A couple of weeks ago we went & stayed with my parents about 6 hours south of here.  The children had a wonderful time with plenty to do.  We went a week before the school holidays to avoid the crowds, so it was great.  We stopped at Lake Waihola on the way down to Gore ...

One afternoon we headed out to a park & went on a bush walk & the children & my mum had lots of fun going on the flying fox in the playgound.  Josh had taken his skateboard with him and there was a cool hill at the park (we don't have many hills where we live ... so hills are a bit of a novelty).  The children had a wonderful time riding the skateboard, and running down the hill.  I love the expressions on their faces!!

At the local ice skating rink ... with hardly any people there ...

Nearby to Mum and Dad's place there is a deer park so the children enjoyed feeding the deer, although Brandi wasn't too sure about these big creatures, but Gran was close at hand to help out.

It took hours & hours to drive home & I think we managed to stop in nearly every town for at least one of the children to use the restroom ... they couldn't co-ordinate things at all on that front.  Then we found these cool public toilets with automatic doors, automatic flush toilets, automatic water & soap dispenser. Apparently there was even music ..  Josh used those restrooms & when he got back in the van all the children wanted to try it out & I'm like 'no!' - we'll be here all day otherwise!!  We also stopped at some public gardens where there are pet wallabys - they are so cute!  They are a small version of a kangaroo & look so cute hopping around their enclosure.