Friday Not-So-Fun Day

Don't you love it when you wake up in the morning with the plan to do something fun and out of the ordinary with your kids, and in your mind you've got this vision of how picture perfect it will be: tear filled eyes replaced with wonder and excitement, whines (spelling?) replaced with laughter, moping replaced with smiling, and instead of stressed out mom you have a carefree woman enjoying her precious children? But instead of this beautiful scene, you get the complete opposite? Has this ever been you? Well, it was me today.

Stealing the idea from my sister-in-law, Kimi, I have decided to try and make Fridays "Friday Fun Day" where I do something fun with the kids that we don't do normally. Today was our first try at it. I thought it would be fun to take them to the local dinosaur park that I have neglected to take advantage of in all the years we've lived here. Noah LOVES dinosaurs, so of course he was thrilled with the idea.

It didn't take long to see that our fun excursion was off to a rocky start. Inside the museum they have a display of dinosaur bones and upstairs they have some cool animal robotics. Instead of being excited and thrilled beyond measure by all this, Noah was scared and didn't want to stay. The robotics were a little too real and made him nervous. Clara, on the other hand, thought it was great. So, we ditched the inside of the museum and headed for the outside, which is where 90% of the park's displays are anyway.

It was really neat out there. It's like a real life version of the movie Jurassic Park, sort of. I was very surprised at how much there was to look at. They've done a great job, a little too great I guess. Noah was even more scared. Not only are the dinosaurs life like, but they also have sound equipment, so you can hear roaring dinosaurs and loud insects. They made Noah quite nervous. Because he was so scared, it made him grumpy. He didn't want to walk down most of the trails, but I kind of made him. I know I'm mean, but I wanted to show him he didn't need to be scared, and I also wasn't about to waste our money! I paid good money to go there and we were going to see every inch of that place and we were all going to have a good time or so help me!! So, after lots of threats that he better be happy or we'd leave, we finally did. We were quite a site: me pushing Clara in her stroller, who, by the way, was a peach, trying to remain as calm as possible while my 4 year was bawling, "I don't want to go! We need to stay!" Fortunately, I was very successful in the whole remaining calm thing. I think what kept me going was the assurance that Clara was going to go straight to bed for her nap and Noah was darn well going to take a nap too, whether he liked it or not. So, he's sleeping right now, much to his dismay and much to my relief.

It wasn't all bad, thank goodness, and I was able to snap a couple shots to prove it.

Inside the museum they had a really neat rock display. These ones (I have no clue what they are) someone had carved some things with. They even made a special one just for Clara! How nice!

Clara's favorite was seeing the ducklings swimming in the river (she's doing her version of the sign for duck). Go to a dinosaur park and watch the ducks. Go figure.

Noah digging for dinosaur bones.

He did smile a few times! This was a fun slide. It was a giant pterodactyl's head and the slide was his tongue.

Well, it wasn't the Friday "Fun" Day I was hoping for. I guess it was a realistic one. Next time I'll try not to get my hopes too high, so I'm not as disappointed. I'm still glad I went because even though he didn't act like it, I think Noah had fun, and believe it or not, I did too. I love doing things with my kids. In fact, while we were there, there was a group of kids from a local daycare, and it broke my heart. The kids were trying to play on the playground area, and they kept getting yelled at by their teachers. Their mothers should be the ones taking them to parks and museums. As challenging as it was for us today, it was still fun, and there's nowhere else I'd rather be. I wouldn't trade any of my "not-so-fun" days for all the glamorous jobs in the world (but don't give me that option in the heat of the moment).