Our last month of summer...

Another long post coming up...sure wish I could stay caught up with all the haps of the summer.

I am surprised that we made it all the way to August before going to the fountains at the Irvine Spectrum, but we finally went, and the kids had so much fun. For some reason, I always feel a little "WT" doing the fountain activity, but my kids have so much fun I just don't care. Perhaps the "WT" stigma comes from the all the kids who clearly weren't planning on playing in the fountain so then their mom just lets them play in their underwear which gets see-through and saggy. Or maybe it comes from the woman who nursed her six-month old at the fountain by pulling her "B-double O-B" out from the TOP of her v-neck t-shirt, without so much as a burp cloth or blanket. And of course, the baby was distracted by all the fountain fun behind him so he kept pulling off, leaving this woman's ginormous breast entirely exposed!! But despite these two facts, my kids still have a great time whenever we go.




We also took a quick trip up to Fresno. When I was in high school, my mom was doing research for her Ph.D. so she took me with her to Romania. Well, she has stayed in touch with one of our Romanian interpreters Tatiana, who has been staying with her son in Fresno. So my mom flew out here and we drove up there for two days. The Romanian couple are both doctors, with no children, so I was just praying my kids didn't break anything in a house with not a single kid friendly item in it. Tatiana kept pouring Ezra mango juice in a measuring cup, filled to the brim, and handing it to him. Then he was ticked when I tried to take it away....it about gave me a coronary. And I didn't know what to do when Tatiana was trying to literally force Kate to take a bite of cold, green, pureed eggplant "salad". Kate was trying to be polite about it, but she was not about to open her mouth. But it all turned out okay, and I learned that Fresno is the "fruit belt" of California, so we had some peaches and grapes that would blow your mind.
So this is me with our interpreter Tatiana, and then my mom with her. Luckily there was a pool outside for my kids, but Fresno is ridiculously hot....105 every day we were there. Going outside was actually painful.

Here's little Ez in our hotel room, at 11 p.m. mind you, eating chips in the bed he and I shared.



Then we did something that was nothing short of miraculous. Us Zimmerman gals planned a family day at Wild Rivers, and our husbands actually all took half-days and came with us! It was such a special day! :) Our little family had never been there, and we all had such a great time. It will definitely be more fun when our kids are older, but it was still great. Kate left the park at 7 p.m. a total mess of tears and exhaustion from being there all day, but that's almost a good sign of a full, tiring day.

Here's Kate, the little ham.

Kate and Jim going down one of kiddie slides. But look at Jim's face...pretty sure he's enjoying himself.


And then Ez, the angel boy, just climbed up on this lounge chair at 2 p.m. and slept for two hours. He is such a good little boy.


Don't know why the guys won't leave work more often...this looks pretty relaxing to me.

Here is Kate when told it was time to leave, after being there for 6 hours. The meltdown that ensued was one for the books.

And although her behavior hardly merited a reward (look at her eyes--she was hammered!), she left the park a happy girl with some Dippin' Dots. Seriously, those things are delish!!

Okay, and then I don't mean to make fun, but we encountered the strangest family at Wild Rivers. The family members were easy to spot, and they kept appearing all over the park. I have never seen anything like this family....I will let the photos speak for themselves.
Here is the mom and the dad.

Two sisters.....

Kate, totally oblivious.

And the baby of the family....i'm telling you....bizarre.

And finally, last night we went with a few other families to a show called "Walk with the Dinosaurs" at the Honda Center. It was incredible. The production cost around $20 million dollars, and the dinosaurs were life-sized and computer generated. We sat in the nosebleeds, so my pictures don't do the dinosaurs justice, but it was so cool. The kids were all afraid when the dinosaurs roared, but that just added to the fun.
Look closely, and you can see the man that narrated the show next to the... Bracciosauraus? Like I know what kind of dinosaur it is.

Here is the T-Rex and some other spiky dinosaur....like i said, the pictures just don't do it justice.

Ez, once again, was such a good boy. He sat on our lap the entire time, oohing and aahing, pointing at everything. It was so cute.