Happy Place

 We've had an awesome week, and I'm excited to share it with you!  It's a long one!

We've been at Disneyland all of last week.  Oh, we love Disney!  We love to visit warm California!  We love to get away from the norm and have fun together!  And bonus!  We love to spend time with family!  My sister and her kids traveled along with us and we were joined by my parents and my brother's family for a portion of the week.

Let's get on with the photos.  First, you can't take a Utahn to California and not go to the beach.  We misjudged the timing of the sun, but darkness did not stop my kids from getting good and wet.  And sandy.  Always lots of sandy.

I think the highlight was watching a family of sea lions swimming around the pier.  They were putting on quite the show for us!

Monday morning - California Adventure!

We had lots of good map readers:

 That was while we were waiting for riders on the Tower of Terror.  My girls were a bit anxious about "scary" rides in the beginning, but by the end of the week, they had warmed up and were frightened of nothing!  They were begging to try Tower of Terror.  Ok, they refused to try Screamin', but honestly, I think they would have enjoyed that too if they tried it.  Ellie particularly has become a thrill seeker!  It was so fun to have excited kids about all the rides.

Sleeping kids in the stroller, a common occurrence:

 Actually, that may have been a rare moment where Daisy was actually happily chillin' in the stroller.  She got to the point where she hated the stroller and hated being with anyone else besides mom.  Like she would violently throw herself around (or out of the stroller) when she wasn't with mom.  I carried that baby for 5 days.  The little stinker.  It's a good thing she's cute.

We played a little fishing game, and Ellie, winner winner chicken dinner, won the "big" prize!  Goofy could not have gone to a better home.  She carried him around for the rest of the day, even taking him on rides, lucky dude.

Next day, Disneyland!

So fun to do Disney with cousins!

 Daisy missed out on meeting Mickey.  She was with Grandma and Grandpa while she snoozed a bit.

A good portion of us (but still missing 4):

Oh, sweet Mickey hugs:

Minnie too:

All the kids got bubble guns, which was a good amount of entertainment for all.  It was kind of funny, whenever a kid was using a bubble gun, other kids would come out of nowhere to pop the bubbles.  In fact, in this photo, I don't know the girl with the blue flower, popping bubbles.  Bubbles bring people together, I tell ya!

Mickey shaped everything!  Love it!

We ended Tuesday evening with a trip to Rainforest Cafe (thanks big bro!).  It was great fun, but the kids were so wasted!  You can't really tell, but three of my five are asleep in this photo:

Wednesday started with Daisy.  Duck, that is.  We had to introduce our favorite Daisys!

Photo with Daisy and Daisy.  Check.

 Daisy wasn't overly impressed, as you can tell, but she wasn't screaming either.  We'll take it.

Ellie driving:

 She looks like she's concentrating really hard there.  That was the one ride Ellie was not impressed with.  In fact, she hated it.  It was overwhelming to drive on her own.

Maren was loving it, though:

 Thank heavens we have a few more years before drivers licenses.

We caught the parade that afternoon.  Disney goes all out, that's for sure.

 A moment about Everett.  He didn't really love Disney.  Perhaps that was because we lost him a couple times.  Whoops!  Good news was that we quickly found him!  Really, it was a lot of walking for the little guy and he didn't like any of the fast, jerky rides we force him on.  He was complaining about walking and I was saying, "ya know, Disneyland is supposed to be the happiest place on earth!"  To which he replied, "No, it's the stupidest place on earth!"  :)  

And, for an almost five year old, everything is so real!  Disney does a fantastic job of telling their stories, and the kids believe.  We took him on Star Tours, and I had him all excited, "We get to go on a spaceship!"  In the middle of his spaceship ride he asked my sis, "Are we still in Disneyland?"

Sadly, half the family went on their way, but my sister and I were still here to play!  Day four, back to California Adventure.

I think Daisy spent the entire vacation just plain tired.  Sometimes even dirty concrete looks like a good bed:

 I look kind of tired and ornery in that photo, and I have to admit, I was.  ;)  My kids were pooped, and so was I.  We lasted until the afternoon, then we had to call it quits and have a little siesta:

Mandatory naps for all.

We were much happier when we went back later that evening for a little Animation Academy where we learned how to draw Olaf:

And then we met Elsa and Anna:

 Elsa got a quick hug from Lainey, but then she was done and wouldn't go near them.

Friday we went back to Disneyland for one last hurrah!  Once again, we napped in the afternoon which made a big difference.  We stayed late and watched the fireworks and rode Indiana Jones before returning to our hotel that evening.  No awesome photos to share!  After 5 days, we were thoroughly Disney-saturated!

We survived (barely) the ride home.  And, in case you didn't already know we were crazy, here's five little people with ice cream cones in the car:

And sometimes we have to get creative to fit us all in a hotel room:

And today, back to life, back to reality.  :(  Reality stinks.  Honestly, though, my kids are happy to be back in their comfortable space, particularly Daisy (who is currently making up for her lack of sleep - still asleep at 10am!).  I am already counting down to our next family vacation.