Great Wolf Lodge

     The weekend after the kids did their play, we took a little mini trip to an indoor water park/hotel about an hour south of us.  We have been a couple times before, but the last time was about two years ago, so Elliot had never been and Mason never remembered going.  

      The plan had been to go with my sister and her family and my parents, but it turned out to be almost impossible to find a Friday/Saturday that worked for everybody.  We finally decided on March 28, which was a free weekend for everybody, but only three weeks before my sister's due date.  In the end, her family decided not to come.  I don't blame her; she was having contractions for weeks ahead of time and was nervous to be almost two hours from the hospital that close to her due date.  My parents still joined us Friday night and part of Saturday though and we had a lot of fun, but missed Mal, Brandon and their kids!  

       So, when Carson was a baby I dropped our almost brand new camera in the water at the beach and ruined it.  Since then, I have mostly avoided taking our camera places where there is a lot of water, so there is no pictures of us swimming or going down slides, but that was definitely the highlight of the weekend.  It was different having big kids this time around who were actually tall enough to go on the big slides and it was nice to have my parents there to help.   Mike and I were actually able to ride some of the big slides with the older kids, which was a lot of fun.  All three older kids loved it and Elliot was a good sport.  He didn't want to be set down in the water, but he was content to be held and look around.  He was in a good mood almost the whole time we were there and slept all night until 6:30, so I consider that a huge success as far as babies and vacations go!

Abby playing glow mini golf after swimming Saturday morning.

I love this kid and his expressions.  He gets so excited about almost anything right now and I wish I could just push the pause button and keep him at age three for a (long) while.

Enjoying treats from Grandpa.  I remember going on vacations growing up and something about being on a trip puts my dad into treat buying mode.  I loved it as a kid and my children were thrilled when Grandpa offered to treat them to something from counter selling ice cream and pastries right outside the water park.  I also enjoyed my ice cream cone.  Thanks Dad!

My little family.

With Grandpa and Grandma.

         We also went to the arcade and after trying three or four times Mike beat the record of the basketball hoop game there!  I know I took a picture of it on my phone, but I can't find it, so just picture him standing by one of those hoop shoot games pointing triumphantly at the new high score.  It was a proud moment for us all.
          We arrived back home Saturday evening with worn out, happy kids.