Disneyland: Day 2

We started Day 2 of Disneyland around 9:30 and went straight to Pixie Hollow, one of the newer additions to Disneyland and one that I knew Edie would love. For those of you who don't have a 3 year old daughter, Tinkerbell now has a series of movies out that follow her and her fairy friends in the land of Pixie Hollow. They're actually decent movies and Edie and I have seen all 3 together. The 4th film is coming out in a few weeks and it looks like it takes place in a winter forest where Tinkerbell meets another fairy named Periwinkle. Pixie Hollow was all decked out for the new movie, and Edie got to meet Tink and Periwinkle in a wintery fairy land.

Waiting in line to meet the fairies.

Entering Pixie Hollow where everything gets enormous in order to make you feel smaller.

Meeting (and hugging) Periwinkle.

Smelling the flowers.

Peter Pan peeked through the giant blades of grass and asked Tinkerbell why she was
"dressed like Santa", which cracked me up. 

Pointing at Peter and Tinkerbell.

Chatting.

After Tinkerbell, we headed to Frontierland and rode the Jungle Cruise.  She loved it until the gunshots and then spent the rest of the ride loving it with her hands over her ears. This kid has sensitivo ears.

After a quick ride on Whinnie the Pooh and lunch in Bear Country, we rode the train to Main Street and headed back to the hotel for naps. Later in the afternoon/early evening, we took the shuttle back to the park and immediately headed to Toontown and within seconds stumbled upon Minnie on her way to a little courtyard for a spontaneous photo op. Our timing was perfect and we only had to wait a few minutes for Edie to have her big Minnie Moment. While we waited for the few people in front of us to greet Minnie, Edie frantically begged Jeff to get her "little minnie" out of the back pack so she could introduce her to "big minnie".  As soon as it was her turn, she RAN up to Minnie and hugged her like they were long lost sisters. I went all alpha mom when I saw that Jeff was taking pictures without looking through the eye hole of the camera, ripped the camera out of his hands and took a few zoomed, posed photos on my knee.  Then realized that I got too excited and stopped taking pictures after that and didn't capture the moment when Edie introduced little minnie to big minnie or when Minnie gave Edie an Eskimo kiss.  Jeff was a saint and didn't rat me out for my poor behavior.  

Other miscellaneous Toontown photos:

Chip and Dale's house.

Dumbo photos (except we didn't go on Dumbo at this time - the line was weirdly long):

And now we reach the pinnacle of our Disneyland trip: THE PARADE. Oh my god the parade. We got front row seats with only 15 minutes to go before the start time and Jeff just rested the camera on his knee, aimed generally at Edie and snapped photos the entire parade.  We must have 323324 photos of Edie's face during the parade, but I've tried to only hand select the best ones:

Right before the parade starts.

Parade started with a drum line and Edie got PUMPED.

And here we have the best picture of the parade: in which I am just as excited as Edie.  Nerd alert.

Okay, I lied.  THIS is simultaneously the best and MOST EMBARRASSING photo ever. In which I eclipse Edie in excitement levels and take it to death con level 3 excitement.  Edie is at level 1.

Moving on...

That's Ariel up there on the pedestal.  

Edie's face when she sees the princesses coming toward us:

And after Cinderella makes eye contact and waves right at Edie:

Before Edie, the parades at Disneyland were just an opportunity for me to go on the big rides with shorter lines, but this was such an amazing experience. To see Edie's face light up like that was so great. After the parade, our friend Mike who lives in LA joined us for a few evening rides. First up was Alice in Wonderland, then the carousel:

Then Edie got brave and asked to go on Snow white AND Pirates of the Carribbean (she didn't care for the cannon shots, but otherwise liked the ride).  The photos of these moments were too dark and didn't turn out well.  Except for the one taken with a flash in which I look pasty and mannish, so this photo won't be featured here thankyouverymuch. We finished off a late night with root beer floats and ice cream on Main Street and headed for the 9pm shuttle before the fireworks scared our child to death with their booms.

We all slept like the dead and decided to take the next day a little easy and not do the "Magic Morning" early admission as originally planned. With Day 2 a rousing success, we didn't want to push our luck.