Daniel Galang Photography » San Diego and Bay Area Wedding Photography

Disneyland – Anaheim, CA

ONE YEAR. It’s already been one year. Truthfully – I truly anticipated a smooth first year… one with stability, freshness, and planning for our future together. Then, the fresh smell of life and reality kicked in – hard – like straight to the shins… Together our first 5 months of marriage was both life in the fast lane and life in traffic – too fast mixed with relational growth moving at a very slow (almost too slow) pace… We let things like our time together, our prayer life, and just the little things get blown by as we frantically settled into living together and managing life together. I was initializing new photography business foundations, just really starting a new job, and Vaness was working a challenging new teaching role… By June, we were spent and generally tired. But, for Vaness, a “break” was around the corner as she was about to be on the hunt for a new job – while her current teaching contract was done… Then – things were about to get interesting – I get laid off too…

So, for me, a huge number of things begin to run through my mind…Both of us have no job, a mortgage, student loans, bills… we’ve gotta eat… how are we going to do this? I had very few weddings booked at the time, no real leads on jobs, and for Vaness – California was continuing to cut budgets in education. There was a minor – no major – moment of panic for me… why were we going through this? Why now? What are we going to do??? It turns out that God had more plans for us than we can imagine. We were supported by family and friends and we were provided for – CHECK. Business began to take off with photography (I was busy almost weekly with shoots), job leads and interviews were coming in at a steady pace, and Vaness landed another teaching contract 2 months later – CHECK. But – the most important thing – our marriage began to truly be FIRST – MAJOR CHECK. We attended The Rock Marriage Retreat, we installed date night, we spent time together during our “vacation”, we made a REAL effort to learn each other…We were BLESSED… Today, we are stronger than I could have imagined. As for me, God worked on my heart – shaped it. And since then, I’ve grown and changed soo much. 2010 is booking up fast for weddings and over Christmas I was offered a new job at an awesome company… ONE YEAR. It’s already been one year. Truthfully – we are changed and blessed better than I could imagine or anticipate.

So – we celebrated. We stayed in Anaheim for 4 days and went to Disneyland for a few days! Thanks mom and dad for providing a place to stay! Hope you don’t mind me sharing a bit from our week! First, the cast members…

We arrived at Worldmark Anaheim and decided to have some dinner at the Garden Walk’s Fire and Ice restaurant.

I swear – I was painfully full – sooo much food.. It was an all-you-can-eat grill spot… great stuff.. and we even got to watch a bowl game!

So after exploring the shops we headed home to rest for the next big day at Disneyland. They still had some Christmas décor up! Sweet! That tree on Main street is HUGE…

We were glad that their photopass people take pics with our camera for us sometimes…

So seriously, this Jedi Academy is genius.. Great fun for the kids and the Jedi master teaching them their tricks likes to insert some snippy/funny comments that make the show fun for adults…So great… and the kids were sooooo cute!

They really know how to take Christmas décor to the max! Love it…

So after a great day at the park we went back to Garden walk and visited one of their major little stops – 300 Anaheim – a really great take on bowling… It’s grown, sexy, and VERY classy. Like really. Dim lights (reds and purples), organized bowling ball distribution system, mega large screens with pro games and music videos playing, cushioned couches for each lane, food/drink service brought to your table, separate room of lanes for private parties, and all their photography for their marketing is very well done – of course I’M paying attention to THAT! – this place is SOMETHIN’… We were seriously impressed! All Vaness and I kept saying was, “MAN! San Diego really needs a place like this! We’d go there ALL THE TIME!”…If you’re in the Anaheim area (or I hear in the San Jose area too) check it out if you are lookin for a different/fun bowling experience…We had a lot of fun! And we both bowled great games together…

Next place to be conquered – Disney’s California Adventure!

So there are some big changes comin up in the next two years – one being the new “Cars Land” taking over the old Timon and Pumba lot – and another is this huge water show (like Fantasmic, but better) that they are planning at the boardwalk.. Bellagio’s got nothing on this one… they are almost done constructing the waters show and we got a peak at all the water spraying and optics platform before it gets submerged for the real thing in Spring 2010! We’re excited already and can’t wait to come back!

Here is a little map of the new plans for DCA.

Okay – so it has been a great week (and a really long blog post – haha), but I’m endin with this one.. Amazing food.. We dined at Disneyland’s one big spot for the best in fine dining – The Napa Rose. Soooo good.. the service was amazing – it was so fitting for Disney, our server was like a cast member! This place – if you are into some fine dining – is WELL worth visiting… I seriously had the BEST short-rib I have EVER had. Fall off the bone, flavorful, juicy… and Vaness gave cioppino a try – waay good… everything was sooo good…just go. Now.

Okay – I lied – one more… of course I had to leave this one for last…

We loved our time up there – it was great… We really got to celebrate together and we realize that we’ve been blessed in our FIRST YEAR of marriage… there is sooo much to be thankful for… It wouldn’t have been the way I planned it – but hey – you’ve gotta love the results! I love you babe! HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!