Six Flags

We took a family trip to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom yesterday. It was a lot of fun! We went with three other families and split up in the following way: Two dads and the four older boys in the Tahoe, two dads and the three younger girls in the minivan, four moms and the two baby girls in the other minivan. It worked out great, I heard each car did fabulous and our car with the babies was totally quiet! They slept most of the time, both ways!

We started off in the Looney Tunes area and the kids went on a train ride, an airplane ride, a small roller coaster and played in a ball shooting playground thing. While we were on one of those rides we saw Thomas town was right next to us so we headed over there next. All the kids went on the Thomas the Train ride, the Bertie Bus ride and the Harold the Helicopter ride. The Thomas ride conveniently drops you off in their Thomas gift shop and you are forced to walk through the shop with your children as they try to grab every toy they see and then demand to play trains at the train table, even through you have all the same trains and a train table at home, and it is never used!

Anyway, after Thomas Town we went and grabbed lunch and our family brought our lunch to the sea lion show and ate while we watched. The kids really enjoyed it and it was nice to be able to eat lunch while watching a show, instead of wasting that time just eating. Unfortunately I left my camera in the stroller for the show so I don't have any pictures of the cool (and large) sea lions. After the show we looked at the penguins and touched some stingrays-they were slimy.

Then we had to trek to the opposite side of the park to feed the giraffes. It was a long walk and we were in a hurry to get there by 2, but it was totally worth it! Drew and Ava both loved it and we got some awesome pictures of them feeding the giraffes. The giraffes would stick out their long black tongues and wrap them around the carrot or green onion or lettuce leaf the kids were holding out to them. It was Ava's favorite part!

After that we hung out in Jungle Land and the kids played on a giant play structure, rode an elephant ride, a boat ride, a balloon ride and a jeep ride. We also saw lions, white tigers, a cougar, elephants and camels. At 3:00 we tried to make it the Shouka show and while we got all nine kids and four moms settled in to watch the show, the dads went off to do some rides. Ten minutes later, the whale show was over! We couldn't believe it! So we had to find something to entertain the kids until the dads came back. We ended up watching a dolphin in the tank for a while, taking a potty break-no small feat with that many kids- and walking around.

Then it was the ladies turn! We used our time to go on Medusa-a big scary roller coaster with lots of twists and loops, Vertical Velocity (we went twice in a row), and the new one Tony Hawk's Big Spin. It was awesome! And we even bought the video of us spinning around like crazies on Big Spin. By that time the park was closing and we headed out. I think all the kids did a great job, there was virtually no fighting, arguing, or tantrums and most of these kids still take naps and had to skip them. We took our whole crowd to a nearby Rubio's for dinner then made the long drive home in the dark. It was a great day!