kiddy escapade

we fetched dad from the NAIA last wednesday. he came from thailand for a brief tour. he was sent prior to that to bangladesh for work. we have not seen each other for a span of 4 weeks, i was still in the US when he flew abroad. my dad had gained some weight so it was nice to see him looking healthy again. we were jumpacked in the ride. mom brought rayne, together with my 2 nieces, my brother, & a driver. they fetched me from work & my sister after. it felt like a huge family affair. we waited for more than an hour at the airport. good thing sam followed us, w/ nephew tylord, to the airport. rayne was able to catch up some comfty nap in her new SUV. we ate at the food park first, like we always do, then rushed off to the shopping areas. mom, at some point, was uncertain which items to buy and said "wala ako mapili, halos lahat na napamili ni genna sa states!".......still, we ended up shopping quite a humpful of chocolates & snacks. at the grocery, i pried my eyes on the white castle cheesburgers & corn dogs, stuff that i wanted to but was not able to bring home.

yesterday i've had several readings about a 4 mo. old baby's development. it was so funny reading through items that are actually happening to your toddler. when i came back from the US, i was shocked but thrilled to see & hear my daughter voice her "coo-coos", her love for colors, her TV stares, her frequent smiles & giggles. her sleep is now longer & has properly adjusted, her feeding has increased, her skin's fairer, she's alot prettier, her cries are now short-term & seldom. i guess this time i am fully enjoying my momhood. the pressure & sleep deprivity are no longer part of it. i've got tons of pictures of her recently but i have not found time to transfer them to my pc so i'll have 'em in my next posts.

last march 25, tita baby, micah & me went to disneyland. we previously planned the trip to disney before i was supposed to go to dallas but the weather up in LA was bad so we postponed. it was raining daily in LA so it was freezing cold during the evenings. a bad month to visit, according to tita baby. they were anticipating good sunny weather by april. well....

before we went to disneyland, we shopped for bargain stuffs at the swapmeet. i got excited by the vast selection of cheap items from clothing, shoes, lingerie, toys, watches, bags..etc..etc... it did not surprise me that most of the shoppers were filipinos, who like me, were like panic buying on all sorts on sale to bring or send to PH. i've encountered alot of filipinos as well that are merchants....i was expecting a warmer atmosphere, due to the likeness, but it did not appear so. everyone minded their own business....so i minded mine.

after lunch we prepared for our disney trip. mark, my other cousin, was at work so he was not able to join us...again. after we parked at disney, we rode the tram to the main park.

at the minnie mouse parking lot 1.

to disney we go!

the entrance fee to the park was $51 per person. the park was partitioned into 2. both parks were huge i had time to tour only one of 'em. it was & is still, disneyland's 50th anniversary so they had alot of scheduled park attractions. it was almost 3 in the afternoon & everybody sat at the sides of the street for a parade of all the familiar disney characters.

greeted by hook as we enter

eager for a parade

mary poppins; sleeping beauty cast

peter pan; beauty & the beast cast

ursula; alice in wonderland cast

the cast of snow white

lion king

after the parade, we went to the star tours 3D ride. micah was particularly excited about this attraction. we waited in 'a moving' line for 30 minutes. almost all the rides have a waiting time of more than 30 minutes. the ride wasn't very impressive, perhaps due to the neater & sophisticated 3D rides at the universal studios. to include another flop, which we went after star tours, was the "honey i shrunk the audience" 3D movie.

waiting for the "honey i shrunk the audience" 3D show

next we went to the "Indiana Jones Adventure" ride w/c i remember waiting in line for more than 50 minutes! i was too young then (when i saw the movie) to remember the sights & scenes of this movie so most of the props were unfamiliar.

the entrance to the 'indiana jones adventure' ride

we rode the jungle cruise (boat ride) too, where plenty of robotic piranhas, hippos, monkeys, lions, snakes, crocs surprised everyone on every stop. next one was the "buzz lightyear astro blasters" which was recently featured in the disney channel. this ride is interactive. the car's equipped w/ toy guns for target-shooting aliens. the participants are later scored. you can email your picture (during the activity) to yourself upon leaving the area.

i need to practice

probably the best ride out there was the "haunted mansion". it was well-crafted. instead of an anticipated scare, i found myself exremely amazed. the ghosts looked real, the graves, forests looked real, the 4 heads that sang looked real, the crystal ball w/ a head, floating w/ the rest of the marching band instruments looked technically impossible but they made it look effortlessly possible. i vote this ride as the best attraction in disneyland!

prior to the "haunted mansion" ride, we went to the nightmare before xmas" outlet w/c i found peculiar but interesting items on sale

waiting in line for the "haunted mansion" ride; the only ghost i was able to capture

at 9PM we walked back to where the float parade was. it was scheduled 930PM but when we got there, we barely saw the show due to the thick crowd infront of us. simultaneously, a fireworks display was launched at the disney palace.

it started to drizzle at around 1030PM so we decided to go home. i was so wasted i personally begged to go home even if my tita, who obviously looked tired as well, offered me to tour the other side and downtown disney.

disneyland's 50th anniversay!!

the disney plaza behind us