A visit to Cleveland

On Friday we packed up the car and headed back to the Cleveland area for an eventful weekend.  Early Saturday morning my friend Alissa and I headed to a kids resale in North Ridgeville.  We love these things.  I got Carter some cute shirts and DVD's for the long car trips.  I can only watch Cars 2 so many times until I go crazy.  Then we ventured out to Fairview to have breakfast with the Rader's.  They have a little boy, Mason, who will turn 2 in February.  The boys played so well.  MJ made eggs, bacon, toast, hashbrowns, and cut up fresh fruit.  My boys ate like vultures.  They hardly ever eat breakfast foods so I was pleasantly surprised while I watched them shovel it in.  Next, we headed back to Alissa's house for a potluck luncheon with friends.  It was so great to see all the kids playing together and to get a chance to catch up with everyone.  Afterwards, we packed up the car and headed to Great Wolf Lodge in Sandusky.  This is an indoor waterpark/hotel.  My mom met us there to watch the boys in the evening while we went out.  We took the boys into the waterpark to play.  Landon loved splashing around and playing in the little water fountain spurts.  Carter was a daredevil.  He  went down the little water slides all by himself and then Bob showed him this big play structure.  They climbed on that and then I couldn't find them.  I looked up at the top and realized they were in line for the "adult-sized" water slides.  If you know me, you know that I am pretty laid back when it comes to most things but I was a little freaked out because I was afraid he would get scared and try to jump over the side or something crazy like that.  Oh no, he went down that slide super fast and when he reached the bottom he was backwards and laughing his butt off.  Funny how your kids amaze you sometimes.  Saturday evening Bob and I headed out to the Annual Reverse Raffle hosted by the Sandusky Police Department.  We have friends who are cops there and we always try to get out to this.  We won it one year with a couple other families and since then we hope our luck returns.  When we got there Bob won another ticket for a chance at the big $. We were doing well and ended up being one of the last 30 numbers called.  It totally stinks to be called when it is getting close because by that time you have convinced your self that you could win this thing.  We had a great time hanging out with friends so it ended up being a wonderful time.  Sunday morning we headed over to Steak and Shake for breakfast and on our way out I rolled my ankle and went down in the middle of the restaurant.  Oh yes, I was holding Landon and thankfully I grabbed the railing and didn't drop him.  I began limping back to the table to get Bob to help me.  I was so embarrassed that I started to laugh uncontrollably and made even more of a scene.  I walked heel toe all the way to the car.  It is still a little sore but that is just par for the course right? Back in at the water park, Landon decided that he wanted to go down the slides just like Carter.  He went down backwards also.  For lunch we met friends from college and their families at Chili's.  One of the families is about to have their second child in 21 days.  They seemed a little scared and overwhelmed but I know that it will be fine for them when the day arrives.  After lunch we drove over to Port Clinton to go to the African Wildlife Safari.  This is a place where you drive your car through an area where you can feed animals through your car windows.  My cousin had a friend you got tickets that she couldn't use from groupon and gave them to us to use so...we did.  This was a crazy experience.  You buy carrots and animal food at the gate (sneak in more carrots cuz they are super expensive there) and then you feed the animals as they come to your car.  We fed elk, buffalo, deer, zebras, llama looking things, and crazy horned animals.  At first the boys were scared but then they wanted to hang out the windows and feed the animals themselves.  Some animals would stick their whole heads into the car to get the food.  I was laughing so hard several times that I thought I might pee my pants.

Carter telling me, "Carter ready go"

 Here is Carter coming down the adult slide backwards.

Landon just chillin in the pool 

Carter helping to feed the crazy animals

This guy was a porker.  He was eating all the food from the cup.

Look how far they would stick their heads in!

Landon peed through his clothes during the experience so we couldn't jump out of the car to get him other clothes so we had to cover him up with a coat!  He was loving it!

The zebras at the end were awesome!