Disney videos

Here's Jake driving a racecar on the Autopia ride. With him steering, it was pretty bumpy. In case you can't make out what he's saying, it's "I crash that car! I crash that car!" and "I'm a good driver!"


And here's Jake and Sadie meeting Pluto:

Trip Diary, Days 3-5

My intentions were to keep this little trip diary current, but two things got in my way: terrible internet connection at the hotel and utter exhaustion. Whew! Taking two toddlers across the country to Disneyland is equal parts fun and chaos.

Monday morning, we got up early and headed straight over to Disneyland for the 8:00 am opening. In the morning there are no lines and since Jake ends every ride by saying "I want to ride that again!" it's easy to comply. Later in the day, that request gets a little draining, since the wait-to-ride ratio is about 30 minutes to 2 minutes. But all in all, Jake was very patient with the lines, and LOVED all the rides. His two favorite were Autopia, where he could steer the go-kart around the track (it was guided by rails) and Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blaster where we all got laser guns and had to shoot targets as we went through the ride. We rode each of those about 10 times.

We got around to all the areas, and rode the big Carousel, Dumbo, the flying rocket ships, the Jungle Cruise, the train, the storybook land boat ride, Mickey's house, Go Coaster, Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh, Teacups, Tarzan's tree-house, and the Enchanted Tiki Room.

Jake and I rode the teacups while Ali sat with a napping Sadie. Jake kept saying "Faster Daddy! Faster Daddy!" and then all of a sudden he said "Ok I'm all done".

The rocket ride...
Jake driving the go-kart on Autopia, his favorite ride. "I'm a good driver! I crash that car!"

Sadie was a little young for most of the rides, but she LOVED this playground.
More pictures here.

Trip Diary, Day 2

California is a funny place. I've never seen more S-Class Mercedes on the road, or Denny's on the side of the road (what's that rule about pluralizing words that end in 's' ?).

On our way up to Santa Barbara to visit my grandparents, we drove up through LA and saw the Hollywood sign, and the Capitol Records building and some street where Ali says the Kardashians live (no, I'm not pretending I don't watch the Kardashians show, but at least I didn't know what street they lived on). We had a nice visit with my grandparents, although they might have been a little overwhelmed by the cacophony that a 1 and a 2 year old bring. Here's our group photo, which I got with just one shot, by the way:


Afterwards, we drove to downtown Santa Barbara which is basically an outdoor Tysons Galleria (for those of you from the DC area). Plus, it's right near the beach so we strolled onto the pier watched the boats go by. Here's my favorite shot of the kids from today:

Does Jake look 2, 18, or 75? Thanks to Deni & Patrick for the super-cool hat, by the way. Jake loves it, and we do too.

The kids were noticeably more rebellious today. There were fits and tantrums from both, but of course they were mostly good. I think it's mainly because their days usually have at least some time where they get to make their own decisions about how to spend their time. But today, at least, was pretty scripted, and I think they unconsciously rebelled. Don't get me wrong-- I like their spirit. But, I did briefly contemplate booking them on the Tonight Show as amazingly human-like shrieking monkeys as we drove through Universal City.

Trip Diary, Day 1

It's fair to say I'm (we're) pretty exhausted tonight. We left this morning for a four day tour of Anaheim and Santa Barbara California. The kids did great. I was so proud of both of them on the long five-hour flight, and for being patient with all of the waiting (rental car lines, delayed flights, hotel room not ready, etc). They both get gold stars. And Ali gets a platinum star. Or whatever's worth more than gold these days.

We're staying at a cute hotel across the street from the Disneyland complex. It's Spanish villa-style, which the kids really appreciate, and it has a pool, which we've already checked out. In fact, Jake (after literally demanding) jumped into the pool without me catching him. He was pretty proud of himself.

For dinner, Jake said he wanted hot dogs and coconuts, so we obliged at the hotel restaurant with their finest hot dog and coconut shrimp. His favorite part was the bread. And lemons. Sadie ate the hot dog.

Here we are on the plane, shortly before takeoff. We had the row to ourselves, and no one was in front of Jake so Ali didn't get any heartburn about him kicking the seat.


Here we are about 4 hours into the flight. Yes, it looks like Jake is screaming, but we had everything under control. Who's that extra kid? Oh, that's Helen. She and her family were sitting in the row direcly across from us and we became good friends with them. Helen's favorite food is blueberries. Her favorite yogurt flavor is strawberry banana. Her favorite dinner is mashed potatoes. She has lots of favorites.