Friday Fun at Chuck E. Cheese's

I'm still shocked that Ft. Myers, Florida has a Chuck E. Cheese's. I swear I live in Dinosaur Land with just about enough kid activities that I can count on my hands, so for us to actually have a Chuck E. Cheese's is so cool.

Some friends and I have decided that on Fridays we are going to have Fun Fridays where we do something super fun with all our kids. Last week it was the beach and this week it was Chuck E. Cheese's. They are having their grand opening on Monday, but Leah went in and asked if they are letting kids in before then. They said yes so it was decided that we would all bring our rascals to enjoy some super good fun playing because like the slogan says, it's "where a kid can be a kid"!

Everyone met up at around 11:00-11:30, purchased our tokens and headed out in the crowd for all the fun. We had a pretty large group consisting of Shannon, Aimee, Leah, Terra, Karan and myself and all of our kids, 14 total. The place was so cool and very kid friendly. I love it when new places open up because even the employees are excited to be there. Everyone had a blast, and although we didn't get to hang out that much with our friends because our kids were all in different areas, we still had a really great time.

The boys at first were not too thrilled about Chuck E Cheese's as I was. They were acting a little shy and were almost frightened with all the loud, flashing, moving games. Aidan who I was sure would love the Huge monster truck was yelling for me to take him off and Rylan wasn't sure what to think of everything. After wondering around for a little bit just kind of checking out the place, we decided to get some lunch. I ordered a small personal size pizza for the boys to share along with a cool Chuck E. Cheese's souvenir cup, and I ordered myself a trip to the salad bar. It was great! I love any place that has a salad bar. The pizza I'll admit was not the greatest but my boys gobbled it right up. After we were done eating we headed back out into the madness. This time they were a little more lively and started playing and riding all the rides. Rylan loved the carousel and the train that went around and around in circles. I think he just loved inserting all his tokens into the slots. Aidan took a liking to the air hockey game and even found a little boy to play with. He was having so much fun playing with this little boy, it was the cutest. But the one place that they spent the most time in was the jungle gym that was suspended in the air and then had a slide. The best part was watching them climb up into this thing. Aidan was having a pretty tough time at first because the platform was a little too high. But he found a way to wedge his foot in the netting in the corner and prop himself up. It's really cool to stand back and watch their minds work and do problem solving. I probably look like a jerk mom who is just sitting there watching her kids struggle trying to get up on this platform and not offering a helping hand, but it's not that I don't want to help, I just want to see if he can figure it out himself. If he yells for me to help I usually will explain to him how to get up, but I don't really like just going up and pushing his butt up there. I feel like he isn't learning that way. Anyways, it only took Rylan about 3 minutes to watch what Aidan was doing and then go over and try it too. That kid cracks me up. He always wants to do everything his brother does no matter how dangerous it might be. He amazes me! The things that he's doing at his age is incredible, it's just really interesting to see how much he learns from Aidan.
















After spending lots of time up in those tubes I put them both on this simulator called "Jet Rider". They both were staring at the screen with their mouths open and I could tell that they really thought it was cool and that they also were running out of steam, Fast! So I gathered them up we headed home for naps. They both fell asleep in the car. We'll definitely be going back, I still have a whole cup full of tokens. Maybe daddy can join us next time!