What I enjoyed the most was the security of letting the kids go play in the playgrounds/little kids ride area where I could sit down in the shade and just visit with my friend. I could see the kids and hear them. They were so happy and playing so much I didn't have to worry about what they were doing.
The playground by the lake was so entertaining to the kids I had to pull them out to go ride rides. The 9 year old and the 6 year old were totally focused on all the different things they could do.
The ride area for the littler kids, over by the toddler ride area, was nice too. My friend and I sat down at one end and the kids ran from ride to ride then back again. The older one of course wanted to ride the bigger rides and my friends kids are 12 and 14 so they did get to ride almost all the rides over and over and over.
Then there were the rides we all went on, over and over, some of them we didn't even get out of for 3-4 turns. It's really wonderful going in September. We bought 1 day and got the next free so we went 2 days for less than $200 for all 6 of us, my friends kids have season passes so I paid for my friend, me, and my 2 grand kids. It was well worth it.
We ate at the chicken place right there on the lake. It was so good. All the kids liked the chicken strips and honey mustard. We would feed the fish our leftovers. The kids meals were very good and very reasonably priced.
We didn't do a lot of souvenirs so it wasn't very expensive over our initial cost.