I realized that it was MY son saying that, and he was trying to talk to ME! Wow! he loved it!!!
Alas, he refused to go on it a second time.
Which was bad b/c although DS was excited to ride his "star wars ride", my husband was even MORE excited. And he wasn't there yet. Oops.
Of course you end up in the store, and I was just SO excited about his being tall enough and brave enough, that I had to buy him something to commemorate it.
The problem is...I know my kid, and I wasn't going to get him ANY kind of proper light saber. He would whip it around and I would have to take it away from him. Plus, we are VERY strict about the suggested ages on products, and most, if not all, of those light sabers are for kids 5 and up. I do NOT get products that are "too old" for him, EVER. He sees kids younger than him with toys I won't get him, and I have to remind him that they have different parents who have different rules, and this is a rule that I am very strict on. So no light sabers, no blasters (they are also mainly for 5 and up and the Buzz type blasters for 3 and up do NOT appeal to DS), etc.
Luckily, he saw a Jedi Mickey that was perfect. We snagged him and got in line. In front of us, a cute scene played out...cute even though the gift-recipient was younger than DS, and the gift was something for 6 and up, but whatever...as long as he doesn't give the toy to DS, if others want to give their kids things that are "too old" for them, go for it. But when there's something chokeable on it, or some actual reason for it to be for older kids, well, don't come whining to me.
Anyway, a family was in line...the mom was tattooed, wearing nightmare b4 xmas stuff, dyed black hair...very similar to the actress who plays Abby on NCIS. She had a very mainstream stroller, with two cute kids...the difference was striking to me, and I enjoyed watching them. She was having a transaction with the CM, but was distracted by the older boy (younger than DS). Suddenly I noticed the CM telling the little boy that he needed to help his little sister clean up her cheerios, and I thought "whoa, that's out of line!" B
ut the little boy ducked down in front of the stroller, therefore out of sight of the adults, and while he was helping, the CM gave a big box in a bag to the mom, who whipped it behind the stroller, hung it from the handles, and covered it with a big blanket she had on the handles. It was the big "build a light saber" set that the boy had just been going ON about.
Well that inspired me, especially b/c I had just noticed small keychain light sabers, that were labeled for 3 and up, right there. DS noticed them too, and talked about the green one. I let him know that he was getting jedi mickey, and that was his gift, and wasn't that exciting! Well of course I distracted him and slipped the keychain to the CM, who totally got that I was doing a similar move as the woman before me. He was very good at that.
DS had his Jedi Mickey, I had a secret, we took pictures of DS and Jedi Mickey in front of the store window, and moved on.
After that, I think we went on Buzz, and he got scared in line! I know that he was tired, and that we were hungry, but ya know, we were in line, there was a crowd, and after a bad experience exiting a ride in Oct of '06, I figure that quite often the quickest way off of a ride is to go ON the ride. So I reminded him that he loved the ride, that he'd get to blast things, that it was fun, he had to defeat Zurg, etc...he did protest the whole way through the line, but once he had his blaster in hand, he was fine. As the door thing of the ride vehicle shut, he almost lost Jedi Mickey, but I correctly interpreted his excited yelps, and the CM caught on quick too, and we saved JM.
He was fine blasting things, and though our scores were abysmal, we had fun.
Then we went to Tomorrowland Terrace for lunch. Ahhhhh. That was better.
By then the sun was going down, and there was a cool pre-twilight light on the Jedi training as we made our way to Autopia. We watched the end of the show from behind, and it made me cry. I can't wait until he's mature enough to do that, to listen to them and do what they say, to enjoy it in the moment and really interact. I think he's still a bit young for all of that, though he's maturing quickly! He wanted to do it, and that's a good step!
Went over to Autopia, with a listed 40 minute wait. I tried to talk him out of it, but hey, it's Disneyland and I didn't want to *cause* sadness just b/c I didn't want to wait, so we went. OMG never again. Even with fastpass Autopia with a wait is awful. It's best in the very early morning with NO wait, and that is the only time I ever want to go on it again. At least until DS is 10 and more able to deal with the wait.
Interminable wait, but ultimately we were on, and it was nice to ride at twilight, and he love love loves that ride, so it was fine.
I think we just went wandering at that point, and suddenly found ourselves in the pre-pre-pre-parade waiting time, and we were right there at the Fantasy/Tomorrowland bathrooms, which I've heard are great for parade-watching, so...we decided to wait for the parade! And he was actually really good, waiting for almost an hour.
Saw the Enchanted carriage, though honestly the pooper-scooper CM following behind was more amusing to me. She kept a plastic rose at the top of her can, and pretended that the can smelled of roses.
The family chosen to be in the parade was a family of 24! They were on top of a tall bus thing.
The parade was very lovely, despite a very very LOUD woman yelling things to her child, who was 2 feet away from her. And she kept getting things wrong, too. I mean, yeah, my 3 year old said that Pluto was Goofy, but he did it quietly. She did it, well after DS and I figured it out, and she did it far more loudly. When her husband corrected her, she realized her error verbally, and again, at top volume.
Weirdest part of that parade was that I was surrounded by very tall people. Yeah, I'm only 5'3", so I'm used to being shrimpy, but this was weird. Men and women well over 5'10", all around, and they were not all related to each other (unless they were a really unhappy, not speaking to each other, extended family).
I'm not big into christmas, we're more Yule types, but it was really cute. And it was the first parade we *really* saw, rather than just "oh there's the parade let's go watch the end of it". Eamon liked it quite a bit, especially seeing Mickey and Minnie skating on their float.
Having saved all those receipts is making this easier to remember! At 7:17 we had a snack; I had the "trio of fritters" from Royal St Veranda (very very good) and DS had a chocolate chip cookie. We sat on a brick ledge to eat them and I peoplewatched while DS snarfed half of his cookie.
As we walked on through Adventureland, we ended up on Jungle Cruise in the dark. I was amazed that he wanted to do that! While in line he made "best friends forever" with a woman and her three daughters. They all had curly hair (different varieties of curls, from just barely wavy to near curliques) and that was something to start the in-line conversation. DS just lloooooves making friends while waiting, especially friends with girls or women, and I think he was ready to push me overboard and go live with them. We all rode together, and the middle sister adopted him for the ride.
The skipper was really funny! Alas I *never* remember what the jokes are when I like them, and it was so dark I couldn't see his name. But he had a very high voice, and the one joke I do remember was something I've never heard as we approached the tribal dance. Usually they just say something like "oh they never do celebration dances, oh no, it's an ambush". Total yawn. But this guy said something, then said "let me stop and see if I can translate." We stopped, and stopped, and stayed stopped....just to the point where it was getting weird (especially in the dark!), and then he just said "nope" and started the boat again. It was truly hilarious to all of the boat.
While we were on the boat, the fireworks started, and we could see a bit of that through the trees. It was ending as we got off the boat, and we rushed to main street to try to see the end, but didn't quite get there. We saw the snow, though! E liked the bubbles. And then of course the park was closed and we were in the slow-moving crowd. But that was OK; by that point I was moving slow, too!
Finally made our way out, and by the time we got to the hotel I was hungry again (hmm, am noticing an explanation for the vast tummy I noticed in my photopass pictures) and since Tangerine's dessert fridge was broken, all they had was a peach cobbler so I had that, and it was good.
DS slept all night long, which is shocking for him, but he did each night at Disneyland. Nice.
In fact, when I called the other day, the only thing available at DLH was a $450 room. bwa ha ha. Not going to happen.
One day I'll convince them to build a Disneyland not far from here... Then everything will be alright. Either that, or I'll have to get stinking rich and get my own private jet, just for trips over on the weekend... Yeah... 
