Thanksgiving Safari

Whole trip worth this picture :)
I LOVE IT!!!

Zebras!

Cool stork

The Giraffes being fed

My 3 favorite kids

My 3 favorite kids in front of a totem pole

Me and my Tweeter

Thankfully a fake hippo...

The girls from behind

Yummy Thai fried chicken and rice, and chicken broth and cucumbers and chili sauce and random dish of thai macaroni noodles...

Megan (she did great, this face was just priceless!)

Jack

Dan

Moo, Jack and Dan feeding the birds

The last couple of minutes - I finally let some birds eat out of my hand! Kylie wouldn't go near them!

The danger of playing with birds...

Yay for peacocks walking around - FYI I had to get this picture because our nephew Mikey likes peacocks at the "kazoo" a lot :)

Kylie's feeding the giraffe...because we made her. She didn't want to at all. Totally freaked out.

But was willing to imitate the giraffes with Daddy...

The boys petting the giraffes

Jack feeding the giraffe

Daddy and Moo

Kylie's picture of a giraffe...licking the railing

Jack with albino fish

The boys with strawberry cones

The girls with ice cream...Megan's Magnum and Kylie's chocolate cone!

Dolphins

Beluga Whale

I love pics of Dan and the kiddos from behind walking...

I LOVE LOVE LOVE this lady's sari! It is beautiful and about the coolest color combo EVER! I keep asking Dan to take me to India (only country I've asked him to take me too - FYI) and maybe if I had a sari like this, he would agree to it!

On Thanksgiving, Dan had off work. The kids, however, do not (their school only gets out for Thai holidays, not American ones)! For the past 2 years, we've taken the kids out of school on Thanksgiving Day and this year was no exception. We had Thanksgiving Dinner with our Life Group the previous Sunday and were planning on doing Thanksgiving the following Saturday with Ken and Amy's family (it didn't happen because they were sick, but anyway)...so we decided to go to Safari World for the day!

We had a blast, enjoyed getting to drive through the Safari and then walk around the park! Yay for thai fried chicken and rice, feeding giraffes, the dolphin and beluga whale show, the spy wars show and crazy animals!

Centara Pattaya - Sunday

Our balcony and cool chair!

Me and my Tweeter on our last morning there!

Checking in for breakfast!

Trouble with a capital "T" - They are both 3rd girls and total trouble! (and totally sweet, which makes it even worse)!

The Big Girls eating breakfast by themselves at a table for 2!

Ah, the boys table. Notice how the Bonus is having a silverware fight with Jack. And he's using knives to fight. And the Dad's aren't remotely concerned about this. In fact, they are smiling for the picture. Nice. Totally different than Moms. Right after I took this picture I overhead Dan say, "Bonus! How did you get knives?!? Are you a NINJA?" Again, not concerned that he had knives, but impressed that he was a Ninja!

The Girlies

Ken and Amy's family
K (8 1/2), D (7 1/2), M (5 1/2), Bonus (will be 4 on Kylie's Birthday - but one year younger)!

Our Family (with a palm tree in the background)
My goal was to get a nice family picture...I think this achieved it!

Funny faces...this was the Bonus' funny face. When he takes pictures normally, he sticks his tongue out. This is his funny face.

Kylie playing in the sand at my feet

The boys watching the big girls out with the Daddies

Megan and Dan getting ready to go out!

Dan and Jack

Ken and D

The Freckle Girls

Me and my Bugga

Me and my Sweet Boy

Daddy and the kids waiting for Ken and Amy's family to check out

One last family picture before leaving!

Getting off the elevator!

4 Big Kids

The Lobby (and Dads paying the bill)

M and Kylie

K and Megan

Jack and D

Getting ready to head out!

Our last 1/2 day was Sunday! We headed down for breakfast at 7am, but the only table that fit our families together was taken and for some weird reason, they would not move tables. So, we divided and conqured! The boys ate at one table, the little girls, Amy and I at another table and then the big girls at their very own table! We had a blast swimming until 11am and enjoyed doing everything a bit for the "last time". The guys decided that they wanted to do jet skiing on the beach. So they each rented jet skis for 1/2 hour and took out each child 1x with them...then I got to ride Dan's last one for 5 minutes or so. They had a wonderful time and were so thankful they did it! We had a fun time cheering on the others that were out and awaiting their return! I think it was Dan's highlight of the weekend!

We got showered, packed up, checked out and headed home by 12noon to make it home for a Thanksgiving dinner with our Life Group - including Ken and Amy's family!

FYI - It cracked us up because at this hotel, everything was written in Thai, English and Russian. It was interesting to see a lot of farang (foreigners) that were Russian....wearing speedos. And bikinis regardless of body shape/size. The best (i.e. worst) was a white speedo with a zipper in the front...nice. Yay for hours of people watching available at the hotel!