This post is sponsored.
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Everyone bribes their kids, right? Like, you figure out something that your child really loves, and you use that thing to entice them to do what you want and/or threaten to take it away if they misbehave? People do that, right? Well… anyway… we do that. Um, a lot. And this week, the carrot was the Monster Jam show at Levi’s Stadium!
All week long, it hung as our north star: guiding the children to a peaceful bedtime; breaking up fights; providing motivation to chew and swallow entire vegetable servings without gagging. And that was just the kids! I am not exaggerating when I say that this might have been the highlight of my husband’s month. To wit: after we already had tickets, he received an invitation to go for a night out with the guys for his friend’s 40th birthday. Ladies and gentlemen, he turned down an overnight, child-free night of merriment in San Francisco in order to go to the Monster Jam! (Let’s be honest, that’s a bit ridiculous…)
And did the show live up to expectations? HECK YES. Sadly, we could not swing getting there early enough to take advantage of the Pit Party Early Access Pass, but the show alone was easily the most fun our family has had out in ages. We arrived about an hour early, which gave us plenty of time to find parking, walk to the stadium, and get snacks before sitting down. Just after 7:00, the action began! Two by two, the monster trucks raced around the course and flew from mud-packed ramps into the air in a bracket-style head-to-head timed competition until one truck reigned as champion. In the next round, the trucks competed to see which one could do the best trick on two wheels (seriously, thrilling!). This round was judged by the audience logging in to the Monster Jam website from their smartphones and rating the trucks in real time.
Our favorite, though, was the freestyle round. This competition, also rated by the audience, had the drivers showing us all their best tricks for two minutes. We saw huge jumps, wild donuts, sharp turns, two-wheel tricks, and – best of all – full flips! My almost-five-year-old daughter and three-year-old son reached peak happiness as several of the trucks broke into pieces, popped wheels, and flipped over. Awesome.
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We all rooted for our favorite trucks (the crowd favorite seemed to be the Gravedigger). My favorite truck was the Toro Loco, an orange truck equipped with huge horns, driven by one of the several fearless and totally hardcore female drivers in the show!
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We had heard ahead of time that the show is pretty loud, so we brought noise-reduction earmuffs for the kids and were incredibly grateful that we did. It would have been way too noisy for my sensitive kids, otherwise; the roaring engines, loudspeakers, and cheering crowd infused the show with a fantastic but head-splitting energy. We also dressed warmly (of course, I bundled up everyone except for myself) and brought blankets, which made for a perfect cozy evening in the crisp open-air stadium in San Jose. My kids nursed cups of hot chocolate throughout the night, as icing on the monster truck cake.
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Monster Jam travels for shows across the nation all year long, and we could not recommend it more highly for every member of the family. My son has long been a huge truck fanatic, so I wasn’t surprised that he was totally riveted by the show. But I was admittedly pretty shocked that my daughter, husband and I had an equally good time. That’s a rare unicorn, my friends!
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