Valley Fair

June has escaped me in a big way, so I needed to take just a few minutes to write about how AMAZING our weekend was.

We loaded up the mini van and schlepped the kids plus Aunt Tara to Minnesota where we met my sister and her three kids and headed off to Valley Fair.  Let me just start by saying, hip hip ho-frickin-ray for Aunt Tara being there.  I told her that she should literally market her skills and go on family vacations with people to fabulous places (as if they get much better than a trip in a mini van to minnesota?!) and be a helping hand with their kids.

She was WONDERFUL.  She did stuff.  She helped.  She disciplined she with us, not against us.  She reached things when they fell.  She gave of herself and genuinely interacted with our kids.  It was amazing.

Now, before you get snarky about me taking someone with us, or telling me that it's possible that I had too many kids if i NEED her to go - my logic was simple...she was intended to be someone who would hang back with the stroller when the need presented itself at Valley Fair.  As an amazing bonus, she was so much more than that.  She kept arguing with me when I paid for her food (give me a break, Wendy's for dinner Friday, Pizza Ranch for dinner Saturday and McDonalds for breakfast on Sunday was all I could cover because she was sneaky at the park and bought her own food) and jumped in with my sister's kids and was well worth the minimal cost of the meal and her ticket at Valley Fair.

My kids had a blast.  Wanna know why?!?!?!  Because their parents were having fun.  We were relaxed and enjoying ourselves and everything was how they show it on the Disney commercials!!!

So a few highlights from the weekend:

~ Austin had to be bribed with $15 to ride the kiddie roller coaster  ($5 from me, $10 from his dad), this is the same roller coaster that Aden and Aaron rode like three times each...
~ Travis rode the Wild Thing and Corkscrew -- and gave me hell because I didn't ... am I afraid of these rides?  No, actually, I'm not, but I am kinda that person that has a hard time balancing a trip/day for "adults" and "kids" ... I got nervous that I would get gung ho on rides I actually wanted to go on and end up stealing their thunder.  So I stuck to the kiddie area...
~ My niece rode every single roller coaster in the park except for two ... because they shut one down and the other one she wasn't tall enough for - go Ava Rae.
~ Pizza Ranch post Valley Fair is the best option in the world.  Everyone eats rightthissecond and it's a beautiful thing.
~ my nieces all have a pretty insane sense of adventure, my boys have a desire to live and will not be made to die by the scrambler no matter how many times their cousins tell them they are safe
~ we all watched Identity Thief and laughed - a lot.
~ my sister and i stayed up until reallllllyyyy late talking and i loved it...i also loved it when Tara would wake up, jump in the coversation and pass right back out :)  It was good stuff.

This is going to be a good week.

That's all I've got for now, a super random update -  sorry about that.