Disneyland

The Disneyland trip was good until the last day, but I will save that for another post. We drove down on Sunday. We stopped in Vegas at In-N-Out. When we got to Anaheim we checked-into the Candy Cane Inn. It was pretty good. I just wish we would have gotten a separate room for the kids. The kids wouldn't settle down unless the lights were out. So we all went to bed at 8:00. We also were able to pass a cold around the whole family. Luckily it didn't knock anyone out.
Monday:
We got to the park before it opened. We took the kids to the Autotopia ride first. We then went on the Finding Nemo submarine ride. That line was way too long but it was good. While Marci was waiting in line Bryton and Maili watched the Jedi academy show, but Bryton was too shy to raise his hand and participate. After that, Cordell and his family showed up. We spent the rest of the day at Disneyland without having to wait in many lines. Thyse was able to go on a lot of rides as well. He was doing good until we took him on Matterhorn. Then whenever I took him on any ride he would start to freak out thinking it would be another scary ride. He freaked out on the baby roller coaster in Toon Town, and the "cast member" asked me if I was going to be able to control him on the ride. Marci and I thought the Indiana Jones ride was a lot of fun. We were able to trade kids while we took turns on the ride. We saw a little bit of the parade the first night. We went to IHOP across the street from the park for dinner and were having kids fall asleep as the dinner progressed.
On the way home I saw one of the weirdest things ever. There was this drunk guy riding his bike down the sidewalk. He was yelling and swerving a little bit. He then dropped his bike and went over to a puddle where he started lapping at it like a dog.
Tuesday:
We asked on Monday if we needed special three-day park hopper passes in order to get early admission Tuesday and they said we just needed the three-day park hopper passes. So we went early waited in line, got up to the front and the ticket taker said our passes weren't valid for early entry but they weren't going to make us wait in the whole line again. So we got in early. We did some more rides and then went over to California Adventure to get our free pictures with Mickey. At lunch we had reservations for Ariel's Grotto. Marci and Maili really enjoyed getting to meet the princesses. The food was okay but I think that was the most expensive meal that I ever took Marci too. But at least she got to meet the princesses. We really liked California Adventure. The Brother Bear totem area was really cool. There were a whole bunch of activities that Maili and Bryton loved. Thyse really liked the slides there too. At night we stayed went early to hold our seats for the parade. We found a good spot that also allowed us to escape the park once the parade progressed passed us.
Wednesday:
We started off catching a few last rides in both parks with Cordell's family before they would leave around 1:00. Once they left we headed over California Adventure to eat lunch and catch the Aladdin show. When we were sitting down to eat we got a call from Marci's brother, Ryan. I took the kids and started getting them ready. I looked back over at Marci and saw her facial expression change to really sad. I ran over to her to give her a hug. Ryan told her that her Mom was on life support and they wouldn't be able to bring her back. At that point we didn't know how long they were going to keep her on life support. We left the park, checked out of the hotel and headed to Arizona. A couple of lighter stories... As we were leaving the park a lady asked Marci if she could take their pictures. Then she saw that Marci was in tears and felt terrible.
As we were packing up at the hotel and loading up the car Maili was still crying hysterically. There were two gardeners nearby observing us. Not being able to hear them I just imagined them saying to each other. "Oh so sad the little girl is sad to be leaving Disneyland."
We were able to make it from Disneyland to the Rogers on exactly one tank of gas.