Luisen Park

Today we went to Luisen Park in Mannheim with some other families in our ward for a day of play and fun. I had heard about the park and Jaxon had been there on a field trip a long time ago, but it was pretty much a new adventure for us. The adventure started while we were waiting in the Mobel Martin parking lot for everyone to get there so we could caravan to the Park. When I tried to start my car after a few minutes of waiting in the parking lot, it wouldn't start. It barely made a pathetic attempt at sputtering and just died. Nothin'. Darn. I had left my lights on for the ten minutes while we were waiting for everyone to gather, could that have been enough to drain the battery? Well, there were four women together and we were all pretty smart, so somehow we could figure this out. I was really wishing I had that ADAC membership right about now. One of the moms suggested we go have fun at the park and jump the battery when we got back. So, Amy Parish was awesome and let me and my kids load up in her car and off we went to the park. It is a beautiful place with fountains, gardens, and playgrounds. The kids ran around and had a great time.




Once we found the play ground, the kids were in heaven. Even Jaxon had a great time playing with all the other y chromosome off spring we had with us today.

Ella loved climbing up here and hanging out in this 'cage' before going down the big slide.



The park has a butterfly garden house that was really neat. As soon as we walked in, we saw butterflies all around us.




No park experience is complete without a chance to get wet, so we felt fulfilled when we saw this big fountain. The kids were drawn to it like a huge magnet and while two of mine got their feet/shoes wet, the rest of them remained dry: YEA!






Next came the boat ride. No rowing was required because these boats ran on a track. We chose the shorter of the two options for our ride, a 20 minute sail around a big pond with tons of fish, ducks, geese, and turtles. The German men who organized which of our party went into each boat must not have children of their own. They put all the boys over the age of 8 in one boat with the stern instruction: "No rock boat!!" Then they put most of the little kids in the next boat, with only one 13 year old babysitter. The last boat was reserved for the four moms. We tipped the boat guys 20 euros for the relaxing 20 minutes we next enjoyed. I did have Mason next to me, but the other three were in the first two boats, so I tried to relax and think that they were all pretty good swimmers and would probably be fine for the next 20 minutes. Mason and I had a blast once we figured out that the fish wanted to be fed. They would swim toward the boat with their huge open mouths sticking out of the water. Good thing Mason and Ella didn't finish those pretzels I just bought for a snack. We started ripping off pieces and creating a feeding frenzy as we threw the pretzel into the water. At one point, Mason had his own goose. This goose swam alongside the boat and followed Mason for more pretzel. I asked Mason what the goose's name was, and he said, "Duck." I said, "How about Duck, Duck, Goose?" And he liked that.

Here is the boat full of boys pulling away from the shore. We could still make out them singing "There's A Zombie on Your Lawn" at this point.

And here's Mason being grumpy for a minute, because, as you remember, no outing is complete without at least one temper tantrum or grumpy moment.