Fall Break

While Fall Break started off as a furlough week for the teachers many years ago, it was voted in as a true school break after that.  While I find it annoying that we have to start school so early (August 14th!), I admit it is nice to have this break.

This year I had decided to take the 2 younger boys to Legoland.  I last took them 3 years ago, but Christopher was only 4 at the time and really doesn't remember it.  Since they will soon be too old for it, I decided this would be the perfect time to go.

My mom, sister and I

 We arrived on Saturday.  Coincidentally one of my aunts was having an end of the summer get together.  I got to see all my aunts and my grandma, and the boys got to see cousins that they rarely get to see, and truthfully do not really know.

 The boys hit it off with all their cousins!  Above is Christopher with his 4 year old cousin Quinn.  I was cracking up at the fact that they are almost the same size.  Quinn also has a younger brother Sawyer.  Chris was having a blast picking him up--he is so used to being the youngest cousin here that he was thrilled to have some younger and smaller cousins to hang with.

 Vinny hit it off with cousin Jacob--these 2 were 2 peas in a pod for sure!

 Sunday I took the kids to the Legoland hotel.  It was still being built last time we were here so we had never been.

 We spent a couple hours hanging out at the pool.

 Upon checking in, the kids are given a card with some clues that they have to find the answer to by looking around the hotel and the room.  The answers were the key code to open a safe in the room which had some prizes for the kids- chocolate coins (we were in the pirate room) and a lego figurine.

 The kid portion of the room had bunk beds and their own TV.

 The adult portion of the room was separated from the kids by the bathroom (my mom came with us).

 The decor was fantastic. Lego sculptures throughout and little touches geared towards kids, such as a stool in the bathroom, and second, much lower peep hole on the door.

 Of course the lobby had lots of lego things, including this giant pirate ship filled with legos for the kids to build with.

 Vinny made a Hannibal Lector face mask.  He is so weird.

 The elevator was the best!  As soon as the door closed a disco ball would light up and disco music would start playing.  The kids couldn't help breaking into dance every time.

 For breakfast we ate at the buffet in the family restaurant.  I loved how the kids buffet was low enough for Christopher to serve himself.

 Of course I loved all the cute lego sculptures.

 This picture was taken from the deck of our hotel room-you can see the entrance to Legoland in the background.  That is how close the hotel is.  Since we stayed in the hotel we got to enter the park 30 minutes before it opened.

The sign for this ride said you would get wet, but I had no idea how wet. There was absolutely no one on it.  That should have raised my suspicions. When we got on they asked us if we wanted to take off our shoes--that should have set off more bells.  It turned out to be a coaster with one drop, that partially submerges the car in the water, while it dumps buckets of water on top of your heads.  Totally soaked.  Luckily we did it fairly early in the day so we  had time to dry.

 A new area (new for us anyway) was Star Wars miniland.  There were 6 scenes, each depicting a scene from each of the 6 episodes of Star Wars.  So cool!

 Since we had the park hopper tickets (cheaper to get those with an offer they were having) we popped over to the aquarium for a bit.  Of course it can't compare to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, but was very cute in its own right, with lego figures and scenes in the water.

 I cracked up laughing when I saw this picture.  When Pete was surfing in Hawaii he would curl up on the surfboard with his arms and legs in.  He kept saying he didn't want to look like a seal and attract a shark.

The boys and I

My mom with the boys

After our day at Legoland we drove back to my mom's house to spend the night.

 Tuesday morning the kids thought we were going home.  We told them we were going out for breakfast with my mom, then driving back to San Jose.  Instead we drove to the Disneyland hotel for a character breakfast before spending the day at Disneyland!!  They were so glued to the movie in the van, that they did not notice us driving all around Disney (I couldn't figure out where to park and was driving in circles!)  It wasn't until we walked into the hotel when Vinny stopped and said "Hey!  I recognize this place!"  Surprise!!

 I always love the character meals.  Throughout your meal several of the characters come up and hang with the kids for a few minutes.

 The advantage to coming in October is the lines are much shorter than peak times.  We just walked on the Buzz Lightyear ride.

 Of course if you go to Disney you have to go on It's a Small World, even if you do get plagued with that ear worm the rest of the day.

 My cousin Sara has an annual pass, so she joined us for a couple of hours with her son Ian.

My boys tend not to be roller coaster kids.  Zach just started doing them a few years ago and now will go on anything.  None of the other boys had though.  Vinny went to Great America with a friend this past summer  and was talked into going on a big one there and was hooked!  He did Space Mountain with my mom, and talked Christopher into the Matterhorn.  (He also did all the roller coasters at Legoland, although those are petty small in comparison)  Chris even did Splash Mountain.  When my mom and I saw the above picture after the ride we about peed our pants when we saw my face-- I swear I wasn't that scared!

 All the Halloween decorations are fun!

It is impossible to do both parks in one day, but Christopher was adamant about going to Cars Land, so we ran over to California Adventure for a couple of hours.

 The racer ride in Cars Land was the longest line we waited in by far--40 minutes!!  The ride was fantastic and totally worth it though.

 The entire Cars Land area was adorable and very well done.

We ended our night at Tower of Terror.  Once again Vinny talked Christopher into doing it, and he loved it!

I truly had the best time with the boys on this trip.  It was nice having just them and getting more time without the 2 older boys.  I did realize though that we are way past due for a Disney family trip.  I am going to try and talk Pete into doing it all together as a family next October.