Another Weekend Adventure

Friday at 4pm, we drove to Laurel (just west of Billings) where we would park our camper for the night (a la Cousin Eddie) and leave our kids to be babysat with our friends, The Egelands, while we attended the temple. That's how the temple looked when we left at 9:30pm.

*aside*

After the temple, Rich needed to buy a razor, so we stopped at Walgreen's. Now, if you live in a town with a Walgreen's, you're thinking "Big Whoop," but if you haven't set foot in a drug store for 10 years, you're dizzy with retail overstimulation like us. We spent almost an hour in Walgreen's, completely fascinated by the sheer variety of merchandise, especially stuff we hadn't seen any where else. Besides, I have always had a "thing" for drugestores, but Walmart and Target have made them kind of obsolete. I remember when a big Osco opened in Tucson (8th grade was it?) and me-n-Sooz just went to town in there with our babysitting wages, buying gallon jugs of Sea Breeze and cotton balls, and Noxema, and Aqua Net, and...well, you get the picture. I really went down memory lane, and I am so glad I have an equally-nerdy husband who also gets excited at drug stores and sundry shoppes! ;)
Anyway, we went back to the Egelands and saved them from our children, then spent a cozy night in our tent in front of their home. Mike Egeland is a mechanic and James was fascinated by his garage. Mike even let him "drive" this Hudson he's working on. James was so excited to see "Doc Hudson" (from Cars). Then we headed down to the Billings depot to see Thomas.

This dude marks the downtown Billings skatepark.

James was SO EXCITED!

He even got a Thomas tattoo on his arm!

Heidi and Addie were excited, too!

We waited in line for a piture with Thomas...

...beaming with excitement!

When it was our turn, Heidi was pouting, so just Addie & James went and posed with Thomas.

Shot of the Day: James with Thomas!!

We also saw Sir Topham Hat, superintendant of the railways (and Rich's next halloween costume, methinks).

The girls loved the jumping castle, but James wouldn't go in.

James like playing with the train sets inside the depot.

All over the Isle of Sodor!

James made a conductor friend and got to explore the train.

Caboose!

***

After Thomas (9am-11am), we took the kids to HuHot Mongolian Grill for lunch.

They made their own plates of noodles with meat and veggies...

YUMMY!

Even James gobbled up the good food!

Then Daddy bought us s'mores for dessert!

oops! Heidi's marshmallow is on fire!

mmm-mmm-good!
***

After HuHot, we went to The Reef indoor waterpark (at the Wyndam Hotel) from about 12:30pm-5pm. It's $16 per person, but we had 2-for-1 coupons, so the whole fam went for $32, and it was worth every penny!!!!

Two big slides for people over 48"

Addie just coming off the purple slide

The kids play area (with 4 slides for people under 48") had this fun giant bucket that continually filled and spilled.

Here are my girls waiting for the big splash! (I love this photo!)

We could not keep James out of the wave pool/beach...he loved it!

He also loved these little play canals

Great action shot of Heidi

Heidi plugging the sprinklers

Addie under a water fall

A Beached Whale's got my baby...oh, wait, that's me and James playing on the beach (w/o worrying about sunburns this time!)

Heidi is such a water baby! Even though she is only 47" tall and one lifeguard wouldn't let her on the slide, she went right back up and talked the other lifeguard into letting her slide and she went on all the slides about a million times. Alone!

Addie was determined to get across these lilypads!

Here she is trying it with Heidi

You go, girl...

James tried, too.

Here are Heidi and Addie coming out of the purple slide on a double raft...

WOOO-HOOOOO!

Best waterpark I have ever been to! Clean, fun, safe, affordable...2 thumbs up!

***

After the waterpark, we had dinner at the Subway inside Walmart and did our shopping there (because the Laurel Walmart ROCKS!). We picked up our trailer at the Egelands and headed home, arriving about 9pm, exhausted! Time for some more downtime...

(I say that half-jokingly...really, my cough is still way-bad after 8 weeks & another round of antibiotics, so I'm going to have to chill a bit and find out what's really wrong...shucks!)
We get to hang out with our favorite Laytons this week! My bro, Sam, lovely SIL Kristen, and wee prince Owen are flying up for a visit from AZ. We simply cannot wait!

What are you doing this week?