California Adventure!!

To really celebrate M's 5th Birthday in style, we decided to take him to Disneyland for his first time ever! Considering time and cost, we ended up choosing to go to one park on his first visit, and since he is all about Disney Pixar movies (Cars, Monster's Inc, Nemo & Bug's Life, to name a few), California Adventure it was! He was so excited the night before he had a hard time going to sleep, and woke up ready to go the next morning. This little boy was SO excited to visit Disneyland for the first time, and meet Lightning McQueen! I'm so glad we decided to wait until he was 5 - he really knew how special of an event this was, and I know he'll remember it for years to come. . .

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Tickets in hand, about to enter California Adventure!

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First thing we did when we got there (at 10:30 or so) was make a bee-line to the Fast Pass line for Lightning McQueen Racers. Rumor had it that Fast Passes for the racers sell out FAST, and the stand-by line is always at least 60min. We got up to the front of the Fast Pass line at 10:45 and we were one of the LAST ONES to get Fast Passes for the entire day!! Mind you, the park opened at 10 (just 45 min prior) - and our callback time was 7:30pm! With that taken care of. . .

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It's a Bug's Life! 

Thankfully the Bug's Life pics turned out smiley. . .we made the mistake of going to the "It's Tough Being a Bug" show in Bug's Life Land first thing - it was a TERRIFYING show to our sensitive little guy - we had to leave the show early, and it took a while to coax him into having fun. . .

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Next, the reason we chose California Adventure in the first place. . . Cars Land!

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Downtown Radiator Springs was PHENOMENAL - just incredible Disney's attential to detail, to make something on an animated movie screen come to LIFE. It really was awesome. And M loved it :) All three rides were a blast - we did end up waiting in the stand-by line for the Lighning McQueen Racers, because we wanted to be able to enjoy that one twice (it WAS a 60min wait). There are two versions of the ride (left or right side) and we lucked out and got to do one of each - and our car won both times, woohoo!

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Matthew got to meet Lightning McQueen!

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The Cars were really awesome. We also had the opportunity to see Mater and the Fire Truck out and about - they talked and moved just like in the movie. Really so cool. Matthew was so excited to pose with his buddy Lightning :)

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Perfect CA Adventure shot, with the Mickey Mouse Ferris Wheel and California Screamin' in the background. Such a beautiful day!

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We proceeded to ride on the Little Mermaid, got some ice cream and walked the boardwalk. Later in the day, we coaxed M onto the Toy Story ride, Goofy's Flight School roller coaster (he LOVED that one, only ride we rode two times in a row - it kinda terrified Josh and I though!) and more. 

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Enjoying our boy :)

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While the day started out a bit bumpy (the scary show really threw him for a loop, we didn't think we'd be riding ANY rides that day for quite a while :-/) we ended up just having a BLAST and hearing him talk about it now, with such excitement, we know he had a blast as well :) Can't wait to take him to the REAL Disneyland next time ;)

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And here's K, enjoying her treasures brought to her from our day at Disneyland - it'll be her turn next! :)