BEST.BIRTHDAY.EVER. Disney California Adventure (Day One)

Today is the DAY!!!  

Planning our day

Frozen Fun is at Disney California Adventure so we spent Eloise’s Big Day there.  What better way to celebrate Eloise’s 6^th birthday than meeting Elsa and Anna?  (Warning: There are a whole lot of photos)

Eloise's Big Birthday Celebration

At opening, we headed straight for Cars Land to Fastpass our way onto Radiator Springs Racers (our first time!).  We spent the morning on the rides here (not going to lie, but I love DJ’s Dance Party) until it was time for MissE’s Queen for the Day makeover.

Lightening McQueen

Mater

On Luigi's Flying Tires

Cars Land selfie

Radiator Springs

She had an 'Elsa' makeover at the Anna & Elsa’s Boutique at Downtown Disney while Daddy and Eden headed to RIDEMAKERZ®.  

Let the Elsa-fication begin!

Meanwhile at Ridemakerz...

Pimpin' his ride

Elsa's side braid

A sprinkle of fairy dust

Ready to reveal her makeover!

Queen Eloise

MissE was now ready to meet Anna & Elsa!

Eloise wasn't the only excited one to meet Anna

"Eden, did you steal that penny from the well?"

"Remember the time you punched Hans in the face?"

We had a late lunch at Ariel’s Grotto to meet the Princesses.  Eden decided to heckle the Princesses and paid for it when Snow White kissed his hand and left a lipstick mark.  Eden burst into tears! 

Mulan made him feel better as they compared muscles.

And Eloise compared shoes with Cinderella

And there was more cake...

Then it was time for more rides!  On the way, we met these two rascals...

Chip, Eloise and Dale

Chip N' Dale … where did Eloise go?

A plus with going to Disneyland and Disney California Adventure in January is that it’s the temperature is pleasant and it’s off-peak so the lines are short – yay!  But the downside is the winter hours (shorter) and a few of our favourite attractions are closed like the World of Colour.  Boo!  So we finished the evening at Olaf’s Snow Fest and Freeze the Night! A Family Dance party.  We definitely needed more time here.

Marshmallow!

Favourite ride survey:

Me: Radiator Spring Racers (because I didn’t get to go on The Twilight Zone Tower Terror… again!  Grrr!)

MrH: The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror… it’s a love hate relationship.

MissE: Radiator Spring Racers

MrE: It was a tie between Ariel’s Undersea Adventure (although he’s embarrassed to admit it) and Monsters Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue!

MissE turns 6!

We had a very special surprise for Eloise on her 6^th birthday: Disneyland!  Our flight itinerary took us through Los Angeles anyway so we thought we would take the opportunity to stop and celebrate her birthday in a BIG way.

Surprise!

Baskin Robbin's Chocolate Chip ice cream cake

On our last full day, we had an early birthday celebration for her with family.  She wore her “birthday” dress for dinner and we had an ice cream cake at Yi-mah’s.  After singing Happy Birthday, she opened presents.  I brought with us her ‘Ears’ from our last visit, Dr Seuss’ Happy Birthday to You! Book (for the characters princesses to sign) and wrote the below sign (I spent a few days prior telling her to practice her reading although I forgot about her not being able to read cursive so she needed a bit of help).  

Here was her reaction:

Eloise’s Birthday Surprise (video)

If you don’t want to click to watch (it’s good, I swear! iMovie is so much fun now), here are the stills.

The Day before Her Birthday

Well, it was time to say goodbye but we were Disney bound!  Our short flight was non-eventful other than the usual departing America drama (self-induced).  My wonderful, awesome cousin picked up us and all of our luggage up from LAX with a survival pack (snacks for the kids, water and coffee for us (not them!) and drove us to our Disney home (it’s not much but great for the value).

Disney-bound selfies

Disney or Bust!

On a rainy evening, we walked across the road (yes, our Disney home is great for that) and spent the evening at Downtown Disney.  We had a pre-birthday celebration at The Rainforest Café; Eloise is well-taught in telling our servers it’s her birthday.  Read: she had a lot of cake.

The Hulk at Lego Store Downtown Disney

Getting WILD at Rainforest Cafe

Many cakes...

After mapping out our day, we had an early night for our big day tomorrow…

Lake Tahoe

On the top of our ‘must do’ list was take the kids to Lake Tahoe to show them what real snow looks like.  I’ve been to the snow once in Australia and I was far from impressed.  I couldn’t find the snow!  Now here’s the thing, before I get jumped all over, we are not snow people.  I can only do cold in small doses.  It’s also not something we are going to do regularly during our winters here (we usually escape to the US during our winter).  Given that, we were recommended Planet Kids at Soda Springs for some snow play fun. We booked last-minute accommodation in Truckee, borrowed snow clothes (I didn’t keep any of DC wardrobe), and … ROAD TRIP!   

Prerequisite pitstop at In'n'Out

We were lucky and there was a dump of snow the weekend prior so it was still natural snow.  Yay!  The kids were excited by the scenery as we drove into the area!  But before hitting the snow, we checked into our hotel.  I have to say I was quite impressed by it; fresh baked cookies, mulled apple cider and hot chocolate in the lobby.  Yes, please!

We went for a drive to Donner Summit and a lookout was the perfect place to have a snowball fight.  We also found a discarded sled so Eloise spent the rest of the afternoon going up and down a small hill.

That evening, we had dinner at Smokey’s Kitchen in Truckee.  It was just what I felt like in the cold.  The problem was too much BBQ on the menu, we couldn’t decide.  It was all delicious!  After dinner, we played board games in the lobby (as you do) before turning in for the night.

Soda Springs

Yay!  It’s snow day.  We arrived at Soda Springs, picked up our “lift” tickets, and hopped on the Jeep to take us to Planet Kids.  Only breaking for lunch in Truckee, we spent 6 hours on the tube carousel, mini-tubes, building Olaf (we brought a carrot and buttons especially for this), throwing snowballs at each other and climbing snow volcanos (Eden) and learning to ski (Eloise).

On the "sled" (Jeep)

More snowballs were thrown …er, pitched (good form, buddy!)

This "Magic Carpet" took Eden up the sledding hill all day

Again!

Do you want to build a snowman?  YES!  I do!

Olaf

Tube carousel

King of the (snow) mountain

We were so proud of Eloise.  It was her first time on skis and this video is of her after just 2 runs down the bunny slope.

We had an awesome day at Soda Springs!  It was a great experience for the kids and one they still talk about today (it's Winter here).

Here's some parting knowledge for you:  Don't eat yellow snow.  Note: the snow was not yellow below.