Allie’s birthday celebration continued the next day. Phil was pre-call (meaning he had the day off and would be working the 7p-7a night shift), and I had made arrangements for the boys- Mikey would go home after school with one of his friends, and Jonah would be babysat by our good friends. All so we could have a special day out with the birthday girl. Allie invited her sister to join in the fun.
We just barely made it, but make it we did for a special showing of the new Cinderella movie at the El Capitan theater in Hollywood. Phil had dropped us off curbside so that the girls and I could run in and find our seats just in time to catch Olaf sing “In Summer”.
We got to see the new Frozen short and then the beautiful organ appeared and music filled the theater. The girls were enthralled. So was I. Phil got the van parked and joined us at this point. Which worked out well because Lauren had to go to the bathroom right then. Of course. I took her and we made it back to our seats where Phil informed me that we missed the organ finale and the confetti shower. Flashbacks of that time we missed the Princesses on Ice finale due to small girls’ bladders. Great. At least Allie and Phil got to see it this time.
Then we settled in to enjoy Cinderella. The girls absolutely loved it. I did too. Phil was pleasantly entertained by it and actually managed to stay awake for the whole movie.
I snuck back in after the movie ended and everyone had left to snag a picture of the beautifully decorated theater. With the confetti still on the floor. Turns out they use a huge vacuum thing to suck it all up.
The birthday girl.
The sisters.
The sisters sitting pretty waiting for their daddy who was using the facilities.
Actually, we were supposed to have arrived early in order to view the dresses and props used in the movie but we just couldn’t get there what with getting the boys squared away and inching through downtown rush hour traffic. But all worked out awesomely well for us because everyone else (there weren’t many there for a 10:30 showing on a Thursday morning) had left and we were able to enjoy essentially a private viewing of everything. The employees just smiled at us and said nothing about having to leave right away.
So take our time we did.
The glass slipper!
Even Mikey thought it was pretty cool that we got to see all this.
Beautiful costumes worn by the actors.
I was so glad we ended up getting to see this!
The whole room to ourselves. Nice.
We finally pulled ourselves away and stepped into the Disney store right next door (well played, Disney) where the girls did their best to not want everything they saw. It was hard. But promptly forgotten as soon as we left the store. Whew.
We made it across the street to get a picture of the front of the theater. I like the busy cityscape in the foreground with the red bus even. The people lined up along the building were there for the 1pm showing. Thankful we missed the crowd.
And then, we headed upstairs for her final birthday surprise…
