Holidays at the Disneyland Resort

I love the holidays and this time of year.  The holidays aren’t the holidays without a visit or two  to  the Disneyland Resort.  I love Disneyland at Christmastime. It truly is my favorite time to visit and experience the magic of the holidays Disney style!

We had the opportunity to visit last Saturday for a special mom blogger preview of the resort decked out for the holidays. I’m not kidding when I say that every year it gets better! There are decorations everywhere. The park is absolutely breathtaking during the holidays.

One of our family’s Christmas traditions is to head over the park at least once during the season and watch the Christmas parade. We pick a spot near small world, pack a snack and watch the very fun parade.  This year I paid close attention to my daughter who was absolutely awestruck watching her favorite characters and Santa of course! We enjoyed every minute of it and can’t wait to head back this week to watch it again.

After we finished watching the parade we headed over to Big Thunder Ranch that is transformed into Santa’s Reindeer Roundup. You can head over to see Santa’s reindeer close up, color, create a craft and of course visit Santa himself! It was a hot day and we enjoyed being able to sit down, relax, color, enjoy the atmosphere and course take a picture with Santa!

I think Santa’s Reindeer Round Up is a hidden gem that not many guests know about. Make sure that you bring your camera and take a picture with Santa. We even found out what my daughter wanted for Christmas, a panda pillow pet. I’m sure that Santa will make sure to deliver that Christmas  morning.

After catching Santa we couldn’t miss taking a ride on my favorite ride of all, especially during the holidays. Small World is just beautiful during the holidays. I could ride it over and over! The ride even smells like the holidays with gingerbread and peppermint smells in the air. We like to head over before the parade or fireworks to avoid a long line.

We then headed over to for a very special dinner at the Grand Californian and experienced many of the fun dishes served throughout the park. One must dessert this holiday season is the Gingerbread Mickey Mouse beignettes, that are found at Cafe Orleans. They are out of this world! We also were able to meet the newest character to the Disneyland Resort, Duffy the Bear. He is  a popular Disney character in Japan and you can now find him at California Adventure. My daughter and I both fell in love with him. He is absolutely adorable!

We ended our special day with a warm mug of hot chocolate watching the beautiful fireworks and the snow fall on Main Street. I am a bit of a wimp for admitting this but I couldn’t help but get teary eyed as the beautiful firework show ended, the castle was lit up in all it’s glory and the snow started falling down on Main Street. The snow  on Main Street and firework show has become part of our family’s Christmas tradition. We made many memories last week and I can’t wait to make more beautiful memories at Disneyland with my family soon. Make sure to take the family at least once this year! It is truly a memory making experience!