Disney Dad

As most of you know, Bryan took a new job at the beginning of this year.  He was offered a better position at a better bank and, so far, it has been a positive change for everyone involved.  Well, except for the first month or so.  The company, Centier Bank (check it and Bryan out at www.bryantraylor.com) is based out of Merrillville Indiana and Bryan spent most of February and some of early March out of town for training, interviews and hiring. 

The kids and I stuck to our normal schedule and aside from less laundry barely noticed that he was gone.  Just kidding, we spent most of our time crying and pining for him.  One aspect of Bryan being gone from Monday to Friday every week was that he was eager to spend as much fun time with the kids as possible while he was home.  This lead him to take on the roll of a "Disney Dad"  You know, the term that describes a dad that only sees his kids on the weekends so he does whatever the kids want.  Yep, that was Bryan.  I was exhausted and just wanted to stay home and rest up for the following week, but it didn't take much arm twisting to get me to ditch my chores and head to the Children's Museum and the Indianapolis Zoo.

Bryan and Jack at the dinosaur dig.

 I think the museum requires that children wear the safety goggles just  because they are so cute.

 Well, cute and disfiguring.

 There's always a dad, probably another Disney Dad, that just can't stay out of the dig. 

Lilly hatching her dino eggs.  It was the stillest that she sat all week.

 What's more fun than dinosaurs?

 Not sure if she's protecting the eggs or doing some sort of a rain dance.

 Trains...that's something that's better than dinosaurs, at least for Jack.  He cried when we finally left the train area.

 Ticket saleswoman.  She sold me a train ticket to London...London Kentucky, I assume.

Pretending to be geckos with sticky fingers.

 And, Hot Wheels, those are better than dinosaurs and trains.  Yes, another exhibit that ended with Jack crying.

 So much joy to be had in a giant room filled with toy cars!

 I had just informed Lilly that this was the exact room that housed the Barbie exhibit.  It took only a few moments for her to grasp the meaning of that.  No Barbie exhibit. 

Disney Dad, aka body guard, made sure no one took Jack's car or ramp.

 Excavating.  Yeah, excavating is better than dinosaurs too.

 Lilly is my child.  She, along with a couple other little girls, spent her time at the construction site collecting stray 'rocks' and depositing them neatly into an empty hole.

 Then, Jack helped many of the other kids redistribute the rocks to the floor.

 At the tree house on the next floor Jack made a friend.  We still have no idea who was inside the tree house, but whoever it was kept Jack entertained for a long time by poking the puppet's head out of a hole and then disappearing as soon as Jack reaching in for him.

Carousel.

 The chicken freaked him out a little and definitely wasn't better than the dinosaurs.

 "Lilly, get off your ass!"

 Playing dress up in the Egypt exhibit made up for the lack of Barbie.

Riding a giant Nile crocodile.  Brave girl.  Jack has the baby crocodile and has since pretended to be a baby crocodile several times.  I can only assume that he is much more cuddly and cute than an actual baby crocodile.

 Jack had to stand on the crocodile too.  I think they were locking the doors at closing time as we were leaving this exhibit.

That night we said our good byes to Daddy and he was up and heading to Merrillville before the rest of us were awake.

But, he was home on Friday night, and already talking about the zoo on Sunday.

Before we left that house Bryan asked the kids if they wanted to go to the zoo.  "Yes!"  Lilly said and then rattled off a laundry list of the things she wanted to see and do.  Jack's response, "Me ride the train?  Yes."

So, we rode the train.

 Of course the zoo has a carousel too.  Had to ride that.  I hate carousels, when I take the kids to these places without Bryan I strategically avoid the area with the carousel.  Glad everyone got to ride this time.

 A very special thanks to Daddy for all of the fun during 'Disney Dad February' and a great big thanks to the grandparents who made both of these locations absolutely free for us.  Every year for Lilly's and my birthday we get a Zoo membership from my mom and dad and a Children's Museum membership from Bryan's parents.