California

Our California trip finally came and went! I flew out for my trade show on Tuesday the 7th to get there and get our booth set up. Everything went well with the show and it was back, bigger and better than ever after a couple-year hiatus due to COVID.  

I went on a run in the mornings to still do some type of exercise while I was away from Courts and my group fitness classes. I was worried that I would be hurtin' pretty badly after not having done any weights or anything for a full week. (Spoiler alert: that was still the case! 😑 I could barely walk for days after I came back.)

I saw these cool flowers all over - are they birds of paradise?

We always stay at the same hotel for the show every year, the Candy Cane Inn. It is so nice and conveniently close to the convention center...and Disneyland! 

It has two hot tubs and a swimming pool so I frequented the hot tub in the evenings after long days at the trade show. I was joined by this guy one night. Ew.

I spied a cute black kitty one morning. I wasn't able to catch up to him though. This is the parking lot of our motel - you can see Disneyland in the back there.

I was done working the trade show after Friday which is when the rest of the fam came out to join me.

I was actually surprised at how cold it was out there. The air still had a bit of a chill to it and I didn't feel like I was dressed warm enough the whole trip.

Then it started raining on Saturday morning when  we were scheduled to go to Disneyland park. Luckily I was able to snag a reservation for the princess breakfast, which was three courses, so that pretty much lasted the whole morning, especially by the time we got done canoodling with the princesses. Thankfully the rain had cleared up by the time we were done with that and we were ready to roam the park.

We were all very impressed with the service and food at the breakfast. 

Meeting the princesses...gone are the days of dressing up in our own princess gowns to match the Disney characters, so we were dressed for comfort, not style. We felt especially underdressed compared to the princesses. 😜

I loved Sleeping Beauty's crown!

Dana and Clara went off together and Brynn and I went to do some rides.

After a delish meal at Tortilla Jo's in downtown Disney, Clara and I headed back to the hotel to crash while Dana and Brynn stayed at the park to do more rides.

Sunday we had planned to do the Disneyland Adventure Park which is right next to Disneyland.

Clara and I started out together and Dana and Brynn did some rides.

The old Tower of Terror has been reformatted to Guardians of the Galaxy, though the concept of the ride itself is still the same: deathtrap! 

Of course it wasn't too cold for Clara to go swimming though!

And she even made a friend to swim with.

Clara in a towel sandwich.

After some swimming and relaxing in the afternoon, we went back to Adventureland Park for dinner and some more rides. 

That is Brynn and me on this contraption. I did not enjoy myself as my legs were dangling and the ride went up high.

Disney BeReal!

We checked out this neat obstacle course thing they had in Adventure Park. Before we started through it, we ended up battling against another family in a Disney villain trivia game. We got creamed. 

Part way through the course we came upon Raya from the Raya and the Last Dragon movie. 

Dana and Clara headed back to the hotel for the night and Brynn talked me into upgrading our tickets to a park hopper so that we could go back into the Disneyland park for more rides and the fireworks show.

I had to go back to the hotel and bundle up some more though...so that I could ride the best ride in the whole park, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, four times. 😃 Lines weren't super long, which was great, so we were able to get through to ride pretty quickly.

I always love their fireworks and illumination show.

We had to hit up It's a Small World.

We had our fill of churros on this trip. So yum!

Those Disney steps! 😅 My one foot starting hurting pretty badly by the time Brynn shut down the park at midnight on Sunday. Oof. Somehow I had also gotten a bad case of shin splints to boot. My foot still hurts!

Monday we had planned a trip to Long Beach to see the ocean and take in the aquarium and do a whale watching tour. It was still pretty chilly for the beach, not to mention, turns out Long Beach is trash. :( There was literally so much trash everywhere. We walked along the beach into a shopping area and Dana found a good place for lunch. (We didn't get moving too early that morning and by the time we Ubered over there, it was about 10:30 by the time we arrived to the beach.)

The girls really enjoyed the aquarium.

This thing was super cool. You could color a fish on this screen and then it would appear on the big screen and swim around!

After the aquarium it was time for the boat tour. We started out up front on top of the viewing deck. The sun felt so nice.

A Carnival cruise ship and the Queen Mary.

We did end up seeing a few whales.

Thankfully we were able to go under the boat deck and ride where it was warmer. The girls were so tired by this time and there wasn't a lot of action, so they mostly just rested down there and ate some snacks.

It was a great trip! I'm glad we were able to spend some time out there. Dana and I were back at work on Wednesday while the girls finished the rest of their spring break week. Clara was able to stay at Grandpa and Grandma Froemmings' for a couple of nights. Back to school tomorrow!