Yesterday was BE-A-EUTIFUL! It was so nice and cooler out that we opened our windows to air out the place. Oh how I wish it would stay that way 🙁 BUT it will be getting back up into the 90’s later this week!

Since it was so nice out we took advantage of the weather and took Monte to the Heritage Carousel at Union Park! Remember when I talked about Clowns at the Carousel and all the fun things to do there here? Well, we finally got the last item crossed off our 2013 Summer Bucket List!

Everyone else must have had the same idea! The Heritage Carousel will not be open for much longer, so everyone else was taking advantage of the beautiful day and visiting Union Park to ride the carousel.

When we walked up to the carousel, Monte got super excited because of all the lights and music! He started clapping, so I thought for sure he was going to enjoy this! We purchased 2 rides for him, so he could ride once with Travis and once with me. They only charged us a $1.00 (50 cents per ride) because Travis and I did not actually ride on an animal. Usually it’s $1.00 per adult.

The first time, he rode with Travis. Travis sat him on a large polar bear. For the first minute he did okay, but then freaked out because he was not too sure what was going on. For the rest of the time Travis held him as they went round and round.

The second time, he rode with me. Before the carousel even started, I tried putting him on a huge giraffe but he wanted NOTHING to do with it! So, we rode around while I held him. He was perfectly content with that and enjoyed pointing at the lights.

On the top of the carousel there are paintings of places unique to Des Moines. I was able to take pictures of a few of the paintings, when the carousel was at a stop. The top painting was of the State Capitol, the middle painting was the Botanical Center, and the bottom painting was of the Victoria Hotel. You can point out all of the unique places in Des Moines, while riding and make it a learning lesson also!

 After all the fun at the carousel we headed over to the rocket slide!

Monte was REALLY excited when he saw this! This thing is super tall and he definitely was not going to climb up it and go down it alone, so Travis tagged along.

Whenever he would go down the slide, he would clap and dance AND would run back around to do it again. Travis became tired pretty quickly!

I am glad we made it out to Union Park to enjoy the carousel and rocket slide. It is such a great place to hang out and play for the day. There are some shelters and even a wading pool (it had already been drained). This is one place to check out!

What did you do for Labor Day?