Ratliff Zone

Saying Goodbye, Again

2009-03-29T19:07:00.000-07:00

So, to go through the loss of your three cats that you've had for 16 to 19 years, then turn around and lose a baby kitten, no older than 3 and a half months old after only a week of knowing him, well, let's just say that it's not something I ever want to do again in my life. Losing Charmer was perhaps harder than, no, it was harder than losing any other pet I've ever lost. I barely knew him, but I loved him, dearly. He had stolen my heart in an instant, and he'll always have that chunk of it that he took.

Charmer was a bright happy kitten the day we brought him home. He was fearless and all he wanted to do was explore the house. He was so calm and didn't even seem to notice the fact that there were two squealing little boys that just wanted to jump up and down every time they saw the kitties. He had a big house to explore, and by golly, he was going to explore it. We had brought the kittens into the play room with a child gate in the doorway, to keep them in and the boys out, but Charmer decided he was having none of that and he climbed right over it! We discovered he liked to play in sinks, as you can see from a picture below.

The next day brought a different story. Charmer fell ill and we thought it was a simple cold, after all many of the kittens in the shelter had an upper respiratory virus, as Abby had, so we figured, no big deal, we'll get him some treatment and he'll be fine in a few days. How wrong we were. Within days he was deathly ill and we were fighting for his life. We did everything we could for him, sub-q fluids, assisted feedings, medication after medication, vet visit upon vet visit. Our vet said we'd done everything we possibly could, and unfortunately Charmer was resisting the heating pads and warming treatments that would warm his chilled body. My frisky little bright eyed boy aged to a fragile, weak shell of a cat within a week.

Sadly we knew that we had done all that we could and as shocking and unbelievable as the thought was, we had to let him go. It was incredibly difficult to lose one so young, so full of life, so eager to explore and so darn cute! I'll never know just why I had to lose Charmer to the calicivirus, what lesson exactly I was meant to learn; I can say it's an experience I don't ever want to have again.

I will never forget those bright eyes, that silver fur, those hugely long whiskers, or that adorable little trill that made me fall in love in an instant. I look forward to the time when I will see my Charmer again and will have an eternity to know him, to love him, and to share my love with him and all of my loved ones, both human and of the furry variety. Until then, there will be others to fill the void, but none will ever claim that little chunk of my heart that Charmer has stolen, for he was a special little cat. I wish I had known him longer.

Saying Hello

2009-03-29T10:30:00.000-07:00

It's actually been a while since we've welcomed our new furry crew to our home, but it's somewhat difficult to write, and yes, I'll admit it, I've been busy, okay, lazy too. We adopted three beautiful kittens not too long after our beautiful old ladies passed. We decided it was time for the boys to experience kittens and the joy of watching them grow, and what little bundles of energy they could be. So, down to the local animal shelter we went. The first little kitten to catch our eye was a little white a grey, that we came to call Nandi. She is named in honor of a friend who helped me night and day through the most difficult of times, and the best of times, with Ebony's illness. She had a cat named Nandi and I always loved the name, so this is our beautiful little Nandi, and she helps me to remember everything that my friend did for me and the charity she showed. Nandi has claimed Thane as her personal human and my if she isn't a daddy's girl. Nandi is very quiet and hardly ever meow's. It's usually only when Thane leaves the house that she'll meow for a few minutes, as if to ask where her daddy went, or "hey! take me with you!"

Next was the tiniest, sickliest, most pathetic looking little kitten in the whole place. She was adorable though. But I'll admit, there was part of me that couldn't help but figure that the boys would fall in love with the most pathetic looking scrap of cat out of the bunch. We figured she had to be a runt she was so tiny, even the animal control people said she was small. We called her Abby the tiny Tabby, for her nickname, and Abby is her name. It came about because Galen kept asking what kind of cat she was and we kept telling him she was a tabby, but it kept coming out Abby instead. We thought it was rather cute, and it stuck. Here is our little runt after she fattened up with a week or so of good eating. She was so skinny when we got her home and it was adorable to watch her little belly pop out with a steady diet. She has now grown into a gorgeous cat! No longer the pathetic looking little runt. The boys still adore Abby and she is their favorite. Thankfully she is calming to their 'affections' and becoming more and more tolerant of their love. She was quite skittish when we first got her and it took about a month for her to just come out of our bedroom. If you could see how she reacted to the television! I think it took nearly 6 months before she realized it wasn't something that was going to eat her!

Then there was Charmer. He charmed his way into my heart, and into our home. I saw him in his cage, off away from the others, with a gorgeous orange cream tabby that was his brother and something about him just really caught my eye. I asked to see him and the moment I held him he just leaned into me and purred. I was probably a goner at that moment, just didn't know it. I brought him over to the boys but they didn't give him a second look - they were in love with Abby and couldn't care less about any other cat! Thane thought he was beautiful, but Abby and Nandi growled at him. I was bummed and based on the reaction I decided to put him back. We adopted Abby and Nandi and went home. Something about him though... I just couldn't get those eyes and that purr out of my head. I told Thane I thought I had to go back, so the next day I did, and I adopted my Charmer. Little did I know that I would be saying goodbye to my little boy a week later. We lost him to a severe cold that struck with a vengence. But I'll talk a bit more about that in a subsequent post.

After the difficult loss of Charmer it took a little while, but I had a gaping hole that felt needed filling, and this beautiful little Black and White kitten did the trick. Her name is DivyUmi and she's all spunk and love. She's definitely claimed mom as her human and she has taken up Ebony's old job of being mom's shadow as she goes from room to room. If you're wondering about the name, which everyone does, DivyUmi stands for "Divided - Whiskers" She is both divided in color and has a perfectly divided lip, half pink, half black, and UmiUmi in Hawaiian means "whiskers" and she has very long white whiskers, much like Charmer did. So, she is our DivyUmi, whom we often call Divy for short. She's a little huntress and loves to drag her latest catch (cat toy) to the water bowl and drop it in to wash it off, or just haul it around the house to show it off. She is quite adorable.

So, that's our new kitten crew. Part of me thinks we may still be missing one. I'm not quite sure. I'm so happy with the wonderful trio we've got, but I think I'll have to poke around Pet Integrity just to be sure. There's always enough love for four!

Saying Goodbye

2008-09-09T20:57:00.000-07:00

This past summer was a rough one for us and our pets. It actually started April 1st when we lost our Miety, our "Me-Too!" kitty. She was our mama kitty, mother of Ebony and Curlie Sue (and a host of other cats belonging to my mom and dad). Miety was 18 years old and would have been 19 on July 3rd, but sadly she would not see that day. On May 31st we realized she was starting to leave us, and by April 1st we said goodbye. We had 18 wonderful years, with a couple challenges here and there (she was our irradiated kitty!), but all in all they were good.

I got Miety as a kitten shortly after coming to Ridgecrest. She was abandoned by her mother and a neighbor down the street was trying to find a home for her. Miety was my 'foot' kitty. She started out not liking to be petted, only willing to rub herself against a foot. Then she decided that hands were good, but only if you held it still for her to rub against. Then she finally figured out (probably around age 10 or so) that getting scratched felt really good! So it only took a decade. She earned her "Me-Too!" name by always wanting to get in on whatever petting, scratching, brushing, loving action was going on. If you were petting one of the other cats, well she wanted to be petted too! So, Miety (Mee-Tee) we decided stood for "Me-Too!" We were very sad to say goodbye to our little Miety Mama, Me-Too girl.

Next came, or went rather, our Curly Sue. Ebony's little sister, and Miety's youngest. Curly had been diagnosed with Chronic Renal Failure in the spring of 2007 so we knew that it was only a matter of time, just like it was with Ebony. Curly took a turn for the worse and started getting anemic and was having problems with her blood levels. We tried what we could, and she like her sister had been on sub-q fluids for over a year, but unfortunately she just kept spiralling downwards and we had to say goodbye. Curly left us on June 23rd.

Curly Sue was the cutest little kitten. She was a little stinker though! She was born with a crooked tail (thus earning her name), and she had a devilish little personality. She loved to cause trouble. She was full of life and a ball of energy. In her latter years Curly became a little, uh, neurotic I guess? As Thane puts it, every household has that "one crazy cat." Well, Curly was ours. Our poor little girl had continual skin irritation issues and sometimes I wonder if that's what drove her mental. Who knows, all I know is that she decided that hiding out in the bedroom, particularly from the kids, was the best thing. I'm glad though that she would usually come out at night and snuggle with me. I had lots of good nights with my little (okay, big) Curly girl with her beside me kneading (usually with sharp little pointy claws!). I called her my Little Miss Big-Paw because she had really large paws. She was such a beautiful kitty and she took after her father. I miss my Curly Sue.

It was hard enough losing Miety, harder still to lose Curly Sue only a couple months later, but nothing prepared us for what came next. Exactly two weeks to the day from when we lost Curly we lost our Ebony. Ebony had been battling Chronic Renal Failure for 3 years and had amazing, if not miraculous, recovery from her initial 'crash' back in 2005. We called her our 'Trooper' for putting up with nightly sub-q fluids, being force-fed for months, then given meds every night for 3 years. She did it all for us. Unfortunately though her battle came to an end on July 7th when we discovered that the breathing difficulties we'd noticed were actually a major condition. Her chest was filled with fluid and it was crushing her lungs and I knew that no medical conditions that caused that would be a positive outcome for my girl. We knew then that it was time to say goodbye and to let her go so that she didn't have to fight any longer. She'd been through enough, she fought enough battles for us, it was time we fought the final one for her.

Our Kitten-Boo as we called her often was a very special cat indeed. Ebony always seemed to know how I was feeling, and she knew when I needed love. She was our only lap cat and particularly loved Thane's heating pad matabolism. I had formed a strong bond with Ebony as a kitten when she was burned running across my parent's stove upon which burned her front paws. The care I gave her helped us to really create a special connection that we kept until the very end. Ebony was my shadow, always following me around the house. She would be waiting by the garage door every day when I got home to welcome me. She would sit on top of the monitor as I'd teach my online class. How I miss my little black shadow!

We miss our girls dearly, and we've brought them home now to stay until we are reunited forever in heaven. I've written a couple poems that you can read here: http://www.digitalcaptive.net/ebony/ ("To Be Free" was written after Curly passed, and "Kitten Boo" was written for Ebony)

As a final note, I want to thank the wonderful people at the Feline CRF Support Group and at Tanya's Feline CRF Information Centre for everything they do. It was with their help that we got Ebony and Curly through everything we did, and without my friends and the help of the angels there we would have lost our Ebony in 2005.

Fireworks Abound

2008-08-04T20:42:00.000-07:00

So we may have gone a bit overboard on fireworks this year. In fact, I know we did because we still have some left over... But, it was fun. We started off the fireworks festival with the typical hometown fireworks show and then we went to Gramma and Grampa's house to light off a bunch - and I mean a bunch - of fireworks. We had so many that the kids actually got bored. I definitely learned a lesson there - the small ones that make the loudest bang are the ones the kids like most, and the big ones are the ones that they don't really care too much about.

It didn't help that we had bought a large family pack of fireworks, and my parents had bought an even larger pack of fireworks! We had fireworks coming out our ears! It was funny because I thought the kids would just think it was awesome... I guess they haven't hit the pyromanic age yet. They enjoyed it for the most part though; but hey, after the 20th some-odd one, even I was getting a little phased. All in all it was a fun night, filled with lots of color, patriotic melodies, love for country, and appreciation for life, liberty and freedom... oh yeah, and outright incendiary fun!

Sprinkler Fun

2008-08-04T20:23:00.001-07:00

The boys were introduced to the world of "sprinklers" recently. My mom bought a fun yard sprinkler recently that wiggles all over the place and sprays water in all directions. It's great fun and the boys have had lots of laughs, squeals, giggles, hoots and hollers over it.

It always amazes me watching kids experience things for the first time. Galen tends to be so careful while Liam just jumps right in, and yet other times Liam looks to Galen for guidance. I think all kids need some sort of sprinkler though - it really let's the true kid come out! And hey - it's a great way to beat the summer heat!

A Day at the Museum

2008-07-28T20:44:00.000-07:00

We took the kids to visit the Maturango Museum not that long ago. They thought it was pretty neat. We introduced them to local artwork in the gallery, which had a really neat show featuring pottery that integrated antlers in some of the pots. The show was called "Ancient Clay - Desert Legacy" by artists Twyla and Hal Wardell. There was some really neat pieces and it was nice to expose the kids to fine art.

After visiting the art gallery we took the kids through the museum itself. They thought it was neat to see some of the desert animals on display and both of them really liked the Saber Tooth Tiger skull and special effects display. Galen thought the missiles were pretty neat for the NAWC display and we reminded the boys that their grampa and a couple of their uncles work on the base where they make the missiles.

Liam liked looking at things, but I'll admit it - Galen got a bit restless. He especially decided it was time to go when we suggested he stick his hands in the "touch and feel" boxes that have hole in them so you can't see what you're touching. The contents are things like local rocks and minerals, but oh my was that ever not a good idea! Liam thought it was great fun - my adventurous little one. The boys also thought the mammoth bones were kind of neat but you could tell Galen was slightly freaked out by them. (We've since asked him if he'd like to go to a museum to see dinosaur bones and he's said "NO").

The most fun part of the event, at least judging by how many trips they did, was the rock labyrinth next to the museum. You can walk around it until you reach the rock at the center. They have some solstice marks indicated and in several areas around it are desert gardens. I sat on a bench in the garden and watched as the kids took several trips around the labyrinth. They weren't happy to leave because they were having too much fun! However, promises to return and walk the labyrinth again coaxed them into the car where we had fun talking about our little trip to the museum. I look forward to future trips as they grow and can learn more about our local habitat and history with each visit.

Knights Abound!

2008-05-10T16:56:00.000-07:00

Since Galen's birthday party wasn't on his actual birthday we had a family dinner and birthday cake celebration on his birthday. That's when Gramma and Grampa Karnos gave Galen his birthday presents. Nana came to visit with Cori's cousin Emily, and Grandma Ratliff joined us for dinner too. Uncle Clint and Aunt Laura were there for a while as well to wish Galen a happy birthday.

Galen and Liam were both excited to see that they both got Lego Knights outfits from Legoland. They proceeded to have an epic battle in the living room. Clint was quite impressed with Liam and his natural fighting abilities and decided that he could be his new squire! I really wish now that we had video taped it because it really was impressive, and Liam was being so serious about it! It was really adorable. Of course it was also kinda funny because Nana was rather shocked to see that we were willing to let them be so enthusiastic, okay maybe violent would be a better word, and she was worried that they were going to get hurt. I guess my attitude has always been that boys will be boys and hey, I wish I'd had these kinda toys when I was their age! We started counting up all the swords we have in the house for the kids and realized we have about 12 swords, a few daggers, about 4-6 shields, a few different knight outfits, etc.. So, do you think we're raising a couple of warriors or what? I dunno, they look pretty innocent and sweet to me :^)

Happy Birthday Galen

2008-05-10T16:17:00.000-07:00

My munchkin is 5... FIVE! Five years old! How in the world did that happen?!? Okay, freakout moment over. We recently celebrated Galen's 5th birthday and it was a blast. This was our first "real" birthday party, where parents dropped off kids for games and events - the works. Galen decided he wanted a "Bionicle" (a Lego line of toys) theme. So, we started with the birthday invitation featuring Galen as a Toa, a Bionicle hero, inviting others to join him on the "Great Kanoka disc hunt." Kanoka discs being one of the weapons of the Toa and it tied into one of the Bionicle movies. The house was decorated with Toa colors, red, yellow, black, and we put tons of Thane's Bionicle toys (note I said Thane's) all around the living room to decorate.

We played Pin the Mask on the Toa (which amazingly Galen got dead on the spot), Bionicle Mask Spoon Race, we did the Great Kanoka Disc Hunt, and we had the kids decorate their own discs and do a Bionicle activity placemat. It was pretty fun. Galen's guests were his brother Liam, his cousins Rees, Caden, Victoriah and T.J. and his friends Bryce and Gavin. We invited the younger cousins and siblings and parents to join us after the games for cake and ice cream.

I definitely think the hats and swords/shields repository was the hit of the day. We had kids running all over with swords and a variety of hats that day! Galen enjoyed his presents and he received a variety of Speed Racer (a movie we just saw yesterday, and guess what, all enjoyed quite a lot actually), Hot Wheels, Transformers, a Dragon Egg toys and of course a variety of Bionicle items from the latest movie to a new Toa to a 3 foot spear (foam of course). He was also most pleased to get a new space man helmet to replace his broken one and was happy to see a brand new space helmet in the mix too! He also got a variety of other gifts, but that's a second post to come. So, it was a fun day which we all enjoyed! I still just can't believe my little munchkin is five....

Day at the Park

2008-05-10T16:09:00.000-07:00

We went to the park recently, nothing special, just hanging out at the park, but I snapped a few pics and I thought some of these were really cute and I wanted to share them. Liam just wanted to swing and swing. I couldn't get him out of the thing! I think it wasn't until maybe the last 10 minutes we were there that he finally got out, so he must have been in it for about 20 minutes or more! Galen was having a blast, throwing sand as usual, running all over, and trying to play with a couple little girls that were obviously having fun and which he wanted in on the action. It was cute how he wanted to play with them, but it was pretty clear he was a 'boy' and they weren't going to have any of that! Ah, the age old struggle begins at such a young age!

Easter

2008-05-10T15:56:00.000-07:00

Easter is always a fun time of year. I've always loved Easter. Not only do I love coloring eggs, but I love easter egg hunts, the candy, but most of all the special time that Easter is. We're still working on developing our own special family tradition, but we have had fun coloring easter eggs every year. This was the first year we let Liam color eggs - as many of you might know, coloring easter eggs can be a dicey and messy process - many opportunities for spills and stains! We waited until Galen was three before we let him help out too. So, here is our first batch of a full family easter egg coloring fest! Mostly Thane and I colored the eggs, but the kids gave us lots of directions about what to do. We all had fun and looked forward to our easter egg hunt the next day.

For our easter egg hunt we use plastic easter eggs that we can put candy in. We've mostly decided that easter shouldn't be about presents, but candy is one thing that is a fun surprise for easter - you just gotta have the chocolate bunny for easter, and who can pass up a Cadbury creme egg? So, we have lots of fun hiding the eggs and then during the hunt there are usually lots of "Hmmm, what's over here?" and "Hey, what's that over there?" but it's a joy to watch their excitement. I think next year we'll move the hunt outside! Hopefully we'll be able to convince the kids to continue with their equal sharing and divying up of the loot once the hunt is over, but, alas, only time will tell and I'm not holding my breath for total peace on eastern morn with two boys ;^)

Happy Birthday Liam

2008-05-10T15:30:00.000-07:00

This year we celebrated Liam's third birthday in January. Our little man is 3! I can't believe it. And yes, we're a little behind the schedule in getting these pictures posted, but hey, at least they're posted - right? It was a fun event filled with family. His theme was Spiderman.

Liam specifically wanted a cape for his birthday, with a letter L on the back, in green and yellow (his two favorite colors). So, it was time for mom to break out her sewing machine she'd had for 10 years and never used (other people have used it - just not me!) and learn how to sew - for real. So, believe it or not, I sewed him his cape, and not just one cape, but three! I also made Galen a cape with a G on the back (oh my goodness was that a pain to make), and a plain red cape as well. It took a few days and lots of work, but it's been a joy to see our superhero's running through the house in their capes over the last 5 months.

Liam also gots lots of swords, shields, and star wars toys for his birthday. Grandma and Grandpa loaded him up (meaning spoiled him rotten) with tons of Lego castle toys. He's had lots of fun with all of his toys though and he enjoyed his birthday. We were just glad we were able to convince him that he was going to be three. For the longest time he insisted he was going to turn four like Galen was - he would get quite irrate if you suggested otherwise. About a week before his birthday I finally got him to admit he was turning three! I was worried we weren't going to be able to put a number on his cake for fear of upsetting him! Ah the joys of toddlerdom.

Wildflower Hike

2008-03-23T20:11:00.000-07:00

Something we've done the past couple of years, well, when it rains at least, is take the kids on a nature hike to look at the wildflowers up above the college and in the Rademacher range. The boys love to get out of the house and it's a great opportunity to expose them to nature. We have fun photographing the flowers, watching out for snakes, and running around (if you're Galen at least). Poor Liam got freaked out by a bug that flew past him and so he wanted to go home, but we convinced him that it wasn't going to hurt him and he calmed down and we continued on our adventure. Unfortunately there were many bugs that decided the boys were interesting, which caused many a squeal!

After the hike we stopped at the college because the Galen wanted to play on the rocks, meaning he wanted to jump on the rocks! Thane told me that when Galen and I went one direction to head towards the college sign, Liam said to him, "Galen and Mamma went that way, but we have to stay here, and you have to stay here with me." He's such a character. He is so opinionated, definitely not one that changes his mind easily when it is set. The boys had fun climbing on the rocks, and as you can see, doing some rather good jumping feats. All in all, it was a good afternoon hike and adventure.

January Snow Trip

2008-03-23T19:53:00.000-07:00

Back in January we took the boys up to Walker's Pass to play in the snow after we had a good snow storm come through the Sierra's. It was great! The snow was between 10-12" deep. This was the deepest the snow has been, or at least that we've seen, in a long while. The only snow the kids have seen has been at most a few inches thick, so this was great! We played for almost an hour.

We asked Galen if he wanted to make a snowman, but he said no, he wanted to make a jet. We tried, and got the semblance of it, but he was so distracted having fun rolling around in the snow and making snowballs, that he didn't really notice that it was mostly a fuselage. Liam wasn't as thrilled as Galen, but that was because he had a hard time getting around I think. Being much shorter, and the snow going up to his knees in some places, or higher, made it hard for him to walk. We finally got him smiling though when Thane decided to make Liam headprints in the snow.

The only bad thing was that we forgot about how short the kids are in relation to the depth of the snow and the fact that their pants were going to get soaked - poor Galen's pants were completely soaked through, his socks were completely wet, and we had to strip him down to his underpants for the trip home (to be wrapped up in mom's coat and uncomfortably strapped into his carseat in just his undies). Thankfully we just happened to find an extra set of clothes in the diaper bag that Liam could use (dumb luck). Both the boys were toddler popsicles by the time we were done, and Galen in particular was having so much fun he didn't have any clue how cold he was.

Little Liam insists he didn't have fun and didn't like the snow, even though we know he had some fun. Galen enjoyed it, and we definitely learned that we need to bring an extra set of clothes for the trip home! Hopefully next year there will be more snow and we can get some sleds and go sledding! Here are some happy faces, having fun in the snow:

First Ocean Visit

2008-03-23T18:45:00.000-07:00

During our Legoland trip we had an opportunity to take the boys to the ocean, not just see the ocean from the car, but actually take them to the beach and let them walk up and see the vastness of the Pacific up close. Since Legoland didn't open until 10am, it was a great way to spend some the morning.

It was fantastic, and an opportunity we couldn't pass up - especially when our hotel was only a mile from the beach! Both the boys were a little freaked out by the waves that were "trying to get them" and poor little Liam really got thrown for a moment or two, but for Galen, who loves to dig in the dirt and sand, well, as you can imagine, he was in sandbox heaven! We showed them seashells, seaweed, seabirds, seafoam, squirrels and surfers. The boys had fun climbing on the rocks, and as you can see, Liam had another one of his more, serious moments as he contemplated the ocean before him.

At a little inlet where the water formed a tiny pool, Thane showed them how he could dig a hole and it would immediately fill with water - seemingly out of nowhere! When it was time to go we were getting the sand out of the boys shoes and socks up at some benches overlooking the beach up the cliff and there were a bunch of squirrels looking for handouts. It was a fun way for the boys to get a close up look at some wildlife (that wasn't quite so wild unfortunately). All in all it was a great little visit, to a wonderful little spot in Carslbad.

Legoland

2008-03-23T17:37:00.000-07:00

Our first real family vacation! We felt bad because Liam couldn't go on some of the rides, and he was definitely cranky as a result. It didn't help that it was nap time and that only amplified Mr. Cranky Boy. We went for two days, not sure if we would stay for a second day, but since we didn't get down as early as we'd hoped the first day and the boys were having so much fun, we left it up to them as to whether or not they wanted to go home, or stay the night and come back the next day. Well, of course they wanted to stay! It was a really fun trip.

The second ride Galen went on was the biggest, fastest, roller coaster they had in the whole park! He'd never been on any rollercoaster before so it would be interesting to see how he'd do. The first downhill was a shock to him, but after that it was all smiles! Liam loved the boat ride, one we went on about 4 times, if not more, and both of the boys loved the lego Vader and R-2 D-2. Gramma and Grampa Karnos came with us the first day and that was really fun to get to enjoy some of the trip with them too.

The boys were pretty tuckered out on the way home, which took us much longer than expected due to an accident and a pit stop at Costco. It was really cute how they hung onto their newly acquired Legoland swords and axe while riding in the car - and even falling asleep with them, as you can see from Galen's photo. We'll definitely be back again in a year or two when Liam is a little bigger so he can go on all the rides!