Annual Knott's Weekend 07

For the last 7 years, Jay has been taking the girls to Knott's Berry Farm for one weekend in November. Knott's honors our service men & women by allowing them and one guest free entrance into the park during the month of November. Additional tickets are only $12.50 so it's a wonderful deal and we love deals! My first trip with the Ketchums was in 2004 and we had a wonderful weekend. Chrissi was able to join us that weekend and the following year Sandi & Nana and Sam & TJ all came for part of the day. This year, we had the pleasure of Grandma Ketchum's company on our trip. We drove down to LA on Friday (the 16th) and picked up Miss Nicole from the airport and stopped at Claim Jumper for dinner and then it was on to the Knott's hotel. I must saying staying in one hotel room with all 5 of us provided many memories :). Apparently, Grandma Ketchum is quite the snorer and provided us with lots of entertainment on Friday night. We all managed to get to sleep (with Kendall in the sleeping bag on the floor) and woke up in the morning and headed to the park. We got there just in time to hear the National Anthem and started out at Camp Snoopy. The weather was perfect and the lines were not outrageous. We kept up our fast pace up until about 1:30 when we headed over to TGI Fridays right outside the park for a nice, relaxing lunch. The wait was about 45 minutes, but it was worth it to sit down and be served rather than standing in line at a hot dog stand inside the park. We got Grandma on the Mexican Hats and Jaguar and the Dragon Swing and just about wore her out! We were pretty tired by the end of the day so we decided to pick up Mrs. Knott's Chicken to Go and bring it back to our room. Jay and the girls and Grandma had never had Mrs. Knott's chicken and none of us were willing to wait 3 ours for a table to Grandma and the girls headed back to the room to start showers while Jay and I picked up dinner and headed back and ate in the comfort of our room. I assumed that we were all so exhausted that sleeping would not be a problem but there was a Christmas party going on somewhere in the floor above us so the ceiling was vibrating and we were sure we'd be up all night. We all put our heads on the pillows (with Nicole on the floor this time) and sometime during the night I woke up and saw Jay heading toward the bed shoving toilet paper into his ears. I, of course assumed it was because of Grandma's symphony but apparently Nicole and I joined her and he couldn't take it anymore. Equipped with inventive ear plugs he managed to get to sleep and we got just enough rest to get us through day #2. We got up and went over to the bakery outside of Knott's and picked up breakfast to go and sat on some picnic tables before we headed into the park. We decided to hit the big roller coasters before the lines got too long so we started with the Silver Bullet and then over to The Exelerator. Grandma and Kendall didn't join us on either ride and Nicole skipped the Exelerator but they patiently waited for us on the "other" side. Grandma got pretty worn out on Saturday so she wasn't up for much on Sunday but she was a great sport and extremely patient with all of us dare devils! The park closed early on Sunday so we did our souvenier shopping on our way out and made it to Valencia before we stopped for a first class dinner at McDonald's. By the time we got home we were all walking zombies, but we had a wonderful time and will be ready to hit it again by next November.