Dino-sore

Once upon a time there was a crazy woman who decided to take her five boys to a thing called Jurassic Quest because she wanted to be a good mother. Unfortunately, she ended up in the hospital for surgery just days before this very exciting activity. Fortunately, her saintly mother-in-law decided to come help. And so, despite being a little loopy from medications and a little sore she embarked on the journey to Bismarck with her husband, mother-in-law and five hyper children. Will she survive the carnivorous giant reptiles? The throngs of small children? The bathroom trips? The dreaded craft table? Find out in this photographic saga called DINO-SORE: A Prehistoric Pain (that was also kind of fun)

Here are the intrepid explorers about to enter the dinosaur infested area.

The boys were immediately eaten. The End.
Oh wait! The dinosaur coughed them back up. I'm guessing they caused ingestion. They look so happy about having spent time in a large reptile stomach. There's just no accounting for taste.

Ack! It's an Allosaurus complete with Allosaurus sounds and Allosaurus head movements!

The boys seem very confident that the fence will keep the dinosaurs contained. They haven't seen Jurassic Park. Also, they are completely unbothered by the scene of carnage unfolding behind them.

No, Oma is not choking Gabe. I think he's staring in fear. For the record, Tobias dressed himself. I think he thought a backwards shirt might confuse any pursuing dinosaurs.

Wouldn't you know? Oma traveled all the way to North Dakota only to run into someone from Utah. That's a Utahraptor posing behind her with it's pretty feathers.

Elijah found his favorite dinosaur. Things were going swimmingly after that initial digestive mishap.

But then, the dinosaurs started to turn. Hey! Steggy! Don't look at my son that way. You are an herbivore. An herbivore!

David John and Tobias had to flee in terror from this pachycephalosaurus. Curse your omnivorous ways!

We all fled to an area where the wildlife was a little less threatening. AKA dead. Hello, little T-rex skull.

They had all kinds of pretty fossils. I'm pretty sure this one is mentioned in the Book of Mormon. Ammonite. That's a thing, right? Except I'm pretty sure they were people, not shellfish. Regardless, the Ammonites didn't hold the boys' attention for long.

So we moved on to the dino dig area where they could all help excavate dinosaur bones.

This was very serious business. I had hoped at this point, that Marc and I might be able to sit down and chat. No such luck. This was the beginning of the bathroom breaks. Thank goodness Oma was there because between the bathroom needs and disparate interests of our five guys the three adults saw almost nothing of each other for the rest of the time. We would give each other a passing nod, exchange data on who was where doing what and start to talk just in time to hear, "I need to go to the bathroom!" Can't they get their bladders in sync?

There were many many bouncy houses, slides and obstacle courses. We spent a long time watching boys go in and out and all about but of course, never on the same apparatus as their brothers. Gabe and Elijah are excited to try out the bungee run which will help them perfect their escaping from dinosaurs skills.

Run boys! That's a t-rex behind you!

Speaking of t-rex, there were a number of crafts to do. Including this paper craft, making a plaster mold, and digging real shark teeth and other fossils out of a powdery clay with miniature excavating tools. All of the boys who made a paper dinosaur chose a blue t-rex. I tried to talk them into some variety but the manliness of the t-rex is hard to overcome. This is Benjamin's version. He seems to have lost a few fights... or he has a very bad surgeon... or both.

Here is David John's interpretation. He's pretty fancy with a jeweled eye and glitter and a few feathers. In fact, maybe this is a she-rex?

Tobias seems to be of the opinion that he should just save nature some time and jumble up all of the body parts as they will eventually be in the tar-pits anyway. I'm not sure exactly what's going on anatomically-speaking but he seems to have eyeballs on his tail and his foot. Also, there is an arm growing out of his leg. He's got some issues to work through.

After a break from the dinos the boys decided to get back in the saddle and conquer their fear by riding them. Depending on which dino you chose to ride they went a different speed.

Benjamin made the bold move of going for a bipedal carnivore. I'm not sure if that's Al or Mr. T but he's big and speedy.

Gabriel rode all of them. This triceratops was probably the biggest, and slowest.

Tobias also decided to be brave and actually go pet some baby dinosaurs. Here is a staring contest between T-Rex and T-Ricks. It was a draw. The handler had to drag the dino away.

This is baby brachiosaurus. Isn't she cute?

Towards the end of our journey, Marc and I were finally reunited. No more potty breaks. Phew!

I'm not sure who decided that Tobias could drive. But it was a mistake. The other children were driving their little jeeps in a nice circle inside the fences. Tobias was crashing into the fences, ramming into other jeeps and continually causing a gridlock which required the adults to come pull all the vehicles apart so that the wheels could maneuver again. The sad thing is, he wasn't doing it on purpose. He just really can't drive. Good grief, I bet he would drive that thing into a pond if you let him have free rein. Who does that?*

One last dino ride before going home. We were tired, but we survived. It was a little much for me right after surgery but, hey, dinosaur expeditions were not on the "do not" list from the hospital so whose fault is it really? The boys had a good time and were even happier when we stopped at McDonalds on the way home and let them each get a Happy Meal. I mean, living dinosaurs are cool and all, but dinner at McDonalds? Now that's something. We all went home, tired, happy and dino-sore.

*That would be me, I did that. When I was 15. Just ask my cousin. The best part is, I bailed out before the vehicle actually went into the water but my cousin didn't. Somehow we're still friends. Cousins are cool like that.