“Would you like me to take your picture together?” Carrie asked us.
“That would be wonderful. Thank you.” I handed her my phone, and she took several and then moved onto the next family.
“Daddy, this is something I’ll never forget.” My teary-eyed boy said. “You made one of my biggest dreams come true.”
“Well, I have another surprise for you. Have you taken all the pictures you wanted?”
“Yes, this was so amazing.”
We came out of the sloth encounter, and I led him around the corner to... “Build A Bear! Daddy!” He hugged me and squealed as every other child in the area did the same upon entering the bank account draining store with their parents.
“Pick your animal.” That took far longer than the entire process did, but he finally landed on one.
“We are at SeaWorld, so I need an Orca stuffie to take home. Now, it needs an outfit.” Smart boy, two things in one. Well played.
In the end he made an orca wearing a rainbow tutu and a blue SeaWorld crop top. All I could do was shake my head and smile. My boy was happy and that was all that mattered. After a long day of petting sting rays, cheering on penguins and growling at sharks—yes, my boy growled at a great white to show how badass he was. Two very tired park attendees made their way back to their hotel and slept like rocks.
The next day we spent lounging by the hotel pool and after dinner we packed our bags for our third, and final leg of the trip, that would be the true test for this Daddy. One crazy huge park and a million children. How does that silly Mouse do it?
I had booked two nights at the Disneyland Hotel, having had the forethought that we’d be too exhausted to walkor drive back to an off-site hotel at the end of the day. This way we could take the monorail in and out. We loaded up the SUV, which included Jamie lining the back seat with his new stuffies, who had to share seatbelts, and off we went. Two hours later, we were finally there and got checked in.
“Daddy look, a Mickey Mouse head.” Jamie decided to point out every hidden Mickey and decoration shaped like the famous Mouse’s head from the time we pulled up to the valet, until we got into our room. And even in there, he found more.
“Our room has Disneyland on the wall. And fireworks on the floor. Daddy!” He spun around. “The lamp has Mickey’s head on it.” He ran into the bathroom and squealed. “Daddy the lamps in here are Mickey’s hands!”
Good lord, if he was this excited about our room, how would he react tomorrow once we entered the park? “Who’s your favorite Mickey Mouse?”
“The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.” He held his arms out and leaned side to side as he walked. “In Fantasia he carries heavy bucket’s and walks like this, and the water sloshes out of them.”
“Silly Boy. It’s still early, do you want to hit Downtown Disney tonight? Our park tickets are for tomorrow, but we could check this part out now.”
“Yes, please.” He jumped up and down.
We took a stroll through Downtown Disney and of course ended up in the largest Disney Store known to man. Straight to the Sorcerer’s Apprentice display Jamie went. “Daddy!”
“I know, grab the one you want.” No use arguing about stuffies. “Grab the matching beach towel while you’re at it and you can use it at the pool.”
“Thank you, Daddy.”
We picked up a couple of things for Henry and Chase, and I also purchased a Disneyland picture frame. I had picked up one from each park so I could put a favorite picture of us from each park in the appropriate one to display at home. From there we chose a restaurant to eat at, then after dinner, we brought some sweet treats from the chocolatier before calling it a night.
“Jamie, here’s the map of Disneyland.” He hopped up on the bed beside me to see the iPad. “What do you want to see first tomorrow?”
“Let’s do a circle again, start to finish so we can see it all. What about you, Daddy. Where do you want to go?”
“Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge for me. Those are the movies I can watch on repeat.” I remember my parents introducing them to me when I was younger. I have been a huge fan ever since.
“That will be so much fun. I’m excited for Main Street where they have the parade and toon town. But I want to see everything.”
“We will do our best, sweet boy. Now, it’s time to sleep. We have a big day ahead of us.”
There were no words for the madness we entered. This was every child’s dream and every parent’s nightmare. From the long lines to get into the park to the wall of bodies you had to navigate your way through. Never had I been happier to have a boy that didn’t ride any rides. Those lines had two hour waits for them.
“Jamie, please hold my hand.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
I swear we stopped at every store, every candy stand, every everything. We took pictures in front of the castle and with characters, but when we got to my stop it was like I had become the Little in this relationship.
