Our Week in California and Raegan's First Trip to Disneyland

Wow! A long time has passed since I have posted. I'm going to do my best to catch up. This particular post is going to have MANY pictures in it. Blake is going to print out a blog book for me as my Christmas gift, so I want to have as many pictures in there as I can (then I won't have to scrapbook as many :).

What an AMAZING time we had in California with Meagan and Mark and their family (Blake's sister)! We left on Blake's birthday, October 2nd. We spent most of the day driving (in our fabulous van that we LOVE--SO glad we got it). We stayed at the Marriott Villas at Newport Beach. Meagan and Mark have a time share in Maui (which has excellent trading power), and they were gracious enough to let us stay there with them. It was beautiful! The weather was in the 70's every day and there was sunshine aplenty--a wonderful break from the heat.
On Saturday Meagan and I went to the swap meet in Costa Mesa--AWESOME DEALS. My buy of the year is my $1 jewelry. One dollar for a necklace and earrings. Needless to say I stocked up. We stopped to get something to eat on the way home, and I had the best carne asada taco I have ever had in a restaurant. Yummy! I think we went back to that restaurant three times while we were there. We got home from the swap meet about 3 (honestly, I could have spent two full days there), and Mark and Blake left for Magic Mountain. They drove two hours, stayed until midnight getting their fixes of roller coasters (so hopefull they wouldn't want to ride any at Disneyland) and were home by two or two thirty am. The kids spent time at the beach (why don't husbands remember to put sunscreen on children?) and doing activities at the resort. Blake came home from the beach with a bruise all along his forearm. "How did he get it?" you may ask. Well, he was walking along wet rocks on the beach with Jonathan in the Baby Bjorn and FELL. He "sacrificed his arm" to save Jonathan. When I heard about that stunt, he was lucky the only thing he ended up with was just a bruised arm, because I wanted to strangle him (remember the fact that both of my kids were also bright red, they were sunburned so badly?). It was a good thing he left for Magic Mountain so I had some time to cool off. :)
The next day, Sunday, we tried, but failed to listen to Conference. You would think that at a Marriott in California, you would find Conference on the television. Nope. And the volume on the computer did not go up high enough to drown out kid noise, so no Conference for us. So sad! For dinner that night, we went to Meagan’s friend’s house (her name is Jennifer, too). The kids played, we ate a FABULOUS dinner and made some new friends. Jonathan was coughing terribly, so we left early from our new friends’ house and headed to Urgent Care. What’s a vacation without a trip to Urgent Care? Unbelievably enough, Jonathan did not have an ear infection, the flu (or the swine flu), pneumonia or even a sign of asthma! A miracle!

Monday we listened to the time share presentation at the hotel and got two free Disneyland tickets so we could go back. J After that we all loaded into a tandem bike and rode up and down the boardwalk along the beach. We drooled at all the beautiful beach properties as we rode by. That night we celebrated Blake’s birthday at a local pizza shop.

Tuesday and Wednesday were Disneyland. Jonathan was a trooper—poor little thing. Disneyland was everything we thought it would be—it truly was magical. We had a “pass” that got us to the front of every line, so needless to say, Raegan got to ride plenty of them. I am not a big fan of rides, so her dad went with her on most of them.

We spent our last day just hanging out. Meagan and I went shopping at a very expensive mall, and she almost convinced me to spend $180 on a pair of jeans. What was I thinking?! :) We spent our last night at Joe’s Crab Shack and had a fabulous dinner—yummy!

Lindsey, Raegan and Jonathan (Lindsey and Jonathan are two months apart)

Rocket Launching

A hug from Tigger. Apparently, Raegan was a "favorite" during one of the parades. Many, many of the characters in the parade came over to her and involved her in the parade.

Raegan in the conga line

A common look we received throughout our visit at Disneyland

Dane, Raegan and Drew with Belle

Snow White and the three dwarfs

Sleeping Beauty with Drew, Raegan and Dane

The Old Hag and Raegan

And everyone thinks she gets her antics from me. Here's proof she does not.

Uncle Mark, Drew, Dane

So happy to be on the Carousel

Waiting for the Dumbo ride

Jonathan's first french fry

So happy to be in Disneyland

Classic Castle Picture

Uncle Mark, Aunt Meagan, Drew and Lindsey on Pirates of the Carribbean

My sweetest boy!

The men of my dreams

Look at those choppers!

Scared of the Jungle Ride, Uncle Mark???

Raegan and Princess Jasmine

Getting Princess Jasmine's autograph

Day two of Disneyland--we got smart and rented a stroller for Raegan. Of course, it was her idea.

My little trooper. He was such a good boy!

California Adventure was almost closed, and we spotted Dopey. As we approached where he was standing, his character helper told us he was going home for the night, and we would have to leave. We were so sad! The next thing I knew, he whispered to me to wait a minute. After everyone left, he told me Raegan could not only get Dopey's autograph, but walk Dopey back to his "house." Raegan was THRILLED. This is a picture of the worker that made our Disney experience just wonderful. Thank you, David!

Getting Dopey's autograph

Walking Dopey home

Now this is a Disney smile

Lovin' the parade

Her first face painting. Of course, she fell asleep on her daddy's shoulder about 30 minutes later and smeared it everywhere. Oh, well.

I couldn't believe she could hold still that long. She really wanted her face painted.

Bumper Cars with Daddy

My Angel Baby

Such fun!

Mommy's FAVORITE Disney character-- M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E

A picture of where we stayed. It was posh. Thanks again to Meagan and Mark!

Mama's sweetest boy

Raegan trying to escape the flash on Daddy's camera

Fun on the tornado slide

Lovin that lolipop

Ready for Disneyland!

Riding the tram was the only ride that wouldn't make Mommy sick

Getting Pluto's autograph