Bananas & Lillies: May 2007

Friday, May 25, 2007

Long Awaited Post...LIFE IS GOOD

Funny how things can just come together and work out so well when you don't even try. We have had long time plans to go to Kings Island for Mike's company picnic this past Sunday. We both had to work on Saturday so we had planned to drive up on Sunday in the early morning.

Many moons ago when Mike first started his job and I was still on my beloved maternity leave, I asked him if he would ever, in life, be getting off work early. He said that this never happens and that the Managers always had to be there at open and at close. He'd be working these 10 and 11 hour days whenever he was working. Flash forward to the Saturday before the company picnic when Mike's boss came out to the front of the shop to say one Manager could go home, Mike and his compadre could flip a coin. Awesome! So, they flipped and Mike won. Mike called me at work on his way home to give me the good news. I also left work about an hour early and so we decided to get on our way that night.

After looking on line that night to see about hotel prices we decided to head up and see what we could find because everything was pretty pricey. We knew that this was really a risk but, by now we could see that things were really going our way and decided to roll with it. Mike's cousin and friends were going to be staying at Great Wolf Lodge, not to be confused with Wolf Creek Lodge, (pay up, Mike!) But it was way too expensive. So, we headed on our way.

Beautiful weather and two lovely ladies in the backseat, one in the front! On our way up Mike got a call from his cousin whom we had told we could meet for dinner but would be leaving to find a hotel. He told us not to worry that he and Mike's GM would be paying for half of our room if we wanted to stay there. WOW! We agreed and what follows are posts with pictures of our awesome adventure!

What a cool hotel!

The place had a built in Water Park which we never even used but..

...check out the amenities!

When we arrived that night we checked in, relaxed, danced, had a couple of beers and danced danced danced. There was a DJ in the lobby until like 11pm. Anna loved it.

I even called J to brag!

Lily Had Fun too!

A little hesitant...

So, once we arrived at the park first thing on Sunday, we met up with Mike's cousin and his family. We quickly realized that B was going to have some trouble with her height. She is not quite 36". She's pretty close, especially with that cute ponytail, but not quite. So, this first ride we tried to put her on was Plankton's Plunge, a super kiddie version of Drop Zone. The kid who was checking heights said he would go ahead and let her ride. As I went over to set her on the ride, she said "No, no, no." She didn't want to ride. I thought this would be how the rest of the day would go for sure. I figured she wouldn't want to do anything, even if I could go with her, which I was going to do on this one.

Here's the picture of Scott and his family next to an empty seat where Miss Anna was going to be.

So, when we got over to this awesome little kids' ride, I was not surprised that she seemed a little hesitant to ride.

But, Dylan, himself an old pro, said he would help Anna by riding with her and WOW did she ever love it!

As you can see it didn't take long for Anna to become an old pro.

She even rode with her Dad on this big green bus that took them up into the sky, round and round. But it was too boring for our brave little girl so...

...we drove the bumper cars!

I just can't believe how brave she was! Every time she bumped into someone she'd yell "Bop!" and crack up laughing. And she's so smart too! If she would ever get stuck I would just remind her to keep turning the steering wheel in one direction and she could "unstuck" herself every time!

Here's Anna chasing after Dylan. She means business!

More fun to come!

After the bumper cars it was time to meet Scooby Doo and go to lunch.

When we went to lunch, which was provided by Mike's company there was a raffle set up in the shelter. Since, everything that we had done so far was free, including lunch, and provided to us by the company, we really felt almost obligated to by raffle tickets. But, with over 750 people in attendance and most of them buying the 5 for $20 ticket bundle, we didn't anticipate getting much from it. They were raffling off backpacks, cash prizes, hotel stays and...tickets to the 500. After so many numbers had been called, and many quite close to our numbers, 9258-9262, we finally just let B play with the tickets.

Then when the 500 tickets were being raffled off, we heard it 9...2...6...0! "That's us!" I calmly said to Mike who jumped up.
"Where are the tickets?" he exclaimed.
"Over there underneath that picnic table." I said trying to point but couldn't because I was feeding the baby. (Anna had long ago lost interest in playing with them.) Once he located them he took them up to claim our prize! I'm able to get out of work and we're going to the 500this weekend. I've never even been!

After this excitement we walked around the park where Mike and I rode a couple of rides alone while the other watched the babies. Anna and I rode on the log ride that does a big drop and Anna really enjoyed it.

And finally, the last time I went to put B in the bumper cars to show her dad what an awesome driver she is, she just looked up at me as I was setting her inside the car and said so sweetly, "I wanna go home." So, I took her off the track and this was the scene about 3 minutes later.