Branson, part deux..............

When we last left our vacationing family, they had just finished up a duck boat ride.

And then life got all up in my grill and I have not felt the urge to finish up our vacation story.

So today- I decided I better get the rest of our vacation photos on here.........I mean I know you are just dyin' to know the rest.................hello?...............hello?.....................well- you are getting them anyhow.

Branson is like the Orlando of the midwest, without the super cool mouse.  And the ocean. Regardless.  Every hotel, gas station, shop, restaurant and corner has racks and racks and racks of brochures about stuff to do.  Personally, I loved the racks as the kids felt like they were actually getting something.  Every rack- 'can we get some mom?'  And when I would say yes- it was like they hit the lottery.  Me too, like the free make your kids happy lottery.

Until they would look at the brochures and ask to do it all.  Which is not possible in 3 days or on our budget.

But we did get to do some pretty cool stuff.

There is this place (oh- if only we had found it sooner- they had fabulous shopping and phenomenal restaurants).  I forget what it is called, but it was awesome.  And every hour, they have this fountain show set to music.  We never did catch the actual show, but the regular fountain display was pretty cool.  And none of my children fell in the fountain.  bonus points.

It was like a large outdoor mall with hotels and restaurants.  Sam was happy to find a Ride Makerz.  Grandma had sent him with some cash for a souvenir- and this was what he wanted to do!

We got to spend an entire afternoon checking out the 5 super awesome go cart tracks.

We had only planned to do one- but Emily and Dan managed to get creamed by another car which ended with Emily crying and her back hurting her pretty badly.  The manager felt so bad that he gave us 10 more ride tickets.  Good parents would have said 'this is dangerous, we aren't doing it anymore'- but Dan and I decided to let the kids decide so we went to another track and burned em up dude! (Thanks Emily?)

Us girls decided to take an hour for ourselves and get pedicures (and the girls got manicures too).  I must admit- it was so much fun to do something so girly and to see them get pampered.

The girls even got little flowers with diamonds painted on their nails.  Faaaaanceeeee!

That night- out for a show.  We chose a variety show with comedy, juggling, magic, and vantriliquism.  We all thought it was awesome.  Except Sam.  He managed to fall sound asleep on my lap less than half way through.  Which made the show even better for me, getting to snuggle him up for almost an hour.

The worlds largest bango (with Allyson juggling in front of it).

Emily could not wait to see this thing.  She is so funny.  Just for good measure, I snapped a picture of this huge violin as well.

Our last night, we switched hotels and moved to one with an indoor water park.  Major good decision, it was a blast.

The kids favorite part was the lazy river.  Let me tell you, there is nothing lazy about that river when you are swimming your heart out for 126 laps trying to keep up with small children so they won't drown.  No floating around on a tube here- they liked running in the water with the current- which meant I was swimming violently behind them with my knees scraping the bottom of the pool.  I must admit- we had a great time, I just wish I could have kept some skin on the tops of my knees.

Of course, I didn't care so much about that discomfort once I managed to wipe out inside of a water slide and bang my head (major goose egg) and smash my knee into the wall.  I kid you not- I was crying like a baby it hurt so bad.  Good news, apparently no major damage to my knee as I can almost not feel the pain anymore.

We ended up in Branson on a time share tour deal.  It was a win win.  We couldn't decide where to go, they offered us a REALLY good deal that included accomodations.  We had to attend a three hour painful process 90 minute tour- but who cares right.

We were there on their dime- and they booked all our accomodations for us.

Accomodations at a hotel we probably wouldn't have picked, but was clean and newly renovated.

I would have taken a picture of our room, but there wasn't room for my camera with all five of us in there.

I kid you not, I have never seen a hotel room so so so small.  You had to stand on the toilet to shut the bathroom door.

And we had to scootch the bed to make room for sam's twin size airmattress.

And we left our luggage in the hallway.

I'm just kidding about the luggage- but we considered it.

The beds were even little.  I  fell out of it one night.  Sound asleep- rolled right out of bed, hit my head on the side table and banged into the kids bed on my way down.  Fortunantly I didn't wake anyone up.  I just laid there until I regained conciousness and everything quit being fuzzy and drug myself back into that tiny bed.

So when we moved our last night to the 'new' hotel, it was like we were in paradise.  The kids had their own room with bunk beds- the window didn't look out onto a giant concrete retaining wall- you could take a shower without touching the toilet- there was room to consume pizzas in our room, at an actual table, after playing in the water all day- we could spread out and relax. 

And we did.

Our last morning- back to that great outdoor mall.  We got to ride this great trolly thing and hang out for a while as Dan went to that big fishing hunting store I can't remember the name of.

The kids in a hurricane simulator.  They probably don't have these in Florida.

And our last stop- a big old fashioned candy store.  I let each of the kids pick out a really small amount of candy (you can kind of see their bags in this way too overexposed picture).  The lady told me my total was over $12.  I laughed, outloud.  She was not kidding.  Holy cow.

So Branson was fun.  We probably won't go back there though.  One trip was good.  Two- eh. Unless that silver dollar city amusement park thing were to be open on a return visit.  That might convince me to go back.  And next time, we're going to that dolly parton dinner show where they ride the horses.  So maybe we will go back.......someday.  Most generally, we attend a dinner show every night anyway- we don't have to go on vacation for that.  My kids are not at all calm or quiet at the dinner table, if you catch my drift.  And if we try to eat out in an actual restaurant, well then we are like a traveling show and could probably charge admission.  I'll just leave that alone right there.  

The kids actually loved it in Branson.  A bit too commercial for me, too much to do. 

I'm more of a lay at the pool kind of gal.  If only I had more of a lay at the pool kind of body.

I'll spare you the photo.