Our Happiest Place

For this family, Disneyland never gets old

I do not remember my first visit to Disneyland. From all accounts it was with my then still married parents and I was a toddler. For years, the only proof of this amusement park foray was a partially used ticket book my mother kept tucked away in the family cedar chest.

The first time I clearly remember going to “the happiest place on Earth” I was about 9 years old and on an early summer road trip from Ashland, Ore. to Phoenix, Ariz. with my mom. Disneyland was just one of several stops along the way.

My next visit to Anaheim, the summer I turned 16, made a lasting impression on me. I had one of those Kodak disc cameras which I used to document my days at Disneyland. The photographs from that trip are not the best quality, but my memories of lazy days riding the PeopleMover with friends still linger two decades later.

Suffice it to say, I really love going to Disneyland and I was lucky to meet and marry a man who also shares my affinity for the theme park. We took our first trip together to Disneyland one summer while I was on break from college and we visited a couple times after that, despite meager finances, thanks to a friend who worked for an affiliated company and was able to get us into the park for free.

We took several years off while school, careers and our relationship took priority. During that time, most of our travel was international and we relished it! Then we started a family.

Barcelona was barely a year old when my husband had to be in Anaheim for a work-related convention. My daughter and I tagged along and we built a mini-vacation around his business trip. Some people may not believe this, but Barcelona seemed to enjoy it as much as we did. She posed unafraid with the larger-than-life characters, ate her very first ice cream, and happily spinning around and around on the Mad Tea Party ride. We also celebrated a major developmental milestone when our little one crawled for the very first time across the floor of our room at the Sheraton.

The following spring, we decided to make an annual trek to Disneyland one of our family traditions and spent Barcelona's second birthday at the park. True, she acted more shy around Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends than she had the previous year, but she still loved riding those tea cups! Barely pregnant at the time with my son Berkeley, I braved morning sickness and fatigue to visit our family's favorite vacation spot.

The arrival of little Berkeley less than a year later pushed back our annual trip and we didn't make it to the park again until November. Disneyland was gussied up for the holidays with colorful lights, Christmas trees and faux snow flurries following the fireworks show. Berkeley, like his sister before him, approached this make believe world unafraid and for the third year in a row, we had the resident artist on Main Street cut our daughter's silhouette portrait – this time with our son, too.

The following year was a difficult one for our family and a trip to the Magical Kingdom was not in the cards for us until earlier this year, some 18 months later. Now people may consider us a little loopy for wanting to spend precious vacation time ensconced in one of our country's largest trappings of tourism. And I admit there are times I imagine our family would be better served by expanding our cultural horizons past those defined by popular animated films.

The reality is, we are the parents of two young children, and for us a trip to Disneyland is much like one to a foreign country. But unlike the overseas jaunts of our childless days, the theme park is familiar country for us. We know the lay of the land, speak the language, and do not have to worry about getting a good exchange rate for our dollar.

I write this column fresh on the heels of our second trip to Disneyland in less than a year. My husband calls it “making up time” and even the difference from our visit six short months ago is amazing. Our daughter definitely has her preferences when it comes to rides and she now poses for photos with her favorite princesses and conducts pin trades with the newfound confidence of a kindergartener.

At 2-1/2 years old, our son also has his own ideas what rides he considers fun and is talking in complete sentences. Imagine a little toddler voice his worry about the Anaheim mass transit system – repeatedly – when my husband and I decided to drive our car one day.

“Why we not take the bus? What happened? It broken?”

Truth be told, the more time the four of us spend as a family at Disneyland is more time spent in touch with our own youth. Days and nights are carefree and fun; the smiles on the faces of Barcelona and Berkeley forever priceless.

Parent Tales Column ~ November 2006