when you wish upon a star...

24. Surprise Sadira with something amazing. - DONE!

Yes, yes I know I've already knocked this one off the task list, but I can't help it, I just love surprising my kid.  I think it goes back to when I was a kid, and one Saturday morning my mom woke me up and said, "guess where we're going today?"  I had no clue...she told me, "Hershey Park!"  Now, we had been to Hershey Park many times when I was a kid, but it was something about the element of surprise, waking up thinking that it was going to be a regular laid back Saturday, just to find out, SURPRISE! HERSHEY PARK! It was pretty much the best day ever.

That feeling is pretty much my motivation for keeping some things secret from Sadira until the moment of.  I just like to surprise people..my sisters, my friends, but the best surprise reactions usually happen when I surprise Sadie.

When I last left off on the story of our California trip, we had just finished off the Los Angeles leg of our adventure.  We were headed south, on our way to San Diego, with one very magical place in our path....DISNEYLAND!

Now Sadira's never been to Disney World, and certainly not Disneyland, though she has asked to go many, many times.  Considering that we don't really live a close distance to either, I always had a rule in my head that once she was closer to 5 or 6, we could go.  I wanted to wait til she was a LITTLE older so she could remember and appreciate it, but still young enough to get the whole "Magic Kingdom" thing.

My mom wanted to make sure I was old enough to appreciate and remember Disney before we went too...however I was 15 before we got there.  I REMEMBER IT, MOM! ;)

So upon leaving our LA hotel, I announced to Sadira, "Guess what? We're going to Disneyland!"

Let's suffice it to say her reaction indicated she was excited. :)

After about 45 minutes, we arrived in Disneyland.  The VERY first thing out of this child's mouth was, "are we gonna see princesses?"  I assured her yes, we would see them.  "Which ones?"  I don't know, Sadie.  "Are their princes going to be with them?"  I'm not sure, princes can sometimes be elusive.  "We need to see the princesses..are they here?" Yes Sadie, it's Disneyland...they are here.

We made our way to the carousel, the teacups, small world, the flying hippos...all of the rides appropriate for people of her short stature and age.  We rode the teacups. And then we rode the teacups.  And when we were finished, we rode the teacups some more. A LOT.  It's a good thing neither of us get motion sickness.

 

And then she declared in all seriousness, "Mommy this trip will have been a failure if we don't see princessess."

THOSE were the exact words out of her mouth. Ha! Love. That. Kid.

So we grabbed some lunch, and started our search for princesses. Word on the street was that you had to go to the Royale Fairy Faire, or Royal Walk, or Walking with the Royal Fairies, something like that (someone help me out, I can't remember what the dang thing is called...) but it's this special "exhibit" where you wait in line and you get meet and greet with three princesses.  

Perfect.

So we find this place, and get in line.  Everyone knows how the lines at these parks work, there are the metal bars that wrap the line around and around, to make these monstrous lines look like they aren't really THAT long, right?  Right.  We've all been stuck in that line hell before in our lives.

Well, these bars wrapped around like 7 or 8 times, something ridiculous like that.  And at the end of the last "wrap" there was a sign that said, "from this point, the wait is approximately 75 minutes;" however THIS particular line was only filled with people up to the second "wrap."  The last 5-7 rows of wraps were EMPTY!  

GREAT! I thought, this should only take a half hour or so, right?

Right?

WRONG.

We spent an ETERNITY in that line.  Probably close to two hours, I stopped looking at the time. Seriously, FOR EVER.  With a bajillon little girls, some dressed up like princesses, half of them whining their heads off, all just to see these princesses.

I kept waiting for the whining to start coming from my child.  I kept waiting for her to say, "Mommy, is it our turn, YET?!"  But it never came.  She just stood there in line like a little soldier, stoically waiting for her turn to meet the princesses.  At one point I asked her, "are you doing okay? This is a long time to wait, isn't it?" And she just replied, "Mommy, they are princesses."  As if that was all the answer I needed.

And so we waited.  

The thing about waiting in those lines is that by the time you start to get really irritated and sick of waiting, well, you're already invested.  Like, it happened to me around minute 50-55.  I realized that we had already been waiting close to an hour, and still had almost half the distance of the line ahead of us yet to go.  At that point I really wanted to leave, but then the whole past hour would've been a waste.  We've waiting THIS long, might as well stick it out, right?

There was no budging this kid.  We weren't going ANYWHERE until we saw some princesses.

 

(Patiently waiting in line.  Mommy was not so patient.)

And finally--FINALLY!--that magical moment came.  The moment when we were at the front of the line, just SECONDS from meeting princesses.  We didn't know which princesses, and frankly we didn't care, we just wanted to see some Disney royalty.

So when it was our turn, we walked back, and the very first princess we saw was Ariel!  Awesome! The Little Mermaid was one of my favorites when I was a kid, and Sadie loves Ariel!

Except not today.  

No sooner did we turn the corner to find Ariel that Sadira started SCREAMING BLOODY MURDER.  After almost two hours of waiting in line, the very first thing she does is scream.  She doesn't want a picture with her.  Who am I kidding, she didn't even want to go NEAR her.  Determined to not have wasted two hours of my life, I pick her up and over to Ariel we went.  

And got our picture taken.

 

Screaming. Bloody. Murder.

SIGH.

God bless Ariel, she stayed in character the whole time Sadie was screaming at her.  She tried her best, "awww, whatever is the problem my little dear?" talking in that high pitched sing-songy Disney voice.   I mumbled something to Ariel as to not offend, "Sorry Ariel, it's not you, it's her..." but there was nothing that could be done.  She freaked her freak.

(My friend Steph later told me that her daughter freaked out over Ariel too...something about the kids expecting her to have a tail, but then seeing feet and it kinda freaks them out.  I don't know, it's a valid hypothesis.  I was just glad we weren't the only ones to torture the poor Little Mermaid.)

So on we went to the next princess.  Sadie was CLINGING to me, practically hyperventilating.

Great. 

The next princess was Snow White---one of Sadie's FAVES!!  This time she wasn't as horrified...she still wouldn't let go of me or let me put her down....but she DID agree to smile in a photo with her.  All while keeping her distance of course.

Finally we got to the last princess.  Not gonna lie, I was feeling kind of hopeless about the whole thing.  I mean for as much as this child talked about prnicesses....DANG! What a let down!

A let down until...

....she spied Cinderella.

 

And this happened...

 

...and then this...

 

...this...

 

...oh and let's not forget this...

 

...and finally, this.

I guess that pretty much explains why they call it the "Magic Kingdom." ;)

A big SHOUT OUT to Cinderella, for saving the day, thrilling my darling girl, and making those two hours of my life that I stood in line, worthwhile.

It's no wonder that when we left the Royale Walking Faire (and were immediately greeted with a princess gift shop) and Sadie asked me to buy her a Cinderella dress, I said, "sure, fine.  Anything for Cinderella."  I guess I was temporarily blinded by my love for Cinderella and failed to see the $65.00 price tag---YIKES!  So now we have an authentic Cinderella get-up, complete with dress, gloves, purse, headband and shoes.

 

Other highlights for Sadira included meeting Minnie Mouse and taking a tour of her house:

Other highlights for me included chasing down Pluto to take a picture with a sleepy Sadie.  She REFUSED to go anywhere near him earlier in the day when she was awake...guess Pluto and I got the last laugh!

 

But BIG thanks to Cinderella, for making our day in the Magic Kingdom so MAGICAL!

 

Next stop on our adventure? Casa McLeod! :)