We walked into the California Adventure entrance through the fancy Disney hotel and as we were making our way to the front of the park we saw Minnie pop out and we were first in line to see her and it was the perfect start to Vivi's birthday.
Stacey wanted to buy the girls fancy cake pops, which I thought was unnecessary, but she wanted to get them. Of course the most function they held was that they made for some cute pictures as we got into the park.
So this day really was all about Vivi. Whatever she said she wanted to do. We did it. And that was kind of fun. She ran the show and I loved it. She really wanted to meet Tinkerbell so we went to the Fairy Village to meet Tink. Tink was so cute with our birthday girl. Then Vivi wanted to ride the carousel. So, you guessed it. We rode it. It was so strange though because the person running the ride was really nuts. She kept yelling at everyone to stand in certain spots and she kept stopping the ride. It kind of took the magic out of it. However, Vivi still loved it. And I just watched her ride her horse and was close to tears thinking about how lucky I am to be that amazing girl's mom.
At this point it was clear to me that Vivi needed some medical intervention for her insane cough. She was kind of getting sicker by the hour. After riding the carousel I gave her doctor's office a call to see if we could get a prescription for her inhaler medicine called into a pharmacy by the park. Since my mom was still at our condo it seemed like it could work out. Thankfully they were able to call it in. I really just need to travel with that stuff.
Vivi's other favorite ride is seeing her friends on Small World so we bebopped over there and rode that. We had a hot dog on our way out at Jolly Holiday and then it was time to walk over to California Adventure.
We had fast passes for Indredicoaster and of course later in the day around 4 we had our fast passes to Radiator Springs. Having park hopper passes worked out great for us on this last day so we could hit the rides we missed. But honestly it isn't an ideal way to spend your time I think. It is so so much more walking. However, it worked out great and we were able to fit in all of our dreams. Vivi fell asleep on our way over to DCA. Stacey wanted the same taco salad she had the day before so we got her all settled to eat that and then Stella and I rode Incredicoaster two times in a row. It was intense to ride it twice like that, but it was totally fun. Turns out the ride broke down again right after we got to ride it.
We then made our way to Cars Land and Stella and Stacey rode on Radiator Springs in the single rider line while I sat with Vivi sleeping in her stroller. I sat down next to this woman from Canada and we started talking. Within minutes we were having this deep and personal conversation about infertility and kids and it was kind of amazing actually. To just connect with someone that fast that you are never going to see again...it was a neat little part of my day.
Vivi woke up as the girls were getting off of the ride. And we went and rode my fave Luigi's again. My mom had made it to the park and she was taking her time and having a taco salad of her own. I'm obviously going to have to try this taco salad sometime soon. We found my mom and Vivi got a hit of her medicine and I think it helped her.
It was finally time for Radiator Springs. This was it the whole reason I had the meltdown the day before. So we get over to the ride with our freaking fast passes and guess who is just barely not tall enough for the ride by like a hair? Well, Vivien obviously. That wasn't hard to guess. So Vivien is barely too short, which is a surprise to me because she was tall enough to ride Slinky Dog in Florida and they have the same requirement. So the first girl lets us go, but she warns me that they have two more checkpoints. But I still saw with my own eyes that she was tall enough. We are all cheering and excited and we get to the next checkpoint and she is not tall enough. And these guys aren't going to let her go. Finally one guy says go ahead they make the final call up there. So what do I do? I start stuffing tissues in Vivi's shoes. She was so obviously completely tall enough and I wasn't having it. So people see what I am doing and they think I'm genius or crazy...could go either way...and when we get to the front she gets the green light and she gets to ride the ride.
Turns out within seconds my mom is already sick and Vivi refused to go on the ride the last time we were there so success in the end? Hard to say. My mom says she will never go on it again, but still stands by the fact that it was worth it. It is one of my favorite rides, but I definitely am not going to stress out about riding it anymore. Especially now that we have passes.
Stacey and Stella wanted some ice cream so they picked up a cone. I was over food and treats at the point, but I wanted to be more fun than I was yesterday so I just took a picture of them and enjoyed Disney. Plus my mom needed to sit for a while and get feeling better. Bless her.
As we were heading to the front of the park I asked everyone if they wanted to ride the Monster's Inc. ride. No one really seemed to care either way. So I made the call to head over there and give it a ride. As we were walking up to the line a cute girl asked us to follow her and she took us to the front of the line. I asked her if we were getting a magic moment and she told me that we were and I was so excited. I for sure have had a few magic moments but I've never been taken to the front of a line so it was very exciting. And it really made me feel like the day was super magical.
We meandered back to Disneyland. Vivi was gassing out and coughing a lot. She was still having fun though and one thing she wanted to do that I've never taken her to enjoy was meeting some princesses. They were getting ready for the parade while we were walking up Main Street so I joked that we were part of the parade. Then we stopped in front of the covered up castle and took some traditional pictures. I loved the ones we were taking where people were just walking in front of me. I do love me some Disney crowd pics from time to time. After we did that we got in line for princess time. While in the line we lost most of the life Vivi had left. I could tell she felt awful and it made me very sad. But when we finally got in the rooms with the princesses she perked up again and was so excited to see them all.
After Peter Pan, Stacey and my mom took Vivi home. They stopped off at a coffee shop to get some food and the waiter brought Vivi some ice cream and sung Happy Birthday to her.
Stella and I got to hang together for the rest of the night. It has always been a dream of mine to just hang with Stella and bang out all of our favorite rides, so it was great. Except we were exhausted. We wanted to ride Matterhorn, but it was down for a bit so we went and we rode Space Mountain, and then Autopia. While we were finishing the drive around the track the fireworks started and when we got off of the ride we stood and watched them in Tomorrowland. You really can see the fireworks from different spots in the park and sometimes it is a fun change.
Finally the Matterhorn was back in business and we rode it twice. Stella really wanted to be in the front and a cast member was nice enough to make sure she got to ride the front. Then we made our way over to Indiana Jones. It ended up being our last ride because we were SO tired, and our feet hurt so bad. I made Stella pose for some pictures as we were leaving and also tortured her by going into my favorite store that has all of the Mouseketeer stuff.
Then we had the LONG walk home. Our shoes were killing us and we wondered if we would feel better walking without them. So after we had walked through the hotel we took them off and it felt amazing. We walked the whole mile home in the streets and sidewalks with just our socks on. We made it home, but we were beat.
That night Vivi's cough was out of hand. Her inhaler, wasn't helping all that much. I went to check on her at around 2AM and she was on fire. I didn't have any medicine for her so I got in the car and I drove to a drug store and stocked up on some medicine for her. When I got home to give it to her, the poor thing looked over at me and croaked: "Mommy, I'm sick."
She still got some good rest that night, but we had to get up pretty early to head to the airport. Basically I didn't sleep. As we were driving to the airport and getting on the freeway suddenly one of our tires just fell off. It was one of the craziest and scariest experiences of my life. Without trying I did all of the things you are supposed to do when that happens and I don't remember because I didn't feel like I was even driving the car. We made it to the side of the road and the tire didn't hit anyone or cause any accidents. Within 30 seconds of landing on the side of the road some guy in a big California Highway truck comes up and parks in front of us. Within 10 minutes our spare tire is on and we were on our way. The guy that came and helped us was big, gruff and had tattoos all over. And he seems amazed that we had made it to the side of the road without any incident. When I asked him where he came from he tole me: "I fell from the sky." I think it was joking, but it didn't feel that way to me. The whole thing felt like a huge miracle and I know we were protected by angels. I really felt that so surely as anything could have happened to us or someone else and absolutely nothing did.
Turns out we still made our flight home. Even with that happening. I was assured at the car rental that I would not be responsible for the tire, but I still got a letter weeks later demanding $175. I was pretty irritated, but when I finally got a hold of the girl that was assigned the case, and told her that I felt like I was given a car that was a danger to my family...I never heard about it again. So apparently they decided to drop it.
So even though Vivien did get very ill, I still loved this trip. She still loved this trip and talks about how she was at Disneyland on her birthday and she remembers all of the fun things she did on that day. I told Stella as we were leaving the park that I could not imagine this trip any other way with any other people and it was perfect. We had our moments, well, I had my moments...but it was magical and full of magical moments. Mom fell in love with Disneyland and Stacey had a great time. Of course I wish that Vivien had been healthy, but we still pulled off the best Mother's Day and birthday celebration of all time.
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