Family Vacation Flashback!

I feel like I need to blog about our family vacation just so I don't forget about the details!!  It has already been six months so it is already a bit foggy!!

We took a few days in August to head to Missouri for vacation.  

Addie wanted to go to Laura Ingalls house in MO so that was our starting point.  We decided to stay near Branson and do some of the touristy things around the town.

We left Osky Monday morning.  It is a pretty long drive from Osky to Mansfield MO and not a really direct route for part of it.  We ate at Applebee's in Columbia and then continued on our way.

 The kids did pretty well and we got to the Laura Ingall's house an hour or so before it closed.  They have a museum with all sorts of family artifacts in it that we walked through first. 

Here is Pa's fiddle.  The kids were excited to see that.

Lauren loved one of Laura's dresses.

Then we toured her house.  She lived here with Almanzo and Rose while she wrote the books towards the end of her life. 

They don't let you take pictures on the inside so here we are outside afterwards.

The boys afterward.

Girls by the sign at the farm

Next we made our way to Branson.  We stayed at a resort by Table Rock Lake.  It was a little south of town, but it was really nice.  They had an indoor water slide, pool, splash pad, mini golf and more right at the resort.

We hit the splash pad and water slide the first night there.  The weather was awesome and the kids had a blast!  Most of the schools in MO had started back up so it was fairly quiet at the hotel which was nice.

Waiting on the bucket....

And RUN!!!!!

There was a little slide outside that Nolan enjoyed.

Tuesday we got up and hit the White Water water park.  Now that the kids are old enough to ride a lot of things and don't need naps we were able to go for the whole day.  It was great!

We didn't have any cameras or our phones with us that day so we didn't get any pictures.  Here are some from the website.  It is so fun!

This was a crazy fast water slide that Addie and Adam rode.  Addie's first time on big water slides and she was afraid of nothing!

They also rode these.  The two on the right are straight down. No fear!

This was the big water play area that Lauren and Nolan enjoyed the most.  There were all sorts of slides of different sizes and areas to climb and splash in. 

A closer look at it.  It was perfect for their age.

We ate at the concession stand for lunch there which really wasn't too bad and then hit a pizza buffet afterwards.  All in all it was a great day playing and relaxing together!

Wednesday morning I got up with Addie and headed to the Titanic museum in Branson.  She was old enough to understand about the boat and we both enjoyed learning about the ship.  You couldn't take pictures in this museum as well.

Here is the outside of the museum on the Branson strip.

They recreated the deck of the ship.  It was freezing in here so it felt just like it did for the passengers.

They recreated the grand staircase.  

They had a section just about the musicians.  Addie played this grand piano when we were there.  

Addie's passenger she was assigned (which was a child) lived, but mine died. I was a lower class passenger and didn't get on a life boat.  Addie and I both learned a lot and enjoyed our morning. 

We came back and found an awesome BBQ place south of Branson for lunch as a family called Danna's BBQ.  

Nolan and Addie playing thumb war while we wait for our food.

Awesome lunch and kiddos!  It is on hwy 165.  We would highly recommend it!!!

The kids really wanted to hit some of the go kart places so we found one that had a bunch of things to do.  Lauren and Nolan rode the Ferris wheel.

It was super small, but just their size!

They had a blast!  We also did a small go-cart track and bumper boats and Lauren even got to drive a little go kart all by herself!  

This place had a huge go-kart track that had a four story spiral climb and then a big slope on the way down.  They all wanted to ride and so we had to take turns taking each of them on the ride.  Here is Adam with one of them coming down the slide.

And around the corner....

Adam and Nolan coming down the slope.  They had a great time!  They would have ridden all day if we let them!!  

Wednesday night we went to the Dixie Stampede show.  Again you couldn't take pictures inside so I don't have any from that evening.  These pictures are from online.

  It is show designed by Dolly Parton about our country's history.  Everyone sits on around the arena and they feed you a four course feast!  We had tons to eat and the show was fantastic.  Lots of horse riding and tricks, magic tricks, singing and entertainment.

This is what the whole arena looked like.

The group that rode and sang.

This is the outside of the stampede.

You could come early and walk along the stalls of the horses.  The kids really enjoyed that.

We headed back to the hotel and decided to play a quick round of mini golf and hit the pool one last time.

Nolan mini golfing

The kids were tired and getting a bit frustrated by the mini golf challenges.  I think about here we quit and decided to go swim.

Here we are since we aren't in most of the pictures!!!

The next morning we packed up and drove south of our hotel a fish hatchery.  

Here is cute pie Lulu.  She was in the car trying to help load up.  It is SO much easier to travel without an infant now.  I think about all the stuff we used to travel with....pack n play, little potty, booster seat, extra diapers, coolers of milk and baby food, bottles, wipes....oh man the list goes on and on!  It is so fun to vacation with kids that are potty trained and can feed themselves!! 

This fish hatchery is at the dam at Table Rock Lake.  We took a tour and it is a fascinating process.

'

Some of the smaller fish.

They are covered so the birds don't eat the fish.  It doesn't look like it, but there wasn't a cloud in the sky and standing on that pavement it was burning hot. We had to quit before the tour was over because the kids were hot and not totally interested in it.  Adam and I enjoyed it a lot other than being hot!!!  

We drove across table rock lake dam.

We found a Cracker barrel for a huge lunch and then headed north out of Branson.  We went to Fantastic Caverns north of Springfield.  We took the kids to a cave in WI a couple of years ago and they were excited to see another one.

Here is Lauren by a huge Amethyst.  I think that was like $800.

They each picked out a rock to buy out of the gift shop.

You rode a tram through the caverns.  It was quite a place.  Very large and privately owned.

Some of the huge formations

More of the formations.

Some young girls were some of the first explorers sent into the cave.  They signed their names on the wall of the cavern.

These were incredibly large.

Some formations as we were leaving the cave.

Another formation right as we were leaving. 

The kids were in one of the old trams.

They were still happy at this point.  They didn't realize how far we had to travel before we would be home.  It think it was a five to six hour trip directly home.  We made it to Columbia for supper at Culver's and picked up another new Red Box movie to get us home.  

I think we made it home about eleven o'clock that night.  We were all exhausted.  We packed as much fun as we could in four days and enjoyed every single minute!!!