Wednesday brought us to Rapid City and Wall, South Dakota, then back to Rapid City and finally Hill City. HOW we accomplished all we did in one day with three children and two adults, I have no idea, but we ZOOMED all over the western part of that state!
Apparently, I'm the last person on earth to hear about Wall Drug, the giant store that has taken over a city block in Wall, South Dakota. There are silly signs EVERYWHERE in SD. No, EVERYWHERE. Their marketing department gets an A+.
Hello, little John.
Try not to look TOO enthused about this ride.
(Lots of kiddo rides at Wall Drug.)
Calm down, little buddy. CALM DOWN.
All together now.
Whoa. What the WHAT is that!?
Little man and I, trying not to get splashed in the water park.
Drummer Boy.
Abs and I and the alligator named Al.
John is still stunned from seeing
a giant T-Rex
ROAR at us from down the hall.
(It freaked me out, too.)
Badlands. BAD!? No! Very VERY GOOD!
THIS is what summer is all about!
Trevor, Abbey and I kept jumping in and out of the car as we drove through the Badlands - John was sleeping in the car, so we'd have to exit and enter the car as quietly as we could.
We are now experts. Ninjas, really.
Love this. Love them.
Peace out.
Yikes. Now we had to be careful not to run over the goats!
You had to pinch yourself - this was REAL!
Background: remember, just yesterday, we spent the days looking at large heads that people had carved into the sides of mountains.
SO...on one of our many trips back into the car,
Trevor asks, "Who made this?"
I told him God had made this many, many years ago.
To which Trevor replied:
"Wow. Nice job."
Yeah. Snakes. We're staying on the path, thank you very much.
The nice people of South Dakota need not hear my screams.
My Boardwalk Buddies.
There's that cute kid again.
Whoa.
There's a Menards in South Dakota, too!
Off to the Storybook Island over in Rapid City. CRAZY amazing park that brings stories to life with large play equipment. SO many stories! Children's music playing constantly in the background! BOOYA! (click here to visit their website)
At some point Nicola noted that I was as amused as the 3 little ones!
My favorite moment: the kids are happily playing, the water fountain was bursting, and Angela Lansbury is singing in the background about the "Age of Not Believing".
HAPPY BRENDA.
Ahoy there!
Just for you, Mom!
Peek-a-Trevor!
"Only YOU can prevent forest fires!"
(We had been seeing Smokey the Bear all over SD, and Nic and I would break into the whole commercial each time, so you should have heard Abbey when we discovered this bear in the park!)
Briar Rabbit - stories of MY childhood!
Yikes. That's a pretty dramatic fall there, Humpty.
And THEN (because you didn't think the day was done yet, did you!?) we headed over to the Chuckwagon Show.
Aside from the fact that we made record time (aside from a dumb wrong-turn thanks to me), we zoom into the parking lot, pretty close to our 6pm reservation, park the car, grab three children and lock up the car, only to hear GUNFIRE.
Man, you're ONE MINUTE late to dinner,
and they start shooting at you!
Actually, it was just the pre-show gunfight for the kids. :)
We grabbed our seats, and the show began!
Cowboys!? Live music!? Food on tin plates? Children!?
We sang the Star Spangled Banner in the middle of the woods.
Warm, summer night. Cool lemonade.
We clapped, we danced, we sang.
We were dusty. We were dirty.
This is summer. This is America.
Headed home for the night.
And THEN where?
Oh yes, off to the POOL, one last time, of course!
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