Branson, Part One!

So, I’m back on the blogging bandwagon (but don’t be surprised if I fall off again next week.)

I feel like I have so much to catch up on, but I have no idea where to start! 

The most exciting thing I have to blog about is our Spring Break vacation that we took last weekend.  On Thursday evening, we headed to Branson (“we” being Stephen, my mother-in-law, Christopher, and myself!) to the condos that we have this year!  We arrived late Thursday night. (When possible, we do our long drives at night, so that Christopher can sleep.  He’s still not a huge fan of his carseat for long periods of time.) We went to bed at 1:30 in the morning but I think the last time I looked at the clock before falling asleep it was 3am!

Christopher woke up around 9 and we had our breakfast and then started getting ready to head to Silver Dollar City for the day!  My parents also happened to be in Branson (no, we did not plan on being there at the same time —my parents had originally planned to go skiing in New Mexico, but the weather wasn’t good for skiing so they ended up going to Branson) so we all met up together at SDC. Christopher was SO surprised to see his Granny and Pawpaw there. The look on his face when he saw my mom was hilarious!

This is Stephen and Christopher when we first got there and were waiting on Nana to buy herself a ticket. You can tell Christopher looks thrilled. Haha! (He was already getting tired – he didn’t get his normal amount of sleep the night before.)
ALSO – please ignore that dirty old shirt that my hubby is wearing. ;) I’m trying to convert him, I swear!

We headed to the “little kid” section of the park. There were only a few rides that Christopher was tall enough to ride. The grandmas went on the rides with him. He LOVED them!

This was the first ride he rode – he was SO excited to finally get in a caterpillar after standing in line for 10 minutes. His face here cracks me up – just sitting in it made him so happy

Waiting for the ride to start…

Then going ‘round and ‘round and up and down!
    

The next ride he rode was the jumping frogs ride.  This one basically did the same thing as the caterpillars, except the frogs went up and down on their own, kind of “jumping” around.  The caterpillar had a button you could push to take you up.   

We also rode the “shootout” ride (I don’t know the names of all the rides.) It is basically a boat that you ride around in and you have a gun that you can shoot at targets and see who gets the most targets. It’s not a “kiddy” ride, but Christopher seemed to enjoy it.  Then we rode the steam train. At this point we’d been at the park for a few hours and C was really needing lunch and a nap. The train takes about 20 minutes to ride and he cried a little on it just because he was sleepy/cranky/hungry.  I asked a nice guy in front of us to take our picture. It turned out really good except that Christopher wasn’t looking at the camera. However, it’s the only picture I have of all of us and I really like it. 

The plan after the train ride was for us to eat lunch at the park then for my parents to take Christopher so that Deanna, Stephen and I could ride some adult rides and so that C could take a nap. (My parents had been at SDC the day before so that were good with leaving after C had ridden all the kiddy rides.) It ended up not working out because of a work favor/thing Stephen had to do, so we ended up just leaving the park early and taking care of Stephen’s errand. Christopher took a much-needed nap in the car while we did that, then we went to The Landing to do a little shopping and had dinner at Cantina Laredo. Their beef fajita meat is to die for. Beef fajita quesadillas = happy tummy.  They also have a very yummy (although expensive) Guac Appetizer that they make fresh right there at your table. Yum.O.

We ended the night we some ice cream from Marble Slab Creamery at the Landing (which is not that good compared to Stone Cold Creamery) and headed back to the condo for the night.  I think we went to bed around midnight, but I woke up with gallbladder pains at 4 in the morning and was up till 7:30 dealing with that. (That was my third “attack” in a week. More about that in a separate post!) C woke up at 7 and Stephen took over duty with him 30 minutes later so that I could try to get an extra hour of sleep in – but I ended up sleeping till 11:00. I couldn’t believe that I slept that long, but I felt much better. My parents met up with us and took Christopher home that afternoon so that we could do some outlet mall shopping (a separate post!) and then return to SDC on Sunday morning to ride a few coasters. (Also a separate post.)  All in all it was a great little vacation and I look forward to doing it again very soon!