Halloween Extravaganza

Mimi flew out to spend Halloween with us and we packed as much spooky holiday fun into her visit as possible!  She brought surprises for the boys, as usual, and handed them out on Halloween morning. Thanks, Mimi!

The first party of the day was for Davis and his preschool class.  They had a parade through the elementary school and he got to go through Carter's classroom!

What a special treat to visit your big brother at his desk!

It was a little chilly for the parade outside.

Mom, Davis & me in a photo that Davis wanted no part of.

He found the Halloween treats...all better!

Mimi playing her "trick" with the candy corns sewn into her pocket. Davis thought that was funny!

LaDonna & Teresa's Preschool class

Partying with our friend, Ella the Ghost.

Carter and his Kindergarten class.

Carter's teacher, Mrs. Snyder, with Iron Man. 

The big kid parade!  (Iron Man was a pretty popular guy this year...)

Playing party games with friends.

Mimi helping at the cookie-decorating table!

Party #2 down, one more to go!

We had some family & friends over for Halloween night, a new tradition we started last year--so fun!  We even got to have Aunt Christy join us this year, so that made it extra-special! (Sister was a stick figure & Sean was a disappointed Cardinals fan, in case you were wondering.)

Debbie, Christy & me showing off our Halloween spirit.

Sister is very bright.

Setting out to Trick-or-Treat with our favorite neighbors! Iron Man, Hershey's bar, Graham cracker & Robo Ranger (Not pictured: Alina, the marshmallow for the S'mores)

Zach & Taylor watching Davis eat candy.  Good times!

Breakfast With Goofy and Bedtime With Mickey

Our last Disney day started with our bonus early entry to Disneyland which meant we got to ride Pirates of the Caribbean & Star Tours with no line--amazing!  We had a breakfast date at Goofy's Kitchen and what a treat that was!  We got to meet seven or eight characters just in that breakfast alone.  The food was so good and we just had an all-around great morning. We rode the Monorail back into the park to spend the day before Mickey's Halloween Party that night.  

Goofy!

Dale and the boys.

Princess Jasmine was so pretty!

Carter loved Pluto. :-)

So cute!

The Mad Hatter was a surprise hit.

Minnie looked great in her Halloween costume!

We partied with the Monsters University crew and danced like rock stars at Mickey's Halloween Party.  We met up with our friends, the Lynch family, who happened to be visiting Disney at the same time!  It was so much fun to see them and spend time with their sweet girls. But, I think my favorite part was having Penny's company on the flight home.  Can we plan all family trips together?!  It sure made traveling with kids much more enjoyable!

Had to steal this pic from Penny's blog because I had no good ones of the kids together.  The girls were so cute dressed as monster sisters.  (Poor Davis was asleep at this point and never even got to put his costume on.)  He did wake up at one point  & I don't know if you can tell, but he's crying at Disneyland with a sack full of candy in his hands.  This was not his finest moment.

Sean loved that the pirate ship was cruising out of a sea of fog.  Creepy.

And then, Iron Man passed out and missed the parade.

Davis was on his second wind at this point & got to see the Halloween parade before we headed back to the hotel.  Sean and I tucked the boys into bed and went out on our hotel balcony to see the Disney fireworks.  It was a great last day/night!

The Magic Continues

We were excited to get in an hour early on our second day visiting California Adventure.  Even so, the line for the "Radiator Springs Racers" in Cars Land was an hour long.  We made a decision to have Sean wait in line for the ride while I took the boys to see a Disney Junior live show.  Turned out, we had enough time to ride the Monsters, Inc. ride twice and Sean was still in line in Cars Land.  We finally joined up with him as he was getting close to the front of the line.  About 5-10 minutes into our time waiting with him, the ride broke down & they weren't sure when it would be fixed.  At that point, we decided to get out of line as Sean had already wasted two hours in a line and we knew it was our last day in the park with lots more to see and do. 

The ride attendant advised me to go to Customer Service to see about a FastPass for the ride if we wanted to come back later. Well, that turned out to be the best thing I ever did!  Long story short, Disney more than made up for Sean's wasted time in line by giving us not only a FastPass to walk on to the ride later (after it was fixed), but they also gave me FastPasses to four other popular rides and the World of Color nighttime show.  PLUS, they gave me FREE Park-Hopper tickets for the next day (I was willing to pay for tickets but in the process of doing so they over-charged my credit card and it took quite a while to reverse the charges. So, they just upgraded my tickets and said "They're on Mickey!") and free snack coupons.  I felt like it was my birthday or something.  Honestly, I am kind of critical when it comes to customer service.  I guess it comes from working in hotels and restaurants for so many years.  I cannot say enough about how AMAZING the Disney customer service people were.  They truly made my/our day by how they went above and beyond.  But, enough about all that.  Let's get to the photos:

Red!

Carter with the statue of Stanley, founder of Radiator Springs.

  

The broken-down ride.  So close, yet so far...

The attention to detail in every part of the parks was amazing.

Davis driving the bumper bugs!

Carter LOVED the zip line in the Wilderness Explorers area. 

Our birthday boy finally got his cupcake!  We ate a wonderful dinner at the Storytellers Cafe, inside the Grand Californian hotel.  I wish we could have afforded to stay in this place, but since we couldn't it was at least nice to eat dinner there and enjoy the scenery.  Probably one of my favorite nights of our trip!

The boys fell asleep before/during World of Color, but Sean & I loved the show. It was so beautiful!  Honestly the photos do not do it justice.  The music, the lights, the color, the images in the water--so cool.  The family next to us bought the special Mickey ears that light up in sync with the show.  Pretty impressive!

It's hard to tell, but Aladdin and Jasmine are in the center water area.

Disneyland, Take Two

On our second day in Disneyland, we got in an hour before the park opened.  Wow, was that a HUGE difference!  We got right on several of the more popular rides, without having to wait in the usual long lines. Nice!  We also got to see several characters.  

No princesses here!

 Even the treats at Disneyland are special.  Mickey cookies and chocolates were a big hit with the Beilmans!

 We met Woody!  Definitely one of the highlights. :-)

 Carter & Sean on the Finding Nemo submarine ride. This was one of the rides that I remember from 1982, when my parents took me to Disneyland! (Although it had a different name back then.)

 Donald and Dale were in the Halloween carnival area.  We even got to color pictures with Donald!

 Davis couldn't resist squeezing Dale's nose. Sorry, Dale! (Or, is that Chip?)

 Davis & I rode Dumbo!

 Yes, we paid a visit to Ride Makerz in Downtown Disney.  It never gets old for this crew.  Even Sean built his own Ride this time! It is such a fun Father/Son bonding experience for them...plus, these cars are a lot cheaper than Sean working on his real street rod!

Beach Boys

Our third day in California, we rented a car and drove to Laguna Beach.  The boys had never been to see the ocean, so this was a big deal.  It was one of my favorite days of our entire vacation because it was so relaxing.  The boys had fun playing in the sand and making new friends.  

First glimpse of the Pacific--WOW!

Let's get wet!

 Beautiful coast.  We even saw a wedding on the beach while we were there.

 Sean buried Davis in sand, just like he wanted. 

 Next, it was Carter's turn! 

 This is one of my favorites...so sweet!

We climbed the hill to Ruby's Shake Shack for lunch.  It. Was. Awesome.  Burgers, fries, and of course milkshakes!  It was seriously a perfect day.  I mean, check out this view!