Day 3: Monday

 I woke up to a little boy’s face right next to mine and an excited voice saying, “Grandma, do you want to go to Disneyland?”  Finley had snuck into our room while we were still sleeping. Anney was mortified but I thought it was adorable. He was dressed and ready to go.  Anney had made cute matching cactus shirts for Chad and Finley and a onesie for Ari.

By the time we got everyone  out the door it was about 8:30 and when we got there the lines for the parking pavilion were horrendous. Eight lanes of stopped traffic. Ridiculous. It was after 10:30 before we got our tickets and were in the park. That gave us just enough time to ride the Pirates of the Caribbean before our early lunch reservation at the Blue Bayou restaurant at 11:40. Ever since I was a little girl and used to see the people eating in the restaurant in the Pirates ride I’d wanted to eat there.

This was my chance and so I called 60 days in advance to make a reservation. It was fun to all be together and the ambiance was neat but the food left a little to be desired in my opinion (my chicken/sauce were so spicy I couldn’t eat them) and it was really expensive too. Oh well, I crossed a bucket list item off.

Everyone split and went their separate ways after lunch. We went over to It’s A Small World with Derek and family and it was fun to watch Zoë dance to the music, clap along, and have fun. That’s one of those rides that will never get old for me. They’ve updated it a lot since we were there probably 20 years ago.

Doug and I went on Thunder Mountain Railroad and in the Haunted Mansion by ourselves.  We stopped and got a turkey leg for lunch which was good, but tasted like smoked ham instead of turkey.

The big kids wanted to go on Space Mountain so we watched Zoë, Finley and Ari while they did that. That was not too fun. Zoë kept wanting to run off, Ari needed to be fed, Zoë filled her pants, etc. I finally went and bought a thing of popcorn to entertain Finley and Zoë.

After that we walked over to the carousel so Finley could ride that and then Doug went on the teacups with Zoë, Derek and Shelby.

We walked and walked and by the end of the day my FitBit read 24,000 steps (10 miles). We had to walk through Downtown Disney on the way back to the car so stopped at Salt ‘n Straw (an ice cream place that Matt introduced us to in Portland) with Derek, Shelby and Zoë  (Chad and Anney drove separately and Matt and Sherlyn caught a Lyft ride since they had a concert to go to that night). It was a long but fun day.