Disneyland Celebration for My Birthday: Day 1

Nicole and I have wanted to go to Disneyland during Christmas time for a long time since our entire Christmas is Disney.  So we decided that my 32nd birthday would be a good excuse.  We decided to leave for California after I got off work on my birthday, and we arrived at the hotel around midnight.  Since we wanted to be at California Adventure when they opened, we got to bed as quickly as possible.  We wanted to get to California adventure first thing, so we could make sure that we got to ride the Radiator Springs Racers.  We got to California Adventure at 8 am and people were already going into the park.  I got our tickets as quickly as I could and we went in and found the very long line for the Fast Passes to the Radiator Springs Racers.  We stood in line for maybe 35 minutes and got Fast Passes for 10:25 - 11:25am.  Then we went to Cars Land to check out the rest of Radiator Springs.  We took a photo with a "Snow-Car" and then went on Mater's Junkyard Jamboree. 

Rory was not too thrilled about that ride, but Nicole, Andrew and I liked it.  Then we strode through Radiator Springs and saw Mater driving down the road.  We took a photo with "Red" the fire engine, and then went on Luigi's Flying Tires. 

"Luigi knows-a what you need...WHITE-WALL TIRES!"

That was a very different ride.  It's kind of like air hockey bumper cars.  We were going to head over to the Racers, when I saw that Mater was doing a photo-op at the Cozy Cone Motel.  So we got our pics taken with Mater and then went to ride the Radiator Springs Racers. 

I can see why the line is so long for that ride.  It is AWESOME!  You drive through different parts of Radiator Springs and see the animatronic cars, and then you are part of a race against the car next to you.  You drive out to the bluffs and race. 

We won our race!  It was amazing.  I don't know why, but Rory was so scared to go on this ride.  She was crying for most of the time in line.  I kept telling her that she was going to love it, and of course I was right.  She loved it!  And of course Andrew did too.  Nicole said that if we had time, we should ride it again using the single-rider line because it is shorter.  After that we headed over to Paradise Pier.  We saw Donald Duck on the way and got a photo with him. 

And Nicole and Andrew took a photo in front of the big Christmas Tree.

We were planning to ride on Toy Story Mania, but the wait was about an hour, so we rode on King Triton's Carousel.

Then we saw Jesse from Toy Story and Rory really wanted to get her picture with her, but she was leaving, so we told Rory we would try to find her again later.  Next we went on the Jumping Jellyfish.

Rory was too short to go on this ride last year, and she had been so excited that she was tall enough to go on it this year.  When we got over there, she didn't want to do it.  So I made her and she ended up loving it.  Nicole wanted to go on Golden Zephyr next, so we did that against the kids wishes.  I don't know what was up with them, but they turned into big wimps.  After that Andrew wanted to go on Goofy's Sky School.  Rory was too short for that one, so I took her on The Little Mermaid ride while Andrew and Nicole went on Goofy's Sky School.  When we met up after, Andrew informed me that it was not a fun ride.  I wanted to take Rory on Soarin Over California because she was too short last year, and Andrew had really enjoyed it.  But he said that he didn't want to go on it.  So we decided to get a Fast Pass because the line was pretty long and head over to watch Prep & Landing: Naughty vs. Nice in 4-D.  The movie played every half hour, and we had just missed it.  So we were going to go on Monsters Inc., but Andrew didn't want to.  The kids were pretty much done at California Adventure and wanted to go to Disneyland.  We were going to try to go to the next Prep & Landing show, but missed it by a minute.  So we decided to head over to Disneyland. 

The kids started acting a bit grumpy on the way over so we decided to detour to the hotel for a nap.  When we were all well rested we headed back over to the park.  Rory of course wanted to go on Small World and has been talking about it since she found out that we were going to Disneyland, so that was where we decided to head first.  I think that it was the ride that was changed the most for Christmas.  And they weren't playing "It's a Small World"--they were playing Christmas songs instead. 

It was pretty cool, and we also got to see them turn the Christmas lights on.

Next we headed over to Toone Town and rode Gadget's Go-Coaster.  We wanted to watch "Candlelight," a candlelight procession and ceremony with some local choral groups and Edward James Olmos retelling the story of "The First Christmas."  But it didn't start until 7:30pm, so we had a little bit of time.  We decided to go on Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters ride.  Andrew says that this is his favorite ride, and I think that it's one of mine too.  Who wouldn't want to kill Zurg?

After that it was time to go watch "Candlelight."  While we were waiting in line, Andrew decided that he was hungry for popcorn, and Nicole wanted the popcorn bucket they had.  It is a Santa Mickey and his hat opens up to put the popcorn in it.  She is planning to use it for homemade Christmas goodies also.  So I ran and got that and then we watched the candlelight procession.  It was cool to see all those people together at Disneyland listening to the story of Jesus' birth.  And I got some cool pics of the ginormous Christmas tree they have on Main Street. 

After watching "Candlelight" we decided to go watch the fireworks off the castle.  Rory had fallen asleep but Nicole, Andrew and I enjoyed it.  It had been a long and good day, so we decided to call it a night and head back to the hotel, so we could get some rest and get ready for day number 2.