Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world. --Walt Disney--

I actually don't know where to begin with this post because there is just so much to go over! I just might have to split it into two blogs...I'll just have to see how far I make it before getting too sleepy to finish :)

Ok...Friday morning Evelyn and I packed up and drove down to Anaheim again, to meet Denise and her fam again and go to Disneyland! We got there and wondered around a bit and looked at things until everyone else got there and then spent the rest of the day with them. Evelyn enjoyed seeing all the little girls and even enjoyed a couple rides we went on.

The first ride I took Evelyn on was the Jungle Cruise, which was just a little trip around a river with some "animals" and such to see (none of them were real). It was nice and relaxing and not too scary for Evelyn and the younger girls.

Don't they look excited?

The next ride we went on was Pirates of the Caribbean! Evelyn was actually asleep when we first got on but after the two initial drops woke up. She didn't cry or anything, which was good, but got a little scared at a couple parts and just buried her head in my shoulder and tensed up. She really didn't like this one part where the boat passed through a "waterfall" with Davie Jone's head talking on it. It was really just a foggy mist thing, but she really did not want to go through it! Kinda funny though...

(The scary mist :)

We didn't meet as many characters that day but we did go meet Jasmine and Aladdin and saw Princess Tiana do a little show in the New Orleans area which was fun. The girls were all excited to see them which was fun to watch. Although at Disneyland it's not only the kids that get excited to see different characters and stuff, which just makes everything so much more wonderful and magical!

Princess Tiana

Aladdin and Jasmine!

So cute!

I didn't get to meet Mary Poppins but we saw her walking around Town Square when we were taking a break.

After awhile Denise and the little kids went off to the kiddie rides and I went with some of the "big" kids to ride some big kids rides. Disney has a "rider swap" pass for people with little kids that can't go on the rides so they all went through the line and after they got off me and one of them went right back on and rode it. So great! We went on "Star Tours" which was Star Wars of course and was pretty fun. It was a kind of a virtual ride and made me kinda woozy when I got off but still fun!

Then the next, and last ride of the day for me, was Space Mountain, which was AWESOME!!! I've always wanted to go on a ride where it was pitch black and you couldn't tell what was coming up and this was a fulfillment of that dream! Well it wasn't all black cuz there were "stars" and such but that was cool too. It is now in my top five favorite roller coasters though. So fun!!!

After that it was getting a bit later so Evelyn and I left and went to check in our hotel, shower and cool down (it was RIDICULOUSLY hot and I just felt disgusting and sweaty by the time we left), and then went to pick up Mark. He had class on Friday so he took the Amtrak down to Anaheim and we picked him up. He said riding Amtrak was a lot better than taking a bus and was actually a cool way to travel. I've never been on Amtrak but have been on trains so I believe him :)

Anywho...that pretty much sums up all of Friday. It was a lot of fun and I thoroughly enjoyed my first visit to the magical World of Disney! I very much look forward to taking Evelyn when she is bigger and can enjoy it as well and remember it. Here's some pics of her though so she can look back and see how cute she was! :)

Her tooth! :)

Despite how hot it was, Evelyn HAD to have her blankie with her to sleep and of course her blankie of choice is the really warm fuzzy one. Luckily she can get by with just a corner to hold in her hands!

If you can dream it, you can do it. Always remember that this whole thing was started with a dream and a mouse. --Walt Disney--

Monday morning Evelyn and I made a little trek down to Anaheim and went to California Adventure at the Disneyland Resort. We met my Aunt Denise and her girls, Sydney and Raven, and some of her friends. They come to Disneyland every year and this is the week! They are also having a vow renewal for their 10th anniversary and Monday was Raven's 5th birthday, which is why we went on Monday.

We got to meet Mickey!!!

The main attraction we did on Monday was have lunch at Ariel's Grotto with all the Disney Princesses! It was really fun, the atmosphere was very cool, the food was great and Evelyn got to meet all the Princesses! (Well except one...Tiana from Princess and the Frog wasn't there). It was So cute though cuz Evelyn was chewing on a celery stick and every time a princess came by she would try to share it! She's been learning to share/feed people and it was pretty funny.

(Cinderella!!! She's my favorite, I even got her autograph :) :)

(Snow White, doesn't Evelyn look so excited!? )

(Belle! See? Feeding the princess)

(Sleeping Beauty! Feeding the princess once again)

(The whole group of us with Ariel!)

After lunch I went on California Screamin' with Denise's niece and not long after that we left and went to the hotel. They had pizza and cake to celebrate Raven's b-day and she of course opened presents. Her "big" present was tickets to see the Jonas Brothers and boy were those girls excited!!! It's fun to watch little kids, especially when they are way excited about something! They were seriously freaking out, especially Sydney. They love Jonas Brothers! The theme of the party was even Jonas Brothers. This is what I have to look forward to when Evelyn gets older....oh boy :)

All the kids after hearing the Jonas Brother news :) they were ALL excited

Happy Birthday Raven!

After all that some of us headed back to Disney to watch the "World Of Color" show at California Adventure. It was seriously one of the coolest shows I've ever seen! It's a water/light show where they have a montage of images of Disney characters shown in the water, with music to accompany of course. Very very cool.

The palace from Alladin

Finding Nemo, one of my favs!

Buzz and Woody!

And Sebastian!

We had lots of fun Monday and Tuesday (we stayed the night and spent some more time with the fam on Tuesday) and are looking forward to going back Friday and Saturday! This time with Mark and we're going to Disneyland! I'm super excited to finally go to the actual Disneyland park! I can't wait! So til then have a great weekend everybody!

"A child's smile is one of life's greatest blessings."

My baby is now 9 months old! Can you believe that?? Today I took her in for her nine month check up. She now weighs 20 lbs 8 oz and is 29 1/2 in. long (which last month she measure that two so one of these two is probably wrong but I don't know which). I can't believe how big she is getting though! She's learning so much and is everywhere now. She crawls and she climbs and she stands and is now walking along furniture....and you all know what's coming next! I'm just hopin' and prayin' that she waits to learn how to walk til we get to Mississippi!

I've been trying to think of some new things she's been doing (that I haven't already mentioned) but today has been a long, tiring day and my mind is just blah...and the main reason for this is Evelyn's been cranky and waking up a lot more cuz she's teething! She has two teeth that have broken through, both on the top and both off to the side. One is showing a lot more and is SO cute when she smiles real big.

(See it on the right...well her left side... :)

Here's some pics from the past month.

She loves her Disney princess phone! And she likes wearing this headband but doesn't like wearing her regular ones...

She's been holding up stuff to her ear like she's talking on the phone, so cute!

She's started "blinking" her eyes real slow, it's kinda funny

I've been finding her in the funniest positions when she's sleeping! She stayed in this one for like 20 minutes.

She LOVES to be outside!

Her mouth gets so wide sometimes

Couldn't decide what to wear :)

Evelyn and her daddy on Father's Day! We went to the park and BBQ'd some yummy steak.

Standing up by the couch

“The main problem with teenagers is that they're just like their parents were at their age”

Boy did Carmen's visit fly by! She left Saturday and it's already Tuesday...I seriously don't know where time is going this summer but it's goin' fast! May and June are gone and soon so will July and we'll be gone as well! Only 3 1/2 more weeks in Cali and we have quite a bit to do so I'm afraid it's gonna be over way too soon! I'm sure I'll gone on about this when it gets even closer to leaving so I'll stop now and finish up Carmen's visit.

We went to the beach one more time before Carmen left...this time one in Malibu called Zuma beach, which is about 3o minutes away. It's a nice big, long beach and it was a beautiful day to go! Carmen and I went in the water again but didn't stay long cuz the waves were SO strong! Carmen was a bit scared and got out quicker than I did. We both kept getting knocked over and getting pulled and pushed and it was crazy! It was the strongest beach I've been to here. Mark got in the water too but mostly spent his time on the beach with Evelyn doing this....

As my previous post showed, Evelyn loves to crawl in the sand so Mark put a stop to it by building that pit, or his playard in the sand as he called it. It was so funny to watch her try to get out! She couldn't quite make it though, despite how determined she was...and boy is she determined when she gets something in her head! I don't know what I'm gonna do with that girl when she gets older...

(Evelyn finally got out of her hole and was determined to help daddy dig a tunnel...that is til she fell in it! oops... :)

Anywho....the best part of the day was that we saw dolphins! They were pretty close to the shore and were just cruising along. It was so neat! Now I just want to see a whale and I'll be set!

(There were two of them but I only got one in the pics)

Another thing we did before Carmen left was go mini-golfing. There's a place off the highway that Mark has been wanting to go so we finally did. It was pretty fun too! Carmen said she'd only been once before but she ended up beating me so she didn't do that bad. The part I liked best though was the actual course...it was so pretty! It was the prettiest mini-golf course I've ever seen and pretty well kept too. There were lots of waterfalls and plants and flowers and trees and it was just very nice.

The very last thing I did with Carmen was go see Eclipse! She's been very excited to see it so we went to the IMAX here, which was very cool. The movie was pretty good too! :)

We had so much fun with Carmen here! She was so helpful with Evelyn, which was great, and she was fun to be with and entertaining :) But now she's back home and Evelyn and I are all alone again during the day and we miss our "nanny"! We've made friends with the other wives/kids here though so we usually see one or two of them during the day and then we do have some fun plans coming up...including a trip to Disneyland!!! So get excited for that cuz I know I am!!!!