LEGOLAND, California!!! Day One: Whooyeah!!! A Big Hit for Kids Ages 10 and Under

LegoLand theme park in California: Day 1

On day 2 of our San Diego vacation, Alan woke me up at 6am to tell me he was going to eat at the hotel and then head to the grocery store to buy breakfast. Did the hotel have free breakfast? Why yes, it did. Is there any way that our whole family of 6 will be dressed and ready before the thing closes at 9am?

No, not really.

Getting myself and the children ready for a day of major fun and adventure takes me a couple of hours, especially since I was determined to shower, look decent, wear make-up, and fix my hair every day.  I never once made it to that breakfast room. Don’t worry,though. Alan raided it for free milks, bowls, and cereals every morning.

And coffee. April runs on coffee.

By the time we got to Lego Land on Day One it was 10:45ish.

The theme park was 40 minutes from our hotel, but our boys were on nine clouds of joy and excitement, so no one complained a bit.

Also, we have DVDs in our minivan. This is a very important part of our road trip success. For this trip, they watched Penguins of Madagascar, Monsters University, Elf, and hours upon hours of Paw Patrol. The big boys complained about the Paw Patrol, but if you could hear sweet little JD say, “Ruff Ruff!  Go! Go!” well, it’s awfully hard to say no for too long.

I wore my glasses for most of this trip because I am very allergic to hotel rooms. Does anyone else have this problem???

When I say allergic, I mean that my eyes itch uncontrollably, and my nose burns.  Benadryl and zyrtec fix this, but they also sort of take away my personality. Ha! April tranquilizers.

Our Legoland day was very successful. We were all excited to see these Lego men as we drove through the gates:

We started out Day One in “Mini Land.”

That’s the part of Lego Land that has all of these incredible Lego versions of cities, Star Wars, and even a Lego Walk of Fame. While that’s all extremely impressive, this is NOT where you want to START your Lego Land experience, especially if you are traveling with a nine-year-old.

Lego Land caters to a very specific audience. This theme park appeals most to kids that are at least 34 inches tall (so that they can ride most rides) and are not at all entering the puberty-attitude phase of life.

One of our children spent his entire time in Mini Land saying, “Where are the rides? Why aren’t there any rides here? Can we go now? Can we go to another part now please? I just want to get out of this section. Can we hurry up?”

So lesson 1: Don’t START in Mini Land. Save that for after they have a few rides under their belts.

Meanwhile, the rest of us found Mini Land very impressive. JD even loved it. Here are my favorite photos from Day One. Alan took a ton too. I may share those on a future post.

We had lunch at a pizza place, and this Lego man often spoke up, inviting passer-by to come eat his Italian food.

Boys kept crowding around him, trying to figure out how he talked.

For 20 minutes or so, we split big boys and little boys up into two groups so that they could do age appropriate activities.

JD LOVED the Duplo play area. Daniel, on the other hand, missed his brothers and kept laying down. I think he really needed a nap.

JD was hilarious, and JD is truly a toddler than I am proud to take out in public. (I’m proud of all the boys, but for a toddler, I just think JD is really great. I’m his mother, after all.) He is so friendly. He kept checking out creations that bigger kids had made, taking people blocks, putting together a few blocks himself, and just having fun.

There were very few rides that JD was allowed to ride. Not being 34 inches tall really held him back.

We were all impressed to get to go in and see the ACTUAL Lego Movie set! This is the only place that you can see it.

There were a few terrible moments when we lost Caleb in the crowds.

We all agreed to head towards the boat ride, but the rest of us got distracted by the Splash Park. Caleb zoned in on heading to the boats and didn’t notice our sudden detour.

Nothing like a little emotional scarring on vacation. Poor Caleb was shaken up for sure, but we did find him  fairly quickly, and then he did get to do the boat ride.

Daniel took me by surprise on that boat ride. JD was napping in his stroller, and I was taking it easy on a bench. Suddenly, my phone rang. It was Alan. “April, can you come get Daniel? We’re still in line, but he has to go to the bathroom right away.”  

This was a forever long line. Groan. Poor Daniel. I took him to the bathroom, and he arrived back to the line just as Alan, Joshua, and Caleb were climbing into boats. Daniel melted down. He so badly wanted to ride those boats! It was called “Skipper school.”

So I waited for them to finish the ride. Then Daniel and I waited in the slow, long line, again, and whoa! That boy can DRIVE! He passed not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR other drivers! I was in the boat with him, but he insisted on doing the driving.  Three of the other drivers were adults! One said, as we sailed past them, “This is nothing like driving a car.”

I laughed. Who knew? Go, Daniel!

Meanwhile, Alan and the boys were shopping at the “Big Store”.

We were happy to join them. Shopping in the Lego Store was exciting the FIRST day, not so much the second day. I’ll tell ya more about that tomorrow. Let’s just say that I now know what men in shopping malls must feel like.

Come back tomorrow, and I’ll tell you about Day 3: Lego Land Water Park! No one complained on Day 3. The water park was a huge hit, and John David didn’t even get wet. Ha! He is one funny little man. He was most excited about the just-his-size lawn chairs! 🙂

“Everything is cool when you’re part of a team. Everything is awesome!!!”