Family Weekend Getaway
We've been talking about getting away as a family this summer, but travel options and distances are limited. During our brainstorming of what to do, we decided that a weekend in Lincoln would be fun. There are so many awesome kid activities in Lincoln, and as a bonus we have memberships that give us "free" or reduced admissions. As a double bonus, it is really close and a routine drive for us. We also considered it a trial run for a potentially longer trip later in the summer. We may now be re-thinking that potentially longer trip!
Friday we arrived and after dinner and a bit of getting settled into our space we headed down to the pool. They were in heaven! Suddenly swimming pools, big big swimming pools, are a big deal for the girls'. They love jumping in the pool and swimming under water. Spencer was a bit apprehensive at first, but managed to get in and have a great time as well. After swimming it was time to head back to our room and call it a night. Unfortunately it turned out to be a long night for Carie & I. I'm sure the kids were low on sleep as well as we headed into Saturday.
Saturday morning I unfortunately woke up with the beginnings of a migraine that was making me ill. After getting some medicine in me (thanks to Carie stalking the gift shop lady!) I managed to doze for about an hour. Carie took the kids to get some breakfast and check out the nearby farmers market & play area at the train station. The kids met a clown and got some cool balloons! They also loved checking out all the flowers from the various vendors. Then Ellie caught a whiff of something. As she's sniffing the air she tells Carie "I smell something yummy" and of course they then returned with a bag of delicious kettle korn. Ellie has a good nose on her & I love how she phrases these things.
At about the time they were done with the farmers market I was getting ready to go myself. I probably would have slept longer, but that darn alarm was set for 8:30 - you know - just in case the kids slept as they normally would. HA! By then they had already had breakfast, they had played, and they were ready to join me for breakfast (for me) and 2nd breakfast/snack for them.
Then we headed to the Children's Museum for a morning of play, and play they did. The kids actually had a choice between the Children's Museum and Morrill Hall. Our sights were set high with hopes of getting them both in, but reality set in and we knew it would be one or the other. Unless of course they wanted to forego the swimming! They alternated a few times between the choices and they all agreed that the Children's Museum was the destination. As a bonus we arrived shortly after they opened and it was really quiet in there. They spent a lot of time in and around the prairie dog tunnels, the stage, and the water areas. The girls' of course scoped out the face painting as a priority. I love that they have the areas staffed and someone who is skilled (way more than I!) at face painting is able to wow the girls' with the results.
After the Children's Museum we walked by a sandwich shop for lunch en route to our hotel. One of the reasons we chose the hotel we did was so we'd be within walking distance to a lot of the activities that interested us. The kids were a little less impressed by all the walking, but in reality we didn't walk all that far. Once we got past all the complaining of all the walking, they did enjoy the walk and the hunt for exciting things. Why are kids so fascinated with ants?!?!?!
Finally back at the hotel it was time for some down time. Spencer was ready for his daily nap and both Carie & I could have easily joined him. Ellie ended up nodding off, and we totally encouraged that. Usually an afternoon nap for either of the girls' is not such a good thing when it comes to bed time, and this turned out to be no exception. But she was so tired and we knew we had a busy evening ahead of us. Carie then insisted that I join them for a snooze. Instead I insisted that she should join them, but somehow it didn't work out that way. She and Abby played some UNO and got ready to go to the pool. After Ellie had a good snooze in Carie woke her up so she could go to the pool with them. Then once Spencer woke up he and I joined them. This time though he didn't want to get in the pool. Instead he wanted to play around the outside of the pool. One of Spencer’s weekend highlights had to have been riding the elevator. I don’t know if it was good or bad (for us) that our room was directly across the hall from the elevator, but it was good for him. I know both Carie and I rode all the way to the top several times with him. Unfortunately for him our room was only on the 3rd floor of the 9 floor hotel.
After some good pool fun it was time to get cleaned up and ready to go to the baseball game. We made it to the game before it started and stayed until the 6th inning. We sat on a blanket out in the 1st base grass berm area and we were lucky to enjoy a cool (for summer) evening of weather. The kids were up and down, as we totally expected - hence sitting in the berm area next to the playground! When Spencer and I were standing out near the outfield watching the game he'd reach out through the fence and yell "guys hit the ball". As we were leaving they talked about how much fun it was. Spencer was especially thrilled with the baseball game and watching the players throw and hit the ball as he would fully demonstrate to us.
Thankfully Saturday night went better than Friday night in the sleep department, though still not as great as if we were at home. But that is to be expected.
Sunday morning we all enjoyed some breakfast before hitting the pool area. It was incredibly quiet in the pool, which was awesome. In addition, there were some really great families in the pool area. The kids had a great time playing and splashing in the pool and could have easily stayed there all day. Unfortunately we did come to a time where we needed to get out and get ready to go. It was time to check out and get to the Children's Zoo!
The whole getting ready to go, loading up, checking out process took a lot longer than we had anticipated and suddenly we were leaving nearly two full hours later than we had hoped. We knew we were delaying ourselves with the trip to the pool, but we didn't expect that long of a delay in the end. So we finally pull out of the hotel and decide that grabbing some lunch on the go would be a wise option before we arrived at the zoo.
As we are nearing the zoo Carie and I look at each other to confirm that we are in fact nuts for going through with this plan. We are all exhausted, we are quickly approaching naptime, and we are still in Lincoln. But we knew the kids were looking forward to it and would totally notice if we skipped it.
So we forge ahead and we had a nice time at the zoo! Everyone enjoyed feeding the goats, llamas, and donkey's! Abby & Ellie then chose to ride the ponies, no big surprise. Spencer said "no thank you" to a pony ride and instead took interest in talking with them and petting them. Then they got to check out several animals that the zoo crew had available to learn about. Then we washed our hands! The only disappointment of the trip was that the Butterfly Pavilion wasn't yet opened. With all the info we had, we were anticipating that it would be open and we didn't stop long enough to see if it said why it wasn't. What we did see was that it would be "opening soon". Near the end of the zoo we came across the ponds with turtles, fish, and alligators (in different ponds). The kids had a really great time checking out the turtles so we spent quite a bit of time there. Spencer kept asking for a towel for the turtles. He didn’t seem to care that these turtles live in the water. At the end of our day there we took a ride on the train, a huge hit for our three.
Then back to the coolness of the van. It didn't take long and Spencer was asleep. The girls' knew that as soon as he was asleep we'd turn on a movie for them, and that we did. While everyone was vegging out a bit we ran a couple of quick errands before heading out of town.
Our final stop being at The Fish Store! We are now owners of two new pet fish. We've had the tank setup for several days waiting for the day they could pick out their fish. The deal was that we would pick out our fish on Sunday, after our vacation. I don't know how many times they talked about Sunday over the weekend. They may have been totally happy with skipping the entire weekend to get to Sunday! We surprised them with a stop at a fish store in Lincoln that Carie and I were familiar with and they picked out two beautiful male guppies. I verified doubly so that we were getting male guppies!
Abby chose a "Fancy Male Sunrise Guppy" and promptly name her "Pepper Shell". Ellie chose a "Fancy Male Blue Guppy" and promptly named her "Rosa Beauty". Now I know I did say that we chose male guppies, and we did in theory. We've referred to them as he or him and have explicitly told the girls that they are boy fish. They disagree and from here forward the fish are girls! This is a battle I’m not going to entertain. As far as the names, I only hope they are heavily swayed by their partners when it comes time to name their children.
The fish immediately went into shock as soon as that fish net entered their tank and the van ride home from Lincoln to Omaha wasn't probably all that pleasant for them. The girls were thrilled though! But they made it and they are adjusting nicely in their new home that resides in Abby & Ellie's room.
Friday we arrived and after dinner and a bit of getting settled into our space we headed down to the pool. They were in heaven! Suddenly swimming pools, big big swimming pools, are a big deal for the girls'. They love jumping in the pool and swimming under water. Spencer was a bit apprehensive at first, but managed to get in and have a great time as well. After swimming it was time to head back to our room and call it a night. Unfortunately it turned out to be a long night for Carie & I. I'm sure the kids were low on sleep as well as we headed into Saturday.
Saturday morning I unfortunately woke up with the beginnings of a migraine that was making me ill. After getting some medicine in me (thanks to Carie stalking the gift shop lady!) I managed to doze for about an hour. Carie took the kids to get some breakfast and check out the nearby farmers market & play area at the train station. The kids met a clown and got some cool balloons! They also loved checking out all the flowers from the various vendors. Then Ellie caught a whiff of something. As she's sniffing the air she tells Carie "I smell something yummy" and of course they then returned with a bag of delicious kettle korn. Ellie has a good nose on her & I love how she phrases these things.
At about the time they were done with the farmers market I was getting ready to go myself. I probably would have slept longer, but that darn alarm was set for 8:30 - you know - just in case the kids slept as they normally would. HA! By then they had already had breakfast, they had played, and they were ready to join me for breakfast (for me) and 2nd breakfast/snack for them.
Then we headed to the Children's Museum for a morning of play, and play they did. The kids actually had a choice between the Children's Museum and Morrill Hall. Our sights were set high with hopes of getting them both in, but reality set in and we knew it would be one or the other. Unless of course they wanted to forego the swimming! They alternated a few times between the choices and they all agreed that the Children's Museum was the destination. As a bonus we arrived shortly after they opened and it was really quiet in there. They spent a lot of time in and around the prairie dog tunnels, the stage, and the water areas. The girls' of course scoped out the face painting as a priority. I love that they have the areas staffed and someone who is skilled (way more than I!) at face painting is able to wow the girls' with the results.
After the Children's Museum we walked by a sandwich shop for lunch en route to our hotel. One of the reasons we chose the hotel we did was so we'd be within walking distance to a lot of the activities that interested us. The kids were a little less impressed by all the walking, but in reality we didn't walk all that far. Once we got past all the complaining of all the walking, they did enjoy the walk and the hunt for exciting things. Why are kids so fascinated with ants?!?!?!
Finally back at the hotel it was time for some down time. Spencer was ready for his daily nap and both Carie & I could have easily joined him. Ellie ended up nodding off, and we totally encouraged that. Usually an afternoon nap for either of the girls' is not such a good thing when it comes to bed time, and this turned out to be no exception. But she was so tired and we knew we had a busy evening ahead of us. Carie then insisted that I join them for a snooze. Instead I insisted that she should join them, but somehow it didn't work out that way. She and Abby played some UNO and got ready to go to the pool. After Ellie had a good snooze in Carie woke her up so she could go to the pool with them. Then once Spencer woke up he and I joined them. This time though he didn't want to get in the pool. Instead he wanted to play around the outside of the pool. One of Spencer’s weekend highlights had to have been riding the elevator. I don’t know if it was good or bad (for us) that our room was directly across the hall from the elevator, but it was good for him. I know both Carie and I rode all the way to the top several times with him. Unfortunately for him our room was only on the 3rd floor of the 9 floor hotel.
After some good pool fun it was time to get cleaned up and ready to go to the baseball game. We made it to the game before it started and stayed until the 6th inning. We sat on a blanket out in the 1st base grass berm area and we were lucky to enjoy a cool (for summer) evening of weather. The kids were up and down, as we totally expected - hence sitting in the berm area next to the playground! When Spencer and I were standing out near the outfield watching the game he'd reach out through the fence and yell "guys hit the ball". As we were leaving they talked about how much fun it was. Spencer was especially thrilled with the baseball game and watching the players throw and hit the ball as he would fully demonstrate to us.
Thankfully Saturday night went better than Friday night in the sleep department, though still not as great as if we were at home. But that is to be expected.
Sunday morning we all enjoyed some breakfast before hitting the pool area. It was incredibly quiet in the pool, which was awesome. In addition, there were some really great families in the pool area. The kids had a great time playing and splashing in the pool and could have easily stayed there all day. Unfortunately we did come to a time where we needed to get out and get ready to go. It was time to check out and get to the Children's Zoo!
The whole getting ready to go, loading up, checking out process took a lot longer than we had anticipated and suddenly we were leaving nearly two full hours later than we had hoped. We knew we were delaying ourselves with the trip to the pool, but we didn't expect that long of a delay in the end. So we finally pull out of the hotel and decide that grabbing some lunch on the go would be a wise option before we arrived at the zoo.
As we are nearing the zoo Carie and I look at each other to confirm that we are in fact nuts for going through with this plan. We are all exhausted, we are quickly approaching naptime, and we are still in Lincoln. But we knew the kids were looking forward to it and would totally notice if we skipped it.
So we forge ahead and we had a nice time at the zoo! Everyone enjoyed feeding the goats, llamas, and donkey's! Abby & Ellie then chose to ride the ponies, no big surprise. Spencer said "no thank you" to a pony ride and instead took interest in talking with them and petting them. Then they got to check out several animals that the zoo crew had available to learn about. Then we washed our hands! The only disappointment of the trip was that the Butterfly Pavilion wasn't yet opened. With all the info we had, we were anticipating that it would be open and we didn't stop long enough to see if it said why it wasn't. What we did see was that it would be "opening soon". Near the end of the zoo we came across the ponds with turtles, fish, and alligators (in different ponds). The kids had a really great time checking out the turtles so we spent quite a bit of time there. Spencer kept asking for a towel for the turtles. He didn’t seem to care that these turtles live in the water. At the end of our day there we took a ride on the train, a huge hit for our three.
Then back to the coolness of the van. It didn't take long and Spencer was asleep. The girls' knew that as soon as he was asleep we'd turn on a movie for them, and that we did. While everyone was vegging out a bit we ran a couple of quick errands before heading out of town.
Our final stop being at The Fish Store! We are now owners of two new pet fish. We've had the tank setup for several days waiting for the day they could pick out their fish. The deal was that we would pick out our fish on Sunday, after our vacation. I don't know how many times they talked about Sunday over the weekend. They may have been totally happy with skipping the entire weekend to get to Sunday! We surprised them with a stop at a fish store in Lincoln that Carie and I were familiar with and they picked out two beautiful male guppies. I verified doubly so that we were getting male guppies!
Abby chose a "Fancy Male Sunrise Guppy" and promptly name her "Pepper Shell". Ellie chose a "Fancy Male Blue Guppy" and promptly named her "Rosa Beauty". Now I know I did say that we chose male guppies, and we did in theory. We've referred to them as he or him and have explicitly told the girls that they are boy fish. They disagree and from here forward the fish are girls! This is a battle I’m not going to entertain. As far as the names, I only hope they are heavily swayed by their partners when it comes time to name their children.
The fish immediately went into shock as soon as that fish net entered their tank and the van ride home from Lincoln to Omaha wasn't probably all that pleasant for them. The girls were thrilled though! But they made it and they are adjusting nicely in their new home that resides in Abby & Ellie's room.
posted by Sonya at 4:09 PM
5 Comments:
OMG! I'm exhausted just reading about the trip!
Sounds like fun. It's so great that there's so much to do for them without it being a huge long trip!
p.s. - i LOVE kettle korn.
Wow! I'm tired out from reading about your trip! Sounds like the kids had a great time. I love the story about Spencer saying "Guys hit the ball." So cute.
Sounds like a delightful Lincoln weekend! Pie-Pie loves the elevator, too, and still at 12 wants to push the buttons.
Wow, what a great trip!! It sounds like you go so much done and that the kids had so much fun.
I hear you on traveling and sleeping. We are getting ready to leave for RI on Sat and we are flying with our 5 and for 11 days. CAN WE SAY WE ARE NUTS?!
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