Vacation Epilogue

After our fun-filled week at Lakeside, we spent a day at Cedar Point in Sandusky. We had a blast! It was raining off and on.... but that kept us from getting too hot. We ended up spending 12 hours at the park.... and now the boys are begging to go back.

The view from the ferris wheel.

We loved seeing Snoopy and the Peanuts gang all over the park. I wish we could have found a Charlie Brown for Jon to get his picture taken with, but we didn't. The boys all got Charlie Brown souvenirs though.

 

Driving was another big hit of the day. Ray was especially thrilled to be able to do FOUR rides where he could "drive." He did a great job. I'm considering letting him run errands in the van. (Kidding) Adam, on the other hand, not so much. I have no pictures of him driving because I was too busy praying and yelling as he TRIED to steer the cars off the track. Jon will definitely be in charge of teaching him to drive.

 

 And then there's my sweet friend/goddaughter.... who proudly carried around this tiger all day after her dad won it by having his age guessed. The lady guessed considerably younger than he is. Woo hoo!!!

 This next picture really tricked lots of people when I posted it on Facebook. :)

 

They were not actually on a roller coaster.... but they did a good job pretending, right? This old Gemini car was on display in a museum at the park.

 

I had not been to Cedar Point in lots of years. I was amazed that the roller coasters that used to seem so huge and scary now look like kiddie rides. They are absolutely dwarfed by the new ones. We did not ride any of those new crazy things. The boys are too young and we're too old. ;) However, Ray was absolutely fascinated by them.... loved studying them and learning all their names.

 

Adam did hoodwink me into riding some Snake River thing that ended up being terrifying and got us both completely drenched!

ONE of us really loved this ride!
One of us got to the hotel MANY hours later and still had damp undergarments! ;)

Adam and I had lots of fun riding all the spinning/twirling rides. Jon and Ray did actually ride a "kiddie" coaster. I LOVE this picture of both of them ----

 

 

 

 

Random giant mac and cheese noodle.

 We rode tons of rides and had so much fun. Cedar Point really does have lots to do for all ages. We even saw an ice skating show and a laser light/singing extravaganza.

My big mistake of the day was telling all three of my video game loving boys that they could play in the old-fashioned arcade before we left.

 They had a great time of course....

I never did ask how much money Jon had to spend to "win" this from a claw machine.



 

.... a great LONG time! They were in heaven. I was somewhere else. So tired and ready to rest. I considered laying down under one of the pinball machines.

 



I finally did get them out of the arcade at around 11:00pm.... at which point Adam asked, "When are we going to have some lunch?" (Yes, we had eaten two meals already at the park. Yes, he was hungry again from having so much fun.) We got them some more food and headed to our car just as the fireworks were going off. We drove to our hotel and spent fewer hours there than at the park.

The next morning we made the short drive to Sorrowful Mother Shrine in Bellevue for a beautiful Sunday Mass in their outdoor pavilion.  All of our feet and legs were aching from the Cedar Point extravaganza, so we didn't walk to all the amazing grottos and shrines, but we did love ending our vacation with the Holy Eucharist.... thanking God for all His amazing blessings.