Raging Rivers

The girls earned a lot of fun rewards through their school's reading program this past year. In addition to the monthly personal pan pizza they also earned a kids meal at Subway, a kids meal at Denny's, Free six flags tickets, and free Raging River tickets. Noticing that our summer was already filling up, we decided to head to the waterpark Raging Rivers the second week-end in June. Our neighbors thought we were crazy. They said that the water would still be too cold. Obviously, they've never lived in Cleveland before. We actually preferred to go before it was 100 degrees outside and the lines were crazy long. The night before, Katy started complaining of an earache. I ran to Walgreen and bought some ear ache drops and told her we'd go to the doctor first thing in the morning. We woke up, and Katy said she felt better, so we bypassed the doctor's office and headed straight for the park. We took earplugs and a swimming cap and told her to keep her ears dry.

We had a blast. The park was not really big, but that was even better for our family. Katy was big enough to go on everything and Xandy was only too small for one ride. Everything was pretty close together which was great for little legs. Jacob and Bella loved the little kid area which was full of shallow wading pools and waterslides just their size. The older girls had a blast in the wave pool and older kid play area. Everyone, even Jacob (on his parent's lap of course) had a blast on the long winding water slides and in the lazy river. The waterpark was right along the river and it was fun to look out and watch all the boats while waiting in line. When we finally had our fill, we decided to head home. While I took the girls to change, Jared and Jacob went to the car. Jacob fell asleep while Jared moved the car to the gate. We woke him up to change him and eat a snack. He fell back asleep on the way home (about 6:30). When we got home, we again tried to wake Jacob up. Jared and I were heading to Bobby's custard for yummy treats and a free summer concert. We didn't want him waking up right when we got home and were ready for bed. We weren't successful in our attempts to awaken him but he ended up sleeping until 7:30 the next morning. He really played hard at the waterpark and was completely exhausted. The next morning Katy woke up in a lot of pain so I took her to the express care before church. She had an ear infection and a ruptured ear drum. I felt horrible, I should've taken her in instead of to the water park, but she assured me that she was fine and had a great time the day before.

There was a sign in the children's area that was probably the most effective "watch your children" sign I've ever seen. It worked for me, no way I was leaving my children unsupervised. I don't need another living creature to potty train and pick up after, nor do I need my children any more hyper than they already are!!!

Eating a picnic lunch