Vacation 2012

Well, we just returned from our first vacation as a family of 4 (5 including Babe B., but for obvious reasons she was not able to attend with us). We decided to go to the Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City and stopped at some other places including the new Sea Life Aquarium in Crown Center. So, bring on the pictures!!! This post may put me over my picture limit and then I will have to get another email address and another blog....Hopefully not!

It didn't take long on the trip down for Emmitt to fall asleep. 

 Not so lucky with Jesstine. I guess she was too excited!

 Here we are trying to find our room.

Was afraid to put Emmitt on the floor, so I let him play in his bed.

The first night there we ordered some Pizza and Jesstine ate hers like a big girl without it being cut up (and without garlic dipping sauce)!

The next morning she started out by reading the daily schedule.

While Emmitt and Daddy snuggled!

Mommy joined in!

Before we were even able to get to the park, Emmitt was ready for his first nap!

We swam most of the day and napped after a light lunch. We then went to Legends Mall and Oklahoma Joe's BBQ.

We capped off the evening with a little more swimming where I decided it was time to take some pictures of the actual park!

 (What you don't see in the picture below is that Jesstine ran off and Daddy had to go fetch her. After which she had to sit out for a while because she was not listening!)

There were three big slides. We were only able to ride two. Jesstine liked the blue the best. I prefered the yellow! Stephen only got to ride the blue.

The bucket here on top of the "tower" would fill up and dump over (with a bell to warn you) at a little less than every five minutes. Both kids looked around each time the bell rang! It was kinda funny!

This was a little side pool with a wood hopping course, basketball and a foam snake. I spent a LOT of time here with Emmitt, just hanging out!

These were the small pools that Jesstine rode at least 100 times!

Jesstine was a bit happier when we said she could resume swimming. 

She finally got brave enough to stand under the bucket. I sent Emmitt too so I could get a picture of them all getting soaked. For the record, he didn't like it!

Jesstine also spent a lot of time on the tower. It was really pretty neat!

There were even some slides coming off of it too that Jesstine really liked. She liked the red one. I thought the yellow was better!

The end of the HUGE yellow slide.

A couple pictures of Jesstine riding the kiddie slides.

She really liked the red one the best...

Today we said goodbye to our temporary home.

And here is my "Lacie from Clearwater" moment for the trip! We decided to try the new Sea Life Aquarium in Crown Center. The line was long and in the sunshine. In the future, we will probably get our tickets ahead of time....That was what the door on the left was for....While we were waiting, someone got my attention and asked what "Franklin Elementary" my shirt represented. I said the one in Wichita. She proceeded to tell me she was also employed by the district and was a Spanish interpreter for the district!

Emmitt turned lots of heads with his hat today! Well, actually he was turning heads EVERYWHERE (I am not kidding) because everyone thought he was cute, hat or no hat!

In the aquarium lobby.

I took these next two photos before I realized that we weren't supposed to use flash! Oops! Would have been cooler without. These fish kinda glowed in the dark!

This fish almost seemed to greet us as we came in! It even got it's head out of the water to check us out!

Jesstine liked this part! She got to actually touch and hold sea stars!

Sting rays.

Jesstine in the tank with the fish! There were several of these throughout the aquarium.

This is an eel that looked like a piece of seaweed or grass!

Can you spot the shark in the next three photos?

Cool way to display the Jellyfish! Jesstine really liked these too!

Another water tunnel.

We found Dory (from Finding Nemo).

Cool sea star!

Found LOTS of Nemos!

Emmitt even got to get into one of the tunnels! He really looked around! It was pretty cool!

Sting Ray cove.

I have always wanted to see a real seahorse. Well, I got my chance! They liked to wrap their tails around the coral! It was pretty cool!

A puffer fish in it's native habitat!

At the end there was a play area. Socks were required and Jesstine was wearing sandals, so Daddy graciously allowed her to wear his! LOL! It was pretty comical!

One last bubble.

Fountains outside.

The Crown Center shopping center we had to walk through to get from the parking garage to the aquarium. It was BUSY!

This guy was actually made from leggos!

We ate at Fritz's for lunch (more on that later).

 But not until we tried out the free dinosaur exhibit....well, Emmitt and I didn't. Didn't feel comfortable leaving the stroller.

 In line for Fritz's.

We sat next to the Coke train (which was fitting since Jesstine had Coke with her meal).

There was a train track around the ceiling. The whole system was built specifically to deliver food!

This is our food!!!

 Lowerd to us on a metal plate!

 Before leaving, we hit the Crayola store next to the Crayola Cafe. Jesstine spelled her name (my goal was to teach her this before the summer was over....someone else either did it for me, or she figured it out on her own....sorta. it looks like JESSTInE...It's at least a start).

Then we finished up with a toy store in which she found all of the members of the Yo Gabba Gabba show! We did NOT take them home with us!

On our way out of town, we came across this at a stop light. I had to take a picture since Corbin is my nephew's name!

We had a great time! In hindsight, I wish Emmitt had been older, but Jesstine was the perfect age! We discovered that Jesstine is scared to death of animatronic animals! We visited the T Rex Cafe and she about peed her pants in the doorway because of the HUGE T-Rex! We ended up getting a buddy for the T-Rex she got on last year's vacation (and it helped her to get out of the store) and one for Emmitt as well. We also scored a pair of shoes on clearance for her (it has become apparent that it is hard to buy shoes for her because the kind she needs are not in her size). We are all so tired! So, my bed is calling me! Goodnight!!!

In Him,

The Hutchins Family