There And Back Again

I've been away! Only for a few days, not for the entire month since I last blogged, but it is at least a little bit of excuse for my absence. Small Girl, Teen Girl and myself went on a long anticipated trip to Disneyland. (I can now distinguish my middle daughter as Teen Girl as her elder sister turned twenty last month and is no longer a teenager. How did that happen?) Teen Girl is a huge Disney fan and Small Girl, who for the first seven years of her life was utterly petrified by even the smallest glimpse of a costumed character (those outsize heads were the issue, I think) had outgrown her fear and was longing to go. M did not come with us - we went once before, when the older girls were 8 and 5, he found it the most exhausting holiday of his life and said never again!

The week before we went the weather forecast looked great, with lots of sun. By the time we got there it had gone downhill. We had one wet day and the rest were cold and windy (near galeforce one night), but that didn't stop us enjoying ourselves. Small Girl is not the bravest when it comes to rides. We coaxed her onto one fairly tame rollercoaster, after which she announced emphatically "I'm not making that mistake again!", which meant Teen Girl and I had to miss out on the more adventurous stuff. It was still a lot of fun. Small Girl was on a mission to collect autographs from as many characters as possible; we watched the parade every night and the fireworks on our last night; we found favourite rides which we rode over and over. After three solid days of Disney we left early on the last day so we could spend a few hours in Paris before catching the Eurostar train home. 

We met Mickey!

And Donald Duck

Buzz Lightyear ride. She shot me!

The Castle by day ...

... and at night.