After spending the first half of our vacation at Lake Tahoe, our family spent the rest of the time closer to Sacramento; staying with my mother-in-law and her husband.

Selfishly, I didn’t mind at all because it gave me several consecutive days to sleep in; since there was never really any planned event or agenda happening before noon the rest of the week.

And after the long, early flight to California (we left Nashville at 2:00 AM), I was pretty much the equivalent of Weekend at Bernie’s for the first few days anyway.

Staying there in the Sacramento area provided more opportunities to visit with more family members, as well as long-time friends of my wife.

But of course, eventually our kids wanted to do something special; since after all, we were on vacation. I suggested putt-putt golf, which was something I kept seeing in Lake Tahoe.

But the kids wanted Chuck E. Cheese’s. It hadn’t crossed my mind since there’s already one just about 20 minutes from our house in Tennessee.

However, I realized how little it would cost us: Just about $13 total for unlimited games for 45 minutes for our whole family.

So I immediately agreed!

We were given what was essentially an infinitely loaded debit card only good for the currency of Chuck E. Cheese tokens.

So for 45 minutes, we frantically passed the card to each other; as ultimately, all four members of our family were constantly earning tickets to buy prizes the entire time.

The time limit actually made it even more fun and challenging for all of us, as we individually learned and decided which games we were best at winning tickets from.

By the end of our California family vacation, my wife suggested that maybe next year the kids will be old enough to visit Disneyland.

Maybe.

But I definitely wouldn’t mind Chuck E. Cheese again either.