Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

A Holly Jolly Christmas by Burl Ives

It's Christmas! The Fodor's Disneyland guide claims that since this is the busiest day of the year save one (4th of July) that they sell out, so we had really get there early. Fortunately, we had a "Magic Morning" pass and thought that we should utilize it on the big day to ensure our entry. That left us in a quandary; if we get ti the park at 7:00 to use the "Magic Morning", then we would be getting up qt 4:00 to do presents... NOT!
So we planned on going to the park in the morning, and then having santa visit while the kids were napping in the afternoon. This was a great way to get them to actually take a nap, as everyone know that Santa does not come unless you are sleeping <grin>

Hojo's

Christmas morning

The Magic Kingdom

The rain kept the lines down.

Waiting in the line in the rain at Disneyland

Inside the Finding Nemo ride
The redid the aging submarine adventure ride in Tomorrowland by placing characters from Finding Nemo in the underwater scenes, and having Marlin narrate it. It was a nice update to an aging ride, and has made it one of the most popular in the park.

Back on the Merry-go-round
Isabella's favorite ride by far was the Merry-Go-Round; and incidentally it is a good refuge in the rain. We rode it about 7 times during our stay.

We have another photo from 5 years ago of Michelangelo in this same spot.

2008
Bella is 2 years older than Michelangelo was when we first took his picture here.

California Adventure

The food is better in this park, so we went across the way to have lunch

Sourdough roll stuffer with Eggs, Bacon, and cheese.

Back to Hojo's

The kids are now pooped. Time to go back to the hotel, nap, and open presents!

Waiting for Santa
To get them to take a nap, we told the kids that Santa would not come unless they were sleeping.

Look! Santa found us; even at Disneyland!

Ooh! Rinkitink in OZ!

G.I. Joe!
I had to go through hoops to get one of these as they no longer make them; eventually resorting to EBay. I found out later, that Hasbro still makes a version for British children called "Action Man"

Socks!
That perennial Christmas favorite

Dancing with joy
I had Christmas music playing in the background, and the kids spontaneously broke out in dance

A Box!
(Real Quote)

The Wizard of Oz
For those who have only seen the movie; the slippers are actually silver

Off We Go to Mexico
That was the title of this book. SG thought it would be good as we were indeed headed off to Mexico the next morning. The opening page says:
Off we go!
Off we go!
Off we go to Mexico!
And this the kids chanted right up to (and after truth be tell) the border crossing.

More presents

Christmas Carol Barbie

Why did Santa leave his bag behind?

Let's look inside to see if he left anything in it...

This just can't be for me!

Michelangelo stowed all his loot (and some of his sister's too) in this drawer in the hotel room

Happily opening more

We got The Wizard of Oz on DVD too.

Look Bah-Boo!... Oh!