Jolly Holiday Surprise Adventure | First Magic Moments

FIRST MAGIC MOMENTS

December 6, 2014

After revealing the secret, we all just couldn't wait to get to the hotel. Our shuttle FINALLY arrived and we loaded our bags and ourselves and began our journey.  At this point we let the kids know that not only were we going to Disneyland, but we were actually going to be staying in the DISNEYLAND HOTEL! Ahhh! 

The shuttle driver kept us entertained with Disney music as we drove from Long Beach to Anaheim. Before we knew it, we were pulling up in front of the Disneyland Hotel. We grabbed our bags and excitedly walked in.  The kids immediately gravitated to the cute teacup seats. At the front desk, Joey and I got checked in, amidst a little complication with our credit card (the transaction got flagged, since we don't take a whole lot of trips - but after some calls we got it figured out. The Cast Members at the front desk were really great and helped us get it all figured out.

We were able to get a standard room in the Adventure Tower. It was on the Downtown Disney side, but only the 2nd floor, so our view was trees - but actually I loved it! So easy and fast to get to our room from Downtown Disney and the trees kind of blocked the noise. It was awesome! And I LOVE LOVE LOVE the Disneyland Hotel rooms. We all loved looking for the Hidden Mickeys and of course the headboard is AMAZING! It was just awesome.

After checking out the room and settling in a bit, we decided it was time to explore!  Everyone was hungry and I also wanted to go redeem my voucher for the Annual Pass and also pick up our Photopass+ Card. (We had decided to get one Annual Pass so that we could get the discounts and such.) So we headed towards Downtown Disney. Joey and the kids grabbed some lunch at Earl of Sandwich and I headed down to the Esplanade. I redeemed my voucher, got my picture taken, and got my new Annual Pass. California Adventure looked less busy, so I went through the gates and headed to the photo shop where I redeemed the voucher to get our Photopass+ card. This all took about an hour and then I met up with my family at Downtown Disney, where we did some exploring in the stores.  We were all fascinated with the Lego Store and all of its awesome characters! The Build-a-Bear Store was amazing too and the kids were definitely starting their lists!

After lots of browsing, we went to Tortilla Joe's for dinner! We LOVED it - it was so good, and we especially loved the guacamole, made for us right at our table!

After dinner, we strolled over to the AMC Theaters to watch BIG HERO 6.  We were AMAZED by this theater. It was HUGE. It was definitely the biggest theater we've ever been to. Plus amazingly there wasn't a whole lot of people taking advantage of it and so in the huge theater, it felt like we were the only ones there.  We LOVED Big Hero 6 - it was such a cute movie.  After the movie, we had to take advantage of a photo-op!

After the movie, we headed back to the hotel and we had a little bit of a Christmas Celebration, complete with a little Mickey Tree, Treats, and gifts.  These were things I brought from home to bring some Christmas to our room.  The kids loved it all, especially the Disney gift cards from Dad and Mom and the money from Grandpa and Grandma Sorensen! MERRY CHRISTMAS!

At this point, we were just so exhausted. It had been a very long, but thrilling and exciting day! We couldn't wait to see what tomorrow brings!

The Adventure Continues in another post. :)

I'm so excited to share my family's magical Christmas adventure of 2014 with you!
To see all the postings in this series go HERE.

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Jolly Holiday Surprise Adventure | The Surprise - Part 3

THE SURPRISE - Part 3

December 6, 2014

The kids were so excited about going on a plane. I have to admit that I was pretty excited myself. I've always enjoyed flying and I hadn't been on a plane since before the kids were born!

 A look at our plane before boarding....

The plane was really crowded and there were some other families on board, obviously heading to Disneyland - I was so afraid that the kids would guess where we were going. But we were able to distract them with watching tv and looking out the window! One of my favorite things about flying is seeing the clouds so up and personal!

It was an easy flight and it went by quickly and before I knew it we were landing in Long Beach, CA. 

While we waited for our baggage, we went ahead and started the next part of our storybook:

After getting our baggage, we went out to wait for our shuttle ("Blue"). As we were waiting, we decided it was the perfect time to reveal the secret, so we read the final page of our storybook:

It was an amazing exciting moment. After all of the planning and waiting, we finally got to tell the kids we were going to DISNEYLAND! It couldn't have been more perfect! The kids excitedly chatted about Disneyland and the book and it was so great to see the happiness in their faces! I couldn't stop a few tears of joy from trickling down my face - we did it! It was a dream come true to do this for my kids and for me. 

And it was only the beginning...

The Adventure Continues in another post. :)

I'm so excited to share my family's magical Christmas adventure of 2014 with you!
To see all the postings in this series go HERE.

Read More

Jolly Holiday Surprise Adventure | The Surprise - Part 2

THE SURPRISE - Part 2

December 6, 2014

At about this point, Beth realized that this surprise wasn't going to be just a day event and that she was going to miss her Christmas Choir Concerts. (We had planned this trip before she even joined choir and there just wasn't any way we could make it work. We had told her choir teacher about the trip and she kept it a secret for us.) When Beth realized this, she had a bit of a meltdown. She was so excited about being in choir and the concerts - I had been feeling bad all week because of how excited she was about it.  After much comforting and promises that it would be worth it, she calmed down. I loved that Joey asked her, "Do you trust me?" She nodded her head through the tears and Joey said, "I promise you that you will love this surprise and it's going to be okay." Pretty soon, she had a smile on her face once again.

We then began Part 2 of our storybook:

Our video of the reading of the next part of our Storybook:

So then we headed out to our van, Appa. When we got to the train station, we bought our tickets and then realized that we were quite a bit early for the train. So we decided to get some breakfast at Village Inn. After a quick breakfast, we headed back to the train station and parked the van.  We then opened the trunk of the van and surprised the kids with their new luggage!!! Then we boarded the FrontRunner train.  As we continued our journey, we opened up our storybooks again....

Our video of the reading of the next part of our Storybook:

So the kids pulled out their new fun treasures and got to work coloring and playing!  Even the stuffed friends were having fun!

When we got to the Salt Lake Central Station, we got off the FrontRunner and boarded one of the Trax trains, which took us to another stop where we got off to wait for yet another Trax train.

While we waited, we read another page in our Storybook:

The kids were so excited to find out that they were going to get to go on a plane (oh I mean a magic carpet) for the first time! So finally our last train picked us up and we were off to the airport.

When we got to the airport, we dropped off our bags and got through security before finding a place to wait. We had a little bit of time, so we explored the airport a little bit and got some wiggles out. The kids bought some fun bag dangles with their names on it from one of the gift shops. 

And then it was time to board the plane!!!

The Adventure Continues in another post. :)

I'm so excited to share my family's magical Christmas adventure of 2014 with you!
To see all the postings in this series go HERE.

Read More

Jolly Holiday Surprise Adventure | The Surprise - Part 1

THE SURPRISE - Part 1

December 6, 2014

** I have been so excited about this trip that of course I had been packed for weeks. But the night before the trip, we attended my niece's birthday party and then came home and had the kids go to bed early!  And then final preparations were made by Joey and I, including getting the bags in the car and the "treasures" hidden and such.  We were so excited that I don't think we really got any sleep!  Let the Adventure begin...

We woke the kids up at 6:00 am with a "Merry Christmas!" They were so confused but we told them to go get in the shower and get dressed. They were not too enthused about getting up so early on a Saturday morning.  They got ready and sleepily arrived in the living room to this:

That actually woke them up pretty good! Presents under the tree!  But we had them eat some breakfast, before we got started. 

Every year it has been our December tradition to have a daily activity. For years we have used an advent calendar that I created out of a over-the-door shoe organizer. (It has 24 slots, perfect for our daily activities to go in the pockets).  But this year, I got a great Black Friday deal at Deseret Book and purchased a new Shadowbox Advent Calendar that I have been eyeing for a couple of years:

So we had the kids sit down on the couch and we pulled out the note that was in the "6" Box. Our note said: "Grimoires of Grand Adventure" (Joey had been giving the kids some vocabulary words in the previous week, so they would understand some of our messages.)

We then instructed the kids to take the gifts out from under the tree and untie the bow. We made sure that they wouldn't uncover the brown paper over the cover of the storybooks. I decided that I wanted to film each time we read a part of the books, so I filmed while Joey read to the kids and they followed along. Joey and I were both pretty emotional as we were actually starting off on this grand adventure that we had been planning for so long.  The second page of the book instructed the kids to go on a treasure hunt.

Our video of the reading of this first part of our Storybook:

JJ and Beth excitingly took their books (which had pictures of where the treasures were) and headed out.

The kids gathered wrapped gifts, gold coins, and slips of paper with messages on them. They were having a great time collecting everything and when they got to the end of the hunt, they piled all of their treasures into the living room. Joey and I happily watched them as they opened the gifts of games, coloring books, activity books, crayons, treats, and more. 

We then had them take the slips of paper to the table and try and put them in the right order.  After a little while (and some help), they were able to do it:

Then we read the final page of Part 1 in the Storybook:

After reading the page, it took a bit of prompting to help the kids figure out what they needed to do.  In the treasure hunt, one of the wrapped gifts included a special decoder that Joey had one of his friends make.  (Joey had 4 made so we all have one so we can send each other coded messages and stuff. It's so awesome!) To figure out how to use the decoder the kids had to use the message on the slips of paper above.  The answer was 13.  So they had to set their decoder to the number 13 and then they could decipher the message on the left side of the page. 

Once they found the cipher they went right to work decoding the message!

And the message turned out to be:

Take the things you found and get in the car.

So we helped the kids get all their stuff into their backpacks and we put on our coats....

The Adventure Continues in another post. :)

I'm so excited to share my family's magical Christmas adventure of 2014 with you!
To see all the postings in this series go HERE.

Read More