GWL for GWML

(The boys thought it was cool that Great Wolf Lodge has the beginning letters for all their names- Grant, Wyatt, Luke- we just have to add the Mason!)

Last summer, my mom told Wyatt that when he gets the courage to jump in the pool, go underwater, and swim without his life jacket then he would earn himself a trip to Great Wolf Lodge. He definitely didn't get the courage last summer, but he never forgot about the offer. So once the pool opened this year, he kept saying, "I'm going to do it! Just a little bit at at time!" So each day he would get a little bit more brave, and by the 2nd week in June, he was a full-fledged swimmer! It was an amazing transformation to watch!! 

So we checked our calendars and scheduled our trip to Great Wolf Lodge!! And oh my goodness, did these boys have a great time!!! The last (and only) time we've been to GWL, the boys were 4 and 6. It was a whole different experience that time around. This time, they were completely independent. Going down slides, playing MagicQuest, wandering around the hotel. Sara and I just camped out in the pool area, or the lobby area and watched them have themselves a good old time! Grant and Mason definitely preferred the waterpark, while Wyatt and Luke played hours and hours of MagiQuest! They also liked swimming endlessly in the lazy river! They loved sharing the hotel room together and getting sweet treats well after bedtime! It was definitely felt like a celebration of Wyatt's swimming success!! And even more fun celebrating with cousins!! 

 My sweet little Wyatt!! I'm so proud of you buddy!! Thanks for being so brave so we could all enjoy this fun time celebrating your courage and awesomeness!!!

 Cute little wolfie, all tuckered out once we got home!!

Washington DC, Part I

On the Friday of my trip to Virginia, we decided to spend the weekend in Washington DC. Neither of us had ever been before, so it was a great time to check out the sites without children! DC traffic is no joke! I don't know how people deal with that every day! We finally made it to our hotel late afternoon on Friday. Our hotel was in the heart of the city and it was beautiful!! And thank goodness for valet parking! We quickly got settled and then headed out to explore for the few hours we had left in the day! 

 We went to Natural History Muesum first. I felt like I stepped foot into the Night at the Museum movie! It was an incredible sight! We saw lots of dead animals and naturally gross things- like spiders as big as my hand! But it was a cool place. Super crowded so it was hard to really get a good view of things. I mostly just admired the architecture of the building. 

 Then we headed over to the Museum of American History. This was probably one of our favorite museums. They had some amazing treasures there!

 A few days before we got there, there was a group of people who gathered to make this USA flag out of Legos. Its 9.5ft by 14ft in size and is made up of over 100,000 Legos! It weighs 546lbs and took 16 hours to build! I knew that would be Grant's favorite thing if he was with us! It's hard to even tell the scale

 Some of my favorite things from this museum was Lincoln's actual top-hat he wore the night he died, as well as a suit worn by George Washington.

After the muesum, we trekked down to the Washington Monument. It was so breathtaking to see how huge it truly is! And to know it was built in 1848 is just astounding.

 All of the flags were at half-mast because of the shootings at the recruiting center in Tennessee. 

 The scenery around the monument is just so incredible. The stone structures and fountains and flags all around- you just can't help but be in awe!

 You can see part of the World War II Memorial here.  Then we walked past the Reflecting Pool towards the Lincoln Memorial, which is so incredibly long. It doesn't seem that long in pictures, but as you're walking next to it, it feels like it never ends.

Here is the Washington Monument from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial! The Lincoln Memorial is HUGE. The building was huge. Lincoln was huge. Just breath-taking!

 By this time, our feet were already killing us, so we hailed a cab back to the hotel to enjoy a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant and rest our feet for our big day of exploring tomorrow!

VA Sunset Cruise

After our dinner downtown, we hopped aboard the American Rover sailboat for a sunset cruise. It was a three-masted top sail schooner that looked like something from a history book. It was pretty, and once we got moving, it felt so good to feel the wind through our hair (remember, it was the hottest and most humid day the entire trip!). We met up with another couple that Merritt knew and enjoyed an evening sunset sail through the waters of downtown Norfolk.

 It was a beautiful evening to be outside and watch the sunset next to my favorite person!!

NAS Norfolk and USS Wisconsin

On our first full day in Virginia, Levi had to go to work for some of the morning. I enjoyed that time by not fixing any kids breakfast and by not starting on any chores!! I got hotel breakfast and watched Netflix!! Fantastic! But when Levi got home, we had plans to explore some of the city with his friend, Merritt. (Merritt was with Levi in Bahrain and came back to the states to separate from the Navy as well. He didn't have transportation out there, so he palled around with us alot.) So Merritt had planned a bus tour of NAS Norfolk for the afternoon. His sister was coming in from DC so it was going to be a touristy day for us all! 

NAS Norfolk is probably one of the bigger bases I have seen. It's also a very historic base, so it was neat to see and hear about the history. 

After the tour of the naval station, we headed downtown to explore the USS Wisconsin. It was a battleship from WWII. We probably picked the hottest and most humid day of our entire trip to walk around and check this thing out, but it was pretty cool!!

 

 It might possibly be the last Navy ship Levi will ever set foot on, unless we become touristy again some other place! Walking around inside and seeing the bunks and chow line, I don't think he will miss that part!! 

The rest of the evening was spent grabbing dinner downtown before heading off to a sunset cruise...

376 Days

I had said goodbye to Levi 376 days ago. Well, technically it had been 203 days since I said goodbye right after his Christmas visit. Either way- that was a loooooong time to go without seeing his face in person! I heard a lot of people say over the past year, "I don't know how you do it" or "I could never do that!" or "I can't stand when my husband is gone, even for a weekend." But its funny because I have said all those things since we got married. I could never imagine what it would be like for Levi to go on a deployment- until he went on one. I could never imagine being able to raise two children without their dad- until I had to. I could never imagine not seeing my husband for over year- until I did. And we all survived every second of it. We are stronger. We are better. It wasn't always easy, it wasn't always fun, but that was the life we were given and I'd like to think we lived it to the fullest.

So, when we found out Levi was going to be arriving stateside, but couldn't come home for a few weeks, I knew I couldn't wait a second longer to go see him. We originally thought of the boys and me flying out for an extended stay in Virginia, but after looking at air fares, and not really knowing what Levi's schedule would look like, we decided it would be best for me to fly out alone. Plus, we haven't had a vacation together in 9 years!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Seriously- not a weekend, not even a night- unless you count a night at the Best Western in KC, but I don't count that. So it was a very very very VERY well-deserved trip that was extremely long overdue. Sure, I was sad about leaving the boys for that long- I'd never left them for more than 48 hours in their entire life!!! So 9 days was going to be long! But I knew they would be having soooo much fun with Mimi and PawPaw and their cousins, so that definitely took the pressure off of my mommy guilt. So I packed my bags and hopped a plane!!

And talk about butterflies in my stomach! After landing in Virginia, and walking through the terminal and seeing Levi at the end of the walkway, it was like a Hallmark movie! Hugging him, touching him, smelling him. It was just the best feeling!!!

We were ready to spend 9 whole days together!! 

Great Wolf Lodge, Part 2

On our first morning at the Great Wolf Lodge, we found out that most of the things don't open til 9 or 10:00. Since we have kids who wake up at 7:00, we had to do something with those few extra hours! So we headed out to breakfast at Chick Fil A, made a quick spin around Target and got back and changed just in time for the waterpark Opening Ceremony! The boys were so excited to swim and swim and swim!

We met Brinley the Bear at the opening ceremony! For someone who has a strong affection for teddy bears, Grant wanted nothing to do with him! But Wyatt loved him!

 Going on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday in late April was probably the BEST time to go to GWL. There were hardly any other people there- no waiting in lines, no crowds to swim around. It was awesome!!!!! The boys loved everything there was to do! Wyatt really liked the little kiddie pool and slides. He was a little scared of them after he went down the blue slide and went so fast he went under water super fast. It took some time but it turned out to be one of his favorite activities!! He even got super brave and went down the tube slides with Levi a few times! Grant loved the treehouse thing, all the water slides, the lazy river, pretty much everything!! I didn't get pictures of much since I was pretty much in the water with them the whole time! 

And when we weren't swimming in the waterpark, they were still having a wonderful time! Their other favorite place was the arcade!

 Grant won the 100 ticket jackpot 3 times!! They had fun playing all the fun games! If only they weren't so darn expensive, we would've spent alot more time in there! But they earned enough tickets to buy some candy, a stuffed ladybug, and a water weenie. Yes, money well spent ;-)

We also played the MagiQuest scavenger hunt game with the magic wand. I somehow did not take any pictures of this, but its basically a scavenger hunt between a few of the hallways in the hotel. It was a fun activity to play in between swimming and meals. We made it to Master Magi level when we had to leave! They can't wait to go back and continue our quest!!!

It was a perfect little family getaway before all the moving madness began! Nowhere to be, no chores to take care of, just living carefree as a family for a few days!!!  It sure was fun while it lasted!!!

Great Wolf Lodge, Part 1

We closed on our house on Monday, April 28th, but we weren't able to take possession til April 30th, so we did the only logical thing- take a surprise mini-vacation at Great Wolf Lodge!! We didn't tell the boys (well, until I spilled the beans on the phone the morning of, so its a good thing I'm good at tricking them and that they are extremely gullible) so once we pulled into the parking lot, they went crazy with excitement! We didn't get there til almost 6pm, so after exploring the lobby for a bit, we headed to our room to check it out and they were sooooooo amazed by the awesome room we got!

Crazy picture of Grant, but he loved the fact there was a tiny mouse on the "shelf" above his bed!

After a quick change it was time to head down to the pool!

The Lake via Instagram

A very random picture post of the lake, via Instagram!!!

Doing What We Do Best

Of course, most of our time at the lake was just spent swimming and splashing! In fact, I don't think I even left the house the first two days! Its a little bit trickier going to the lake with such young kids. The past few years I've gone, I felt like I was hardly ever in the water because I always had a baby to take care of! So this year, it was nice that the boys were just big enough to stay inside in the house and play if they didn't want to swim, and I could still lay on a raft! They were much more independent than I had hoped!

Although they really loved swimming more than I thought they would, especially Grant. Wyatt still wasn't too sure about swimming in such a wide open area, but he did his fair share! Grant LOVED jumping off the side doing cool moves. The big boys had jumping contests and we had to score them! They had a great time squirting everyone with the water guns! And of course, playing with Kenny in the water! He was best water toy there was!!

Of course, us grownups enjoyed lounging on a raft or noodle with a cold beverage in hand chatting and enjoying our time together! The water was PERFECT!! The weather was PERFECT! It was just a PERFECT vacation!!!

The Family

The absolute best part of vacation was spending time as an entire family! Staying at a house altogether versus staying in individual cabins meant alot more time together! I think I can safely say that it made our vacation that much better! I miss all my family, especially since I haven't lived in Kansas City for going on 7 years now! It's hard to be away from them. I am so so thankful we are able to have this time together!