Mommy and Me Meetup at Busch Gardens

Disclosure: I attended an event on behalf of Mom Central Consulting for Busch Gardens. I received free admission to the park as a thank you for participating

I shared a picture last week in this post from my trip to Busch Gardens. Now I want to tell you more about it.

I was invited to attend a Mommy and Me meet up with Mom Central. It was supposed to happen previously, but had to be postponed due to tropical storm Andrea. I'm not sure the total, but there were about 20 other families (other mommy bloggers) who attended also.

Here's a shot I got of my kids before we went into the park:

(c) stay at home mom

They were pretty excited, since it was our first time going to Busch Gardens, Williamsburg. We have lived in Virginia for almost 2 yrs, but hadn't been before.

When we entered the park our group got to meet a mommy and baby sheep. Here's my son petting the baby.

(c) stay at home mom

Then we were all treated to a delicious buffet breakfast. There was everything from danishes, to eggs, sausages, etc. (I should have taken a picture of it) but being a newbie at these events I didn't think of it.

Then we heard a talk by some different people. I'm not sure her exact title, but one of the directors of Busch Gardens spoke and the Founder and CEO of Mom Central, Stacy Debroff spoke. They talked about how, Busch Gardens had hired Mom Central to do a survey. The surveyed about 900 moms, and the results were that mom's think their kids are disconnected from outdoor play, and natural fun. Kids today are spending too much time indoors. And playing video games, etc.

Busch Gardens with the help of Mom Central want to promote natural fun. Stacy DeBroff, even went around the room and had the kids name different ways to have fun outdoors. The kids came up with some great ideas. Such as hiking, camping, having a picnic, and more. (there was more to these speeches - but this is just a general synopsis of it)

Then someone who works with the animals came onstage. There was a turtle, a couple of cool birds. Then she asked for volunteers. My son got picked to go up stage.

(c) stay at home mom

They got to meet "Bob" the snake. My son didn't know what he was going to be holding up there, but he said after he liked doing that. Then around noon time,. we were "let loose" to go and enjoy Busch Gardens however we wanted.

We ran around the park literally for 7 hrs after that. I don't have time to list every single ride or thing we did. But we were non stop go for that whole time. Of course I was relying on my digital camera, and after that last picture of my son & the snake, it died. So luckily the kids had either an ipod (my son) or a cell phone (daughter) to take a few pictures.

Dad & son pictured in back on "Verbolten"

(c) stay at home mom - taken by my daughter 

This roller coaster is described as lightning fast and features an 88 foot plunge. Let's just say, that was the first & last roller coaster my son went on.

My daughter posing outside of Verbolten. She didn't even entertain the thought of going on it:

(c stay at home mom - taken by son w/ his ipod)

Unlike my husband who went on all but one roller coaster at Busch Gardens (just because he didn't see it) and some more then once!

My Daughter loved this ride called Der Wirbelwind:

(c) stay at home mom - taken by my son

I think my daughter went on this at least 5 or 6 times.

This is just the highlights of what we did. We went on many more rides, saw lots of animals. And saw a show called Pet Shenanigans. It was really cute and featured all kinds of pets that they have rescued from shelters.

I hope to go back to Busch Garden's soon. Because although we did a lot, there is still a lot we didn't see. There are more shows and tours you can take. Like a behind the scene animal tour would be cool. And the rides, which we missed or we would go on the same ones again :)

My kids (especially my son) do fall into the category of not getting enough outdoor and natural play. Probably to much time on the computer. So it was nice to spend a family day together at Busch Gardens!