Disneyland

With how much Joseph has been into anything Disney related, we've been trying to figure out how to take to Disneyland.  A few weeks ago, I had some time off of school and we decided to finally take Joseph to meet his good pal, Mickey Mouse.  Overall, it was a blast and absolutely priceless to see Joseph's face as he got to see some of his favorite characters- definitely one funnest family vacations we've done.  Anyway, here are some of the highlights of our trip.

Even before getting to the gate, the magic of Disneyland had already started.  Joseph thought the tram was a train and was so excited to get on and go for a ride.

 Here we are at the entrance.  Shortly after taking the picture, the real train drove by in the background- Joseph was in heaven.

One of the first things that we did was take Joseph to meet Mickey.  Unfortunately the picture doesn't show his excitement that he had when he first saw him.

Another big favorite of Joseph's is Pluto- we had a hard time keeping him contained while we were waiting for our turn.

After waiting in line, Joseph got to burn some energy running around and exploring.

We had so much fun!

We then took Goofy's car out for a little spin.  Joseph was a great chauffeur.

Joseph then got to play in Goofy's backyard while we waited for him to come back home- he had gone out to lunch.

He was so excited to meet Goofy that he even gave him a high five, albeit backwards.

Joseph is definitely a fan of Goofy.

We weren't able to go on too many rides, but we were expecting that with a 2 year old and Jodie being pregnant.  Mostly, we tried to sneak in on the rides that had the shortest wait times- like the tea cups.

However, his favorite ride was "It's a Small World".  He absolutely loved it.  At first, it was just fun to go on a boat ride.

But he was completely mesmerized by all the little "kids" singing; we ended up going twice.

Although it made for a long day for a 2 year old, one of the highlights of the day was letting Joseph watch the parade.  He loved watching the characters singing and dancing.

The next day, we went to California Adventure with some of my family and got to hang out with some of the Pixar characters.  One of the highlights was actually meeting Lightning McQueen- Joseph was so excited.

We then went to Mater's Junkyard to ride on the little tractors.  Here's a picture while we're waiting in line.

Here's our little tractor.  It was one of the "wilder" rides we went on with Joseph, but he enjoyed it while the ride was actually going.

The parade at California Adventure was much earlier that Disneyland's.  Here's a picture of Joseph waiting for the parade to start.

While we were sitting on the curb, waiting for the parade, a trolley comes down the street with none other than Mickey Mouse in it.  Joseph immediately bolts up and starts running as fast and telling Mickey to wait.  Joseph easily runs over a 100 yards trying to catch up, only to watch the the trolley turn onto a small side street and go behind a very large wooden door/gate.  Visibly distraught by missing Mickey, he starts knocking on the door still saying, "Wait!"  A few moments later, Mickey comes out of a side door- Joseph's persistence pays off and we get an exclusive meeting with Mickey Mouse.  Seeing Joseph's face light up gave more meaning to me why Disneyland is the happiest place on Earth.  Afterwards, we quickly rush back to tell mommy about our experience, just in in time for the start of the parade.

After the parade, we went back to Cars Land for some more fun.  While waiting in line for Luigi's flying tires, Joseph spots a picture of Lightning McQueen pulling a Michael Jordan tongue and Joseph has to copy him (my head is partially covering the picture).

We also got to see one of the mischievous little tractors- one of Joseph's favorite parts of the movie Cars.

As we were leaving, guess who was parked outside of the Cozy Cone.

All in all, it was a great family vacation and we can't wait to go back.