Originally posted on 8/3/08…
One of our family traditions is Friday Family Night – where we generally go out for supper, play a game and then watch a movie. We hadn’t had time for family night for a few weeks, due to the kids staying at friends’ houses or the fair or whatever; but we finally got back in to the swing of things last Friday. We ordered pizzas, played a game of Aggravation and watched the 3-D Hannah Montana special – actually the two older boys snuck off a few minutes in to it and watched Stargate Continuum in the playroom.
We celebrated Gigi’s 51st birthday last Saturday. We had the family over for a big lunch, swimming and cake & ice cream. It was a beautiful day for playing outside and even better night for catching lightning bugs! Abby caught 3 and Matt / Luke caught 5. We let them go the next morning, but the kids thought it was pretty cool to have natural night lights in their room. We also had a 2nd birthday party (girls only this time!) for Gracie’s 8th birthday at the Mud House Pottery shop, earlier that day. Abby made a cute black puppy that now sits proudly on her bookcase.
Matt wrapped up two weeks of football camp and a few days of band camp. He will begin formal football practice next week. He will begin 7th grade at the Jr. High this year. Abby signed up for dance again this year. She will be doing a competition tap class again and will also dance with her BFF Baili in a hip-hop dance class. She is very excited to be dancing again this year at the Dixon Dance Studio. She also began soccer with her first practice today. About 30 minutes in to it, she turned to the assistant coach (Tom) and said, “I want to do gymnastics instead!??? She will begin 3rd grade at the elementary school. Luke will take swimming lessons as part of his pre-school classes at the Y, which we bumped up to three times a week.
As summer wraps up, we’ve been preparing for the inevitable end of the season. It’s really hard to believe it is almost over. Ann got the kids signed up for school, paid all the book rentals and did some back-to-school shopping, which helped make it all seem more real. In doing that however, we got the itch to get away for a little while. But, with the kids starting up fall sports already, we had to do something nearby. So, we decided to go to Holiday World again this year. We have had such great experiences every time we’ve gone and this year did not disappoint. We need to thank Gigi again this year for the tickets (thanks Gig!!). We left very early on Wednesday morning and got there just as the gates were opening. We rode a couple rides before it began pouring down rain. We were on the HallowSwings when it started. The rain added a whole new dimension to that ride! Thankfully, it only lasted about 10 minutes and that was all the rain we saw during daylight hours for our entire trip! We stayed in the theme park until it got too hot and then went in to Splashing Safari (water park). We stayed there until they closed about 6 and then rode rides until the park closed. We did that same basic routine on both days and it worked out well. We stayed at a nice little Inn about 10 minutes away in the town of Dale. Poor little Lukey developed blisters on his feet and so we rented a wagon and pulled him on the second day.
Some of our favorite rides included The Voyage rollercoaster (although, truth be told, we enjoyed all 3 coasters – but this one was by far the best!), Liberty Launch, as well as the Bakuli & Zinga (both water slides) and the lazy rivers and wave pools. The kids got to experience the Raven from the front row! …And they loved it. If you look really close at the 1st Raven photo, you can see us waving at Ann from up by the flags! We also took the time to enjoy the Voyage from the very back. We made some enhanced photos so you could see us in the back waving to Ann. She did a nice job with those photos, considering we just took the little camera to the park. Also, you should look closely at the very last picture. We had a lot of fun making that one!! It looks silly, but that’s what we were going for… We had a nice, relaxing getaway to recharge our batteries before we gear back up for everything the fall brings. It has been a great summer here in G’burg…we hope yours has been as well.