Carnival Time and a Great Weekend!

Ever have one of those weekends that you just HATE to see end? That was this past weekend for our family. Such a fun time we had! We started out the weekend with the kids gone to their aunt's house for the night on Friday and the day on Saturday. That left Wade and I with a night and afternoon to ourselves. The best part is that even though we could have found work to do around here, we didn't! After a lazy breakfast on Saturday morning, Wade and I headed into town for a few things, just enjoying looking around and spending time together. We got lunch and just sat and talked. Rare moment! :) After a while, we went home and just enjoyed a lazy afternoon in a quiet house until the kids came home around dinner time.

Sunday, we overslept and missed church...forgot about the new summer schedule....oops. So we had breakfast, got chores done and headed to the carnival in town. We haven't been in years and it was a really good time. Very small, but still fun. The kids were excited, we didn't tell them where we were going. :) The first stop I wanted to make was the "Friends of the Library Book Sale". Such a great event and one that I always seem to miss, until this year. :) You can fill a grocery bag with books and it's just a $1! Pretty cool. I walked away with just a handful of books, maybe 5, but they were still just $1. :) I kind of wish Wade and I had thought to go there on Saturday, I bet there were even more books to choose from then. Oh well...we had a great time!

Alyssa wanted to play one of those silly carnival games...so we let her. LOL No, she didn't win, but every kid has to try...right?
Then the kids picked a couple of rides to go on. There weren't many to choose from...this is a small town carnival, after all. :) Getting them to choose one to go on all together was hard, but we managed. Dylan had never been on a carnival ride...not since he was very little and has no memories of it, really. Yes, it's been THAT long since we took the kids and let them ride on rides. I personally can't stand the rides, they scare me to death, but the kids had fun. :)
This ride, once they were loaded on, they closed the door like a space ship. That made me SUPER nervous, but they said it was fun and they all came out with smiles. Alyssa even went on it a second time later when the boys were doing another ride. Crazy!

The next ride ended up being a bonus...the ride cut short, so they got their tickets back. Pretty cool! :) Alyssa didn't enjoy this one as much, but it was fun watching the boys get her spinning. :)
She was having fun, but had a problem with not being able to control the spinning...the boys enjoyed getting her going. :)
The boys decided to go on a scary ride..at least to this mamma. I'd NEVER go on it, but they had fun. We tried to get Alyssa to join them, but she wanted to go back on the space ship thing. :) I was a bit worried about Dylan, but he wanted to go...and had a blast! Crazy boys.
I couldn't get any clear pictures of them on this ride to post, but here they are getting off. This ride went WAY up in the air, hard to explain, but they stayed level while this huge arm swung them up and around several times. Like I said...CRAZY!
They came off the ride all smiles....guess they had fun!

All in all, it was a fun day. We got to spend some fun time with the kids, tried a deep fried Twinkie....it was actually good! I was VERY surprised. :) Fun time as a family...missed our Marine though. :( Anthony was never far from my mind yesterday, remembering times we took him to this carnival too. It's hard having kids grow up so fast, but we are so very proud of all of our kids and love every moment with them! This season of life is so short....we are enjoying every moment! :)