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Hey, guys!!!! For those of you that know me, know that I am a huge Disney fan, so when I was recently invited to join Disneyland for their 59th birthday (anniversary) celebration and a sneak peek into their 60th anniversary celebration (2015), I was so excited to check it all out! I’m always at Disneyland because I have an annual pass, but even so, I was excited for this.

We (my sister and I) arrived that morning and checked in at a special ticket counter reserved just for the guests of this event. We were given our wristbands and a VIP package which included our entrances to the park, yes, we were provided with a one day park hopper for the day; fast passes to the World of Color nighttime water show and an entry card for the special VIP private room (more on that later).

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Once we were checked in, we entered the park through a special events guest entrance and were then personally escorted to our VIP reserved viewing area for the 59th birthday celebration. The celebration started with the Mayor of Disneyland welcoming the guests to the celebration and then the Dapper Dans sang a few well known songs such as “It’s a small world” among others. After that, they invited 59 of the Mayor’s friends (Disney characters) to join him in the celebration. They all made their way to the front and joined the mayor and the Dapper Dans in singing “Happy Birthday” to Disneyland. During the celebration ceremony, they also played part of Walt Disney’s speech that he made on opening day, and there was also a red carpet and microphone stand in the area where he stood at when he inaugurated the park 59 years ago.  Right after that, the new logo for the 60th Diamond Celebration was unveiled and confetti thrown into the air.  They informed us that the celebration was to begin in Spring 2015.

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After the celebration ended, we headed over to Carnation Café for breakfast. After breakfast, we made our way to the Opera Room on Main Street for the special invite only sneak peek into the 60th Diamond celebration. The Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln attraction was closed for the duration of the special private event. It was only open for those invited and who had the blue wristbands. Once we showed our wristbands, we went inside where everything was decorated in honor of the 60th Diamond Celebration. They had cupcakes in three different flavors, water and lemonade for our enjoyment.

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There was also a private special meet & greet area towards the back where you could meet and take pictures with Mickey and Minnie and Elsa and Anna (from ‘Frozen’)! I was so excited because I haven’t been able to take a picture with them lately because the line is always so long to do so! For example, the line to meet and greet Elsa and Anna inside the park is about a 4-5 hour wait and in this special meet and greet, there was no line!! Super cool! Mickey and Minnie were hilarious!! They were playing around with the Disney employees and with each other and made us laugh so much! Then Minnie, pushed him away and said we should take a girls only pic, he left and then photo bombed some of our pictures LOL! The best Mickey and Minnie characters I’ve met so far.

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We then made our way back to the entrance and were directed to go into another room where we were gifted a big 60th Diamond Celebration cookie, a big diamond keepsake and a Fast Pass booklet. We were advised that the Fast Pass booklet included fast passes for all the rides which had the Fast Pass option and were valid only that day. Pretty cool, huh?! Needless to say, we used all of them and went on so many rides with no wait!

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After seeing all of Disneyland within a few hours thanks to the Fast Passes, we headed over to California Adventure to enjoy the rest of the day and the other Fast Passes for that park.

Hope you guys enjoyed all of the pictures regarding the celebration! In another post, I will upload all of the other pictures I took while enjoying the parks, so make sure you check that out too!

Thank you, Disney, for the invitation! You were a great host!

becky (2)