Labor Day at Brookfield

Joe had to work pretty much every minute of Labor Day weekend.  So that left me running out of ideas  (and patience) to entertain the kids without bothering dad.  I'll admit that I've put together better weekends ... until Monday.  That was a great day.  We met up with Mary Boxer and Emmit and Ian at the Brookfield Zoo and we walked those kids for 4 hours straight.  We had a great time.  We saw the Dinosaurs Alive exhibit and a ton of animals.  We even paid extra for the "touch a stingray" exhibit, but those stingrays had figured out that if they stayed low and in the middle of the big tank, the kids couldn't reach them.  Finn was BUMMED!  But even though the kids were dead tired at the end of our zoo visit, the fun was not over yet.  The kids got a 45 minute disco nap while I drove to the hotel in Deerfield where the Boxers were staying while their kitchen was being renovated.  Since the hotel didn't have a convention booked that weekend, we had the pool and hot tub to ourselves.  The kids had a blast running to get warm in the hot tub before running right back to the pool.  We did that for almost an hour until the pizza arrived. Then we ate in the courtyard as the sun was setting and the kids played tag between bites.  On our way back to the car after saying goodbye, Finn asked if we could come back soon.  If we can get some discount rates on a non-convention weekend this winter, I'm totally up for it.