It's The Way You Love Me, It's a Feeling Like This, It's Centrifugal Motion, It's Perpetual Bliss, It's That Pivotal Moment, This Kiss, This Kiss!

Or should I say, "This Hershey Kiss? This Hershey Kiss?" Ahh, what is not to love about a place where the streetlights are shaped like Hershey Kisses and the sweet, lazy air wraps around your senses and you realize you really want a chocolate bar? We loved our day in Hershey, PA! After we woke up bright and early and drove three hours to get to Hershey Park, we rode as many rides as we could pack into eleven hours of spinning, jostling, line-waiting bliss. First, we had to determine, according to his or her height, what candy each kid was: Fynnley, a mini candy bar; Dane, a peanut-butter cup; Connor and Natasha, a Twizzler; Leslee and Shayne (yeah, we can still be kids), Jolley-Ranchers. Why was this important? Every ride had the designated sign at the entrance displaying who was tall enough to ride. More importantly? We had to hear Dane ask over and over why the peanut-butter cups couldn't ride ALL the roller-coasters and how long was it going to be until he was a Twizzler and when were we going to come back after he was a Twizzler?? Poor kid, I felt awful after the fourth roller-coaster we told him he wasn't tall enough to ride and his previously hopeful and stoic face crumbled into sincerely heart-broken tears! His little body just needs to catch up with his thrill-seeking heart! (As his last ride of the day, we snuck him onto a huge, rickety roller-coaster he wasn't tall enough to ride--by then, the teenagers running it didn't care anymore!) It was quite tricky to intersperse "big-people" rides with "little people" rides so no one was waiting around too much for their turns, but the kids were patient and did really well (most of the day!) One of our last rides was to board the beautiful, and massive, Ferris wheel as a family. It seemed like a good idea on a gorgeous, summer evening (except to Shayne who is really afraid of heights, but got bullied onto it) until we were suspended for a very long time at the tippy-top, swinging quite a bit in the breeze. We all started feeling a little nauseous and dear Shayne took to grabbing the side rails to steady our twirling car! We couldn't get off of that ride fast enough! And the lesson of the day for Mom? I'm too old for the 0-72 mph in 3 seconds roller-coasters that left me feeling like my head had been sandwiched between two truck tires. I was all too happy to sit with the "littles" on every high-thrill ride after that! Nonetheless, we had a great time and lots of smiles. We even came home with a couple of stuffed Hershey kisses! It was a definite "favorite" of the trip!