Meanwhile....

The kids and I headed to Gaylord Palms Resort to beat the heat and have a little fun while Daddy fished in Alaska. I had friends and family say "Are you Crazy? Just you and the kids? " I knew it would be an adventure and hard work without Daddy, but we had a really good time and I enjoyed my kids immensely. We had a few bumps (now they make funny stories), but we're none the worse for wear and we came out alive, all three of us!

Check in was my first challenge. Yes, check in. I wondered if I'd made the right plan when I had Real difficulty keeping my monkeys in one place long enough for me to check in and get our room key. Who knew that one room key would NEVER suffice for the three of us? Oh the fighting that ensued over the key! It wasn't long before we made another trip to the front desk where the very gracious lady, who obviously had experienced preschoolers, gave "special" keys to both Tristan and Aynsley. I hope you really feel for me when I say that EVERY time we got to the room, they both had to try out their keys before I could actually use mine & get in the room. A long process that required endless amounts of patience.

While I'm on the subject of keys, I'll jump ahead to a story from our last night there. Somehow, amidst all the confusion of lugging around our bags, balloons, and kids, the key fell out of my pocket. Of course, I didn't know that until I reached the room and no key. Two words: Not Good. I had preached to the kids all week on the importance of making sure we had our key and not playing with it. (If you've not ever traveled to a hotel with your kids by yourself, you probably can't appreciate how easy it is to get locked out of your hotel room while the kids are inside the room! ) Anyway, since they had heard me harp on the subject all week, they knew immediately that losing the key was not good. They suddenly became model children.

11:00 p.m., everybody's tired and ready for bed and we couldn't get in our room. I wish I could say that I handled this calmly, patiently, and without raising my voice. But as I dumped all our bags' contents out onto the hallway floor to find the key, it was pretty hard not to let my frustration get the best of me. Not my best moment demonstrating to the kids what to do in a crisis. Apparently, my voice was elevated because my son kept telling me..."Momma, please don't wake the monsters up!"

In my defense, we did pray, A LOT, that God would deliver the key, and though He did not, it was still a good lesson. I'll spare you readers from the entire story but it was very very late by the time I proved to the security guard that I was who I said I was and the front desk issued newly activated keys and we got into our room.

My little fishermen:

If you've never taken your kids to Gaylord, it is a must. The kids' pool area is WAY fun!Even for big kids like me. It is becoming one of our favorite places to go because you can stay there, eat there, play there and not leave for days. Tristan is riding a giant sea turtle here.

This crab sprayed mist and you can tell by Tristan's face that it wasn't what he bargained for.

Running through water falls:

If you look close you can see Tristan coming down the gigantic octopus slide. I was so impressed that he was never nervous about this....in fact, he and Aynsley entertained themselves with this all by themselves for hours on end. Of course, sometimes, Momma had to give it a whirl. Luckily, I've no pictures of that. :-)

They are looking into the gator tank...

at these fiesty little gators...

We were thrilled to see a familiar face when Pop came down to have dinner with us our first night. It was welcome relief for me and ultra nice to have adult conversation! And we had great fun! This restaurant is set up like Mallory Square in Key West complete with "street vendors"-everything from a man on stilts making balloon animals to artists of every kind and even a guy juggling swords.

Miss Dixie is drawing a beautiful vine & flowers on Aynsley's arm,

and then it was Tristan's turn. Arrgghhh!

The next morning as we jumped in the pool, we were very sad that our face paint washed away almost instantly. Luckily, the octopus slide helped dry our tears.

Can you see the waterfall behind us ?

O

Our last night, my mother-in-law and sister-in-love & my niece and nephew came up to play with us and we capped off our adventure with more fun. Aynsley learned from this performer how to spin plates...although I think there was trick involved....

Cousins bonding over chocolate cake: