Disneyland Part Two

Our trip to Disney was fantastic! After our first half-day in the California Adventure park, we decided to hit up Disneyland on the second day. We took "Mona" the Monorail into the park which was conveniently located within a 10 min walk of our hotel.  We were able to navigate through the crowds and ride a lot of the mild rides. Just like the previous day, LC did great on all the rides. She would cinch on to one of us if there was a loud or scary noise. The Pirates of the Caribbean ride was probably the one ride we could have done without. The pirates and the dark and spooky scenes didnt seem to phase her, but the two drop-offs that the boat took made her latch on to us. Overall, she did really good on all the rides and didnt seem to mind them. We dont think anything really registered with her, but we think she enjoyed seeing all the kids, the bright colors, shapes and noises. 

She continued to sleep like a champ. She would go right to sleep and sleep through the night logging the standard 12 hour slumber. The next day we saw the Disney parade and had a great view from out spot. She was able to see all the Disney characters and she especially liked the Princess float. On Wednesday morning before we left we reserved us a table at the Character's Breakfast. It was a buffet style breakfast where all the characters made their rounds from table to table for pictures, autographs, hugs, and in LC's case, frightening little kids. She was good with them from a distance but as soon as they got within 4-5 feet, LC would get scared and cling on to one of us. Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Stitch, and Daisy all joined us for the $75 breakfast. It was pretty neat and it was fun to watch all the kids light up when their favorite Disney character was near.

 Riding Mona the Monorail from the hotel to Disneyland

 Starting off the morning in Disneyland

 Waiting in line for the Nemo Submarine ride

 Inside the submarine we saw fish, scuba divers, sea stars and Nemo and friends.

 Buzz! This mural was quickly spotted by LC as we exited the Buzz Light year ride.

 She didnt want to leave Buzz's side. 

 Cinderella's Castle!

 Just about to get on the Peter Pan ride. 

 Nap time in the Pack and Play

 Its a Small world boat ride. Never ending song...

 We had great weather all three days we were there. It was in the mid 70's and very comfortable. Thanks for letting me wear your sunny's mama.

 Open up this gate and get me on that Dumbo ride! 

 She picked the pink Dumbo

 The first float in the Parade was the Mickey and Minnie Mouse Parade

 She was fascinated with all the floats, characters, songs and their dancing.

 Here comes the Alladin float!

 She also really loved the Little Mermaid Character. This was Aerial's float

All the Princesses were on this float. This was Daddy's favorite float too. Cinderella was waiving at me here.... no big deal. 

Waiving at the floats as they pass. 

This was the Winnie the Pooh ride where we rode on a Bee hive through 100 acre forrest.

They had a small petting zoo where LC loved to pet the goats and Pocahontas the donkey

This was some frog ride we rode through the streets of London. 

Group shot with the Matterhorn mtn and submarine ride in the background. 

She really wasnt feeling the swimming pool at first, but after a while she warmed up and was off playing with the other kids.

She insisted on wearing these sun glasses and actually wore them for a long time before jettisoning them.

Character breakfast with Mickey Mouse

That's close enough, Mickey!

Daddy high-fiving Stitch

The scary Daisy Duck

Minnie Mouse and Mama

Stitch came by to say hello a second time but LC still wasnt having it.

Beach Boys dance party with Mickey, Pluto and Stitch. 

One last time with Mickey.

Pluto!

She didnt mind this Goofy because it was plastic and didnt move. 

We're Going to Disneyland!

Actually, we are already at Disneyland.  We left the house around 1pm today, with the plan that LC would sleep on the 100 mile car ride to northern-Southern California.  And she did, for about 45 minutes and the rest of the time she jabbered excitedly about her trip.  Immediately at check-in, she was greeted by a giant Goofy statue -and she oooed and ahhed.  We made it to our rooms and she pointed to each Mickey on the way and each one inside the room... there are lots.  Then we stashed our stuff and headed to the California Adventure Park -which is the OTHER park here.  We have a three day park hopper, so we may come and go as we please to each.
Our first ride was Ariel's Undersea Adventure.  Leyton did great!  It was a very mild ride, but there were still lots of moving parts and such, but she liked it all.  Next we did a carousel ride.  A classic -she had a death-grip on that seal (the animals where ocean-themed), but she enjoyed it.  Then we did the giant Ferris wheel.  We opted for the swinging gondola, which we will not do again.  Leyton did fine, but it left Mommy a little queasy.  I often forget that I'm pregnant.  We took a break for dinner, then we did a train ride on a giant caterpillar, and ended the evening with A Bug's Life 4-D movie that was kind-of scary, but she still handled it awesome.
We weren't sure how the sleeping would go.  She is in a pack-in-play in a new place with Mom and Dad in the same room. But we kept her routine as much the same as we could, and she was cried a little, but within 5 minutes she was down for the count.  Even the blasting fireworks at 9:30 didn't bother her.  So all-in-all it was truly a magical day.  Tomorrow we are heading to the real Disneyland, which I am excited about myself.  So excited in-fact, that I am unable to sleep, and am therefore blogging at midnight.  Actually I think it has more to do with being pregnant and uncomfortable, plus a strange bed, but whatever.  Good training for when baby #2 gets here.

Checking out the room

Our first ride -Ariel's Undersea Adventure

Death grip... but no tears!

On the the carousel

I need one of these at home!

Ah!  Jackpot!  Kids wait their whole lives for this moment.  No tears, but she was hugging Mommy close.

And who do we see just out for a stroll...  BUZZ!  (the only character whose name she can say, but she is a big Buzz fan anyway because he is on her fork and spoon).

We decided before arriving that we wouldn't traumatize her with character photos until the last day, so this is as close as we got.

The scary Ferris wheel

Planning our next move

"Daddy, take me here!"

"Or just take me home, I've had enough for one day"

Life is clicking right along here at the Campoamor household.  Leyton keeps us on our toes, and 2.0 is growing and making herself more noticed every day.  She weighs over a pound now.  Notice I said she... we all call Baby C 2.0 a girl, though we just had the last ultrasound and therefore our last chance to find out for sure.  Technically, I  did get to 'see' the gender at the ultrasound.  The tech said that they have to document the gender, so if I didn't want to know, that I should look away.  But I explained to her that unless she told me what I was seeing, I wouldn't have a clue.  Which is exactly what happened.  She was going along documenting certain things, and at one point she quickly typed 'gender' and then moved on before I could really inspect anything.  But, I didn't see anything that would make me think 'boy', so I'm still saying girl and we are going to plan like it's a girl.  On the slim chance that I'm wrong, I have faith that Grammy and Daddy can rush to Target and pick up some boy clothes, plus there's always Amazon.com.  And if he sleeps wrapped in a pink blanket from time to time, it won't hurt him either.  But I'm putting my chips on pink.

Leyton is now learning several new words a week.  She can say Geico Gecko, bow, and my favorite -butt.  It is so funny to hear her say it.  Hopefully I can get a video on here soon.  AND.... she has peed in the potty 3 times now!  We started sitting her on it before her bath every night, and about every other night she will pee in her big girl potty.  And then Ryan and I clap and cheer like she's cured cancer.  So I am optimistic about the potty training that we will begin in a few weeks.  I think we are going to go the pantless 'potty training in 3 days' method.  I'll let you know if it works :-)

Leyton is also very into wearing bows, bracelets, and hats

And here is her new tricycle, which she got from our next-door-neighbor.  Unfortunately for our backs, she is too short to peddle it by herself.

But she is very determined to learn

Mommy also got her some pink Crocs

Maybe she has a future in law enforcement like her uncles, because she really enjoys keeping the streets clean.

More dress-up.  She actually wore this headband to church.

And she likes to dress up Daddy too

We still try and get to the beach on Saturday mornings.  Leyton LOVES to play in the sand.

17 more weeks to go!  Now that I've slowed down a bit and take a couple of sit breaks during the day, my back and hip haven't given me any trouble.  Apparently I'm not Superwoman.  Bummer.

My Kids

I am babysitting Susannah this morning, so her Mommy can go run.  But instead of being twice as busy taking care of two babies, the girls are happily entertaining themselves with each other, and I have time to get lots of stuff done.  Normally I would try to get some cooking and cleaning done, but this pregnancy has already started being less than wonderful, so I am forcing myself to sit and relax and catch up on some blogging.
I know I am 100% blessed to be able to carry another baby and I wouldn't trade the experience for anything.  But to say that being pregnant is a piece of cake would be a lie.  For several weeks now, my low back has been acting up.  I had the same problem late in my last pregnancy, and it appears that this time around my body just picked up where it left off.  If I am on my feet too much, or push it too hard, which I do basically daily, them by evening my SI joint sends shooting pains through my back and my hip hurts.  It makes our evening walks rather uncomfortable, but it is nothing I can't deal with.  I am still sleeping well at night, and can still to my (very modified) Crossfit workouts in the morning, so I am happy.
Also, I am going to officially put it in writing that I think we are having another girl.  I keep referring to the baby as 'she', although this is most likely due to the fact that my brain is most accustomed to that pronoun.  Ryan has thought girl all along, but again, for no really 'good' reason.  He thinks that helo pilots have more girls.. something to do with the radar they sit on and the female sperm being stronger.  Last time we both had dreams about having a girl, but so far neither of us has had a gender dream.  Poppy (my dad) has though, and he dreamed it was a boy.  So, no hard evidence to go on either way, but if I where to bet, I'd say girl.  I actually I read somewhere that Mom's guess correctly about 70% of the time... so there you go.
And now to my other kid, Ms. Leyton.  She is hilarious.  She makes us laugh every day.  Sometimes it's what she wears, what she does, or what she says.  She loves to dress herself, so she will find a hat, or something she can fashion as a hat, and wear it around proudly as she plays.  I also know she is taller, because she can reach new shelves and climb onto the kitchen table chairs (and the kitchen table too for that matter, but I don't let her do that).  And she has new words.  Most resent is CRASH.  She likes to crash her car, stroller, wagon, etc into other things and yell CRASH (but it sounds more like GASH)!  And she has a new phrase for Sippy  Cup.  It sounds like 'Ga Go Gah!' but we know what it means.  She also says Nigh-Nigh (Goodnight) and Nah! for No!.  We are working on her colors now and she finally likes to sit on her potty again.  We went through a little phase when she wouldn't even sit on it, but now she loves to go 'potty' and read books whenever Mommy goes.  She also wipes her mouth when I give her toliet paper to 'wipe' and then she closes the lid to both her toliet and mine and flushes mine.  I don't have a set date to start real potty training, but I would like to give it a go try before September.  We are going to take a mini-vacation to Disneyland the first part of June, so I think when we get back, we'll give the potty training a real shot.
We are excited for our Disney trip, but we have very low expectations.  Leyton loves all the Disney characters in BOOKS, but I doubt she will feel the same when they get up close and personal (case-in-point: Santa).  But we wanted to do some kind of family vacation this summer, and Disney seemed to be the best option.  Briefly I entertained the thought of Hawaii, but then I recalled our thanksgiving trip with the airplane vomit... and our Christmas trip with either Ryan and I having to sing Twinkle Twinkle hourly every night because LC doesn't sleep well in another crib/location...not to mention we can go to the beach any day we want... and I'm fat and pregnant, making beaches and plane rides and being hot even less fun...  So we are going to keep it to a brief three day trip that we can drive to (and drive home if it is a complete disaster).  We will hopefully have lots of fun, but we could be in store for some famous toddler tantrums.  Like she had today (this post took several days to type) at the doctor's office.  As soon as they called us back to the room, she was out of control crying and screaming.  The doctor said this kind of fear is normal and that it should get better by her next appointment, which isn't until after she turns two.  Today she weighed in at 22lbs (20%ile) and she was 32.5 inches tall (75%ile), though that was with much kicking and thrashing about, so she is probably a little taller.  I guess a doctor's visit is a good reason to have a fit.  Generally though she will have them if any little thing does not go her way -which is often.  It's tough being a toddler!
So, wish us luck with an easy pregnancy, fun vacation, potty training, and tantrum management.  We need it!

This wagon is the best.  She loves to ride in it and play with it.  She will fill it up with animals and push it around, or sit of the handle and ride it like a horsy.  

This is the sweet new house she scored from a nice neighbor.  His son is 9 now and it was just taking up space in their yard.

It's spacious and functional. 

And a big hit with the neighbor kids too.   She loves to play with the big kids, especially Dylan, who is the little girl in the green shirt in this picture.  And Dylan gave Leyton her old tricycle too, which she LOVES.  

We have started making Saturday's our beach day.

We walk to Starbucks, and then to the beach to play in the sand.  Leyton has a ball and is never happy to get back in her stroller to head home.  Poor kid has a tough life...