Making memories

Having taken no time off this summer apart from 2 Fridays, since mid-June and the family having been gone much of that time, I wanted to build a few memories together for the whole family.

So, we intentionally built in some time this week.

On Wednesday, I left the office at 3:30 to round up the boys and head to SunSplash, a local water-slide park for $10 Wednesday nights. Although it was a little chilly, it was their first experience at a water slide park. They're ready to go back... :-)

Both especially fell in love with the wave pool.

Brendon chose, as his first ever water slide, one of the wilder solo slides. I knew he was nervous as I looked at his face for the last time before I headed into the darkness of the tube. He has told me to go down first and he would follow. It was a fast dark tube that broke open into a toilet bowl in which you spin around and around, eventually dumping you in several feet of water. When he finally emerged, he was so thrilled with his accomplishment and still scared from the ride that his whole body shook for 15 minutes afterward.

On Thursday, I left the office at noon and we spent the day together as a family. We rode our bikes together at a leisurely pace to the local library, perused the books, came home to rest and then headed out for ice cream. We finished the day with a DVD and popcorn.

On Friday, we headed to the Bay. It was a foggy day in San Francisco (go figure, it normally is) and a little windy as we found our way to the Zoo. Ian was in heaven as we explored the animal areas one by one. His favorite, of course, was the insect zoo. He described each insect to us in detail and informed us about how dangerous it was.

After wandering the zoo for several hours, we set the GPS for Fisherman's Wharf to delve into a mountain of Ghiradelli Square Ice Cream for supper. We attempted to walk off the sugar rush on the wharf and the beach before fighting rush hour traffic back home.

Saturday morning greeted us with sleeping in, pancakes and cartoons.

Time makes all the difference...