So a few months ago I found this incredible deal on Living Social for a 2-night family getaway at a hotel that has an indoor water park. It included a food credit, 2 nights at the hotel, 4 passes to the water park and a massage (let's be honest, the massage is what got me).
I convinced Ryan that it was a fabulous idea and I bought it.
Maybe it was a foreshadowing or a warning of what was to come, but at first I had trouble buying the deal and then when I did buy it, I didn't realize until 2 weeks before that it had an expiration date!
I quickly called the resort and made our reservation which ended up being this past weekend.
The family packed up the car and we ventured up to the mountains and to the water park. Oliver had no idea what was going on, but Evan was super excited to stay at a hotel (his first time) and go to this mysterious place called a water park.
We got there. The hotel was clean. We scoped out the water park, it looked fun...and clean. I was excited!
This was our first alone family vacation together. Honestly, I don't know if you can really call it a vacation when it was only for 2 nights, but we had to start out with baby steps. All other "vacations" prior had been to visit family.
Excited for the day ahead at the water park, we got the boys ready for bed and set up our sleeping arrangement. Oliver was in the Pack n Play in between the beds, and I would snuggle with Evan in one bed while Ryan took the other.
At one point we thought Evan was going to opt for Daddy, but he soon came back. After only about 45 minutes of craziness, the boys settled down and actually fell asleep by 7:30, which meant that Ryan and I would be forced to fall asleep at 7:30. Let me just tell you, it was great to go to bed that early and just relax.
But alas, not all could be peaceful and uneventful.
Evan is a terrible bed buddy. I knew the child took after me with moving around a lot in his bed. I find him flipped or hanging off his bed most nights, but nothing could have prepared me for his acrobatics. I was forced to a small section of the bed most of the night, but managed to get in some shut-eye.
Then the 5:30 wake-up call came. You guessed it, from Evan. He popped right up out of bed. No rubbing of the eyes or slowly getting up and being groggy. He was ready to rock n roll and then proceeded to wake up his brother. So we were all up at the lovely hour of 5:30 (they usually wake up at 6:45/7:00, and yes, the extra hour or so does make a difference).
The next 3 hours were used to keep them entertained and quiet so they wouldn't wake up the rest of the hotel. I don't know how well we did, but we didn't get any complaints.
Finally, after 3 long hours, we made our way to the water park to have some fun.
To summarize: we had fun. it was cold. we stayed 2 hours. we didn't go back.
The water in the indoor water park was FREEZING! We even went to stay in the wave pool to try and stay warm, but the water was so cold. Oliver's teeth were chattering and we had to keep taking him out to dry him off and dress him. He spent most of the time "wading."
Evan was not impressed. He didn't want to do any slides and was perfectly happy playing with the water hose.
Water park was a bust. Maybe when they're older?
By 10:30 we were all starving. After a few dashes to the bathroom with the boys for potty breaks and diaper changes, we finally made our way to find some food with our food/beverage credit we were given. Nothing opened until 12:00!
This did not go over well with the boys, and so we took a drive and got some snacks to tide us over and then headed back to use up our credit at the hotel's restaurant. I'm glad we had the snacks.
By this point, Ryan and I had decided that after I had my massage appointment, we were going to head home despite the fact that we had another night booked.
The water park was not an option to go back to (freezing, remember) and Mommy and Daddy had not thought ahead and didn't bring any toys for the boys to play with in the room. We tried outlet shopping, but that didn't last long either.
A snow-capped mountain peak in the distance, we made our way back home glad that we didn't plan a long far-away "vacation" to test the waters.
Can't really say we had a lot of muddles, major ones anyway, but to document a family vacation is always good to look back on.
We were all ready to be home.
But the massage was worth it. Oh, yes.
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