King's Island

Living within 20 minutes of King's Island, we take a day once a year and get our fill of the amusement park... and today was that day! It was HOT, but it was such great fun. And to be honest, with all the rain and chilly temperatures we've had in recent months, the hot sun sure felt good.

(above) Big boy bumper cars in the main park. (below) Anna's first bumper car ride, in the "Snoopy's Driving School" in Snoopy Land. Our family spends A LOT of time in Snoopy Land. It's my favorite part of the park.

(below) Anna and Christopher were a team in the Snoopy 500.

We had to take the obligatory trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower. It was a beautiful day, and you could see forever. I kept asking the kids, "Can you see our house from here???" I have a little issue with heights, but after a few minutes I wasn't quite so jittery. Below, you can see some of the rides, including to the left, the The Wind Seeker, which is new this year: that's the tall "stick" that simply takes people this ridiculous height of 30 stories into the sky and spins them around. Craziness. To the right are the Vortex and the Beast.

Below is King's Island's newest roller coaster, the Diamondback, which I believe is the longest rollercoaster in the world. The Diamondback is insanely high (this picture doesn't do it justice) and goes insanely fast. Here's the descripton of it from KI's website: The tallest, fastest and meanest roller coaster to ever strike Kings Island! The ride stands 230 feet at its highest point with a first drop of 215 feet at a 74-degree angle. Riders slither their way around 5,282 feet of track at speeds up to 80 miles per hour!

Let me just explain to you how miniscule the odds are that I would ever ride this rollercoaster.

Ever since Anna Jean was born, she has been mesmerized by carousels. She can't get enough of carousels, and this day was no exception. We took 3 different carousel rides on this afternoon, and even then she cried for more.

It was a bittersweet day for Mommy in Snoopy Land today. Christopher is as tall as you can be to ride the kiddie rides at the park: next year, he will be too tall. Sniff, sniff.

I had to laugh at the beetle ride, below. Since it's still May, and most schools are still in session (ours was out last Friday), we pretty much had the park to ourselves all day: no lines, few people. But even though the beetle ride was completely empty, my 3 babies decided that they all had to ride together, squished together in the same little car. Warms a mommy's heart. Our favorite ride of the day wasn't photographed, because it was one of the few rides that we could all do together: the log flune. Remember the classic log ride that has been around since....ever??? Well, all 5 of us were able to cram into this log thing, meander around a track, and then splash down into a big, wet pool. I got tickled at how the kids were much more impressed with the log flune, which is probably the oldest ride at King's Island (or any amusement park, for that matter), than they were with the $50 million roller coasters. "Do it again, Mommy!" the boys yelled. Perhaps you just can't beat a good log ride on a 97 degree day, huh?