But until that baby comes...

When I was quite pregnant with Kathleen (quite a while ago now), Brandon's family had a reunion.  The Sherwoods live in southeast Missouri about an hour away from Branson, the place where Las Vegas stars to go die.  In addition to shows, Branson has a theme park, Silver Dollar City, which comes with the requisite roller coasters.

I enjoy roller coasters, but the park has rules about 7 1/2-month pregnant women riding roller coasters.  I vowed, however, that the next time I was able to go to an amusement park, I would not be so pregnant, and I would not be taking Kathleen with me either.

About 1 1/2 hours south of us lies Kings Dominion, one of the many amusement parks scattered along the East Coast.  Neither Brandon nor I had had the opportunity to go to any roller coasters since that time with his family, and I wasn't going to let this opportunity pass because who knows when the next time will come?  There certainly aren't roller coasters in Egypt - between the sand and lack of maintenance the roller coasters would be defunct in a month.

Last Saturday, I took our opportunity.  Our neighbor girl, Clara, was happy to babysit our little darlings while Brandon and I took off for the day.  I have a firm policy about children who have to ride in strollers and amusement parks.  They're not allowed.

We had a wonderful time, and rode every large roller coaster in the park.  Despite all of the twisting, looping, dropping, high-velocity roller coasters he encountered, Brandon was only scared by the upside-down Pirate Ship and vowed he would never ride one again.  He muttered something about bars failing and splatting on the ground below.

And the best part about our outing?  We didn't have to wipe a single bottom, not once did we tell someone to sit down, and when we got home the girls were in bed, asleep.  And that was worth every single penny we paid Clara.