Family Fun

Every year for  Christmas Grandma and Grandpa Griffith send us money to spend on the kids.  This year we spent a fun afternoon (new years eve) at Jungle Jim's Playland .  (last year was Chuck-E-Cheese.)

After reading not-so-good online reviews about the food available at Jungle Jim's, we decided to go to Burger King for lunch first.  

Here are the excited kids with their burgers, fries, and SODA!  Joshua thought we were just serving soda for lunch and refused to eat anything else while the rest of us were eating.  I only gave him about 1" of soda in his cup, and he was happy with that.

When we gave up on Joshua  eating and began clearing the table , he threw a fit and decided he was  finally ready for something else.  Olivia even finished her rice cereal and green beans before Joshua finally took his last bite of hamburger.  The whole time he made us wait, he was beaming ear to ear as if he was doing it on purpose!  

For any readers that may not be familiar with Jungle Jim's Playland, it is a miniature amusement park  indoors with rides, games, and climbing play area.  For kids  age 2-8 (my kids) it was heaven!  Admission cost is "only" $8.50 per child to get in the door.  Adults are free, but required to accompany kids.  Even Olivia had to pay, but was not old enough to go on any rides.  

This is one of the first rides the kids went on.  It is a train of jeeps that go round and round.  Joshua loves being in the "truck" but isn't showing much emotion in this picture.   

Look at Adam and Miriam!  They love it!  I think Adam thinks he is driving.

Adam absolutely surprised me the whole day.  Adam is a quiet guy who doesn't make much noise (unless provoked) and I had no idea how he would react.  I guess I imagined him scared to death to go on the rides.  I was sooooo wrong.  Adam loves to go fast - and the faster the better.

This next picture is of the "roller coaster" as the kids call it.  It goes around in a circle and moves up and down like a sine wave.  It is the fastest ride they have and my kids' favorite ride.  The first time they went on it, they made me come with them.  Michael was feeling sick, so he held Olivia and took pictures.  After the ride, I felt a little sick too.  It goes forward for a while, then stops and races backwards.  I know it is just a small kid's ride, but it wasn't something I would want to repeat.   My kids kept coming back to this ride over and over.  In fact, before we left we told them one more ride and they picked the "roller coaster."

Here are the kids by themselves.  Miriam loved squealing with her arms in the air.  Adam and Emily just held on and loved it.

This is another favorite ride of Adam's, the flying ride.  Once Adam learned how to pull the lever to make his car rise into the air, he loved it even more.  (And it goes fast.)

I missed pictures of the merry-go-round, swings, and teacups, but I got a picture of the bumper cars.  Miriam and Adam are in the back  of the picture.  At first Emily couldn't get the bumper car to move and I found myself shouting, "Miriam!  come hit Emily!"  to help her get going.  Now where else would I ever shout that?

It was a fun day, and expensive day, and an exhausting day.  The kids had a blast doing something different.  If we ever do it again, I will pass on tokens for the games because the kids preferred the rides.  

Overall, I would say we had a FABULOUS DAY!  Thanks Grandma and Grandpa Griffith!