~Branz Boys~: Great Wolf Lodge

For Spring Break March 10 - 12 - this little family of 5 along with Grandpa Mark, Grandma Dianne and Aunt Amy went to the Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City as our Christmas present all to each other. We stayed two nights and played hard in the water park (even though mommy left her swim suit bag at home and had to go buy a new one when we got there).

We stayed in a loft style room on the 4th (top) floor. There were two queen beds, a small fridge and microwave and bathroom right when you walked in, and a pull out couch (in a sort of portioned off section next to the balcony), then stairs led to a 3rd queen bed upstairs as well as another half-bath. Mommy and Daddy and Wyatt slept upstairs, and we didn't realize until Wyatt let us know at 6:45 am on the first morning that there was a sky-light up there! So there was plenty of room to eat supper the first night, breakfast and lunch the next day and breakfast on the last day in our rooms.

A view looking down from the loft. That's Wyatt & Reese on the bed and Aunt Amy & Grandpa Mark next to it

One of Wyatt's favorite activities was watching the big bucket in the water park dump every few minutes. It took a while to fill up, but once it got to a certain level of fullness water would start running out of another pipe to spin a wheel that made a bell ding as a warning that the bucket was a bout to tip! He learned to listen for it and once it started dinging he would focus on the bucket till the water all splashed out. He loved it!

A quick smile for Mommy before the bucket dumps!

The Bucket Dump in action (.GIF form)

Reese's favorite thing to do was run around on this play fort pictured below. There were nets to climb up and different mechanisms to fill with water and dump, and ropes to pull to dump other things. He loved to climb up the nets and cut in front of all the other kids in line to go down the water slides there. He got in trouble a few times and almost got kicked off! But after a talk with Grandpa Mark he finally agreed to play by the rules!

Aunt Amy and Grandpa Mark enjoying the zero entry end of the pool

Clayton was sure a fish!

Reese took breaks often to warm up, he's always so cold!

If you asked Clayton, he would say that his favorite thing was going down the big water slides in the tubes with Daddy or Grandpa (although Clayton did go down the yellow one with just Mommy once, it was my first time and it was freaking out while he calmly enjoyed the ride). I know that he really also liked getting the bucket dump though too. He did not enjoy going to the slides on the Fort that Reese liked so much, because he said they were too dark and scary.

Daddy, Reese and Clayton getting off the tube after going down the big yellow slide.

Something we didn't get any pictures of was riding in the inner tubes around the Lazy River. It was right next to the exit for the 3 big water slides and it was always busy with people riding or even walking around it. Wyatt spent a lot time going around it with Mommy or Daddy and one time it was even just the three of us which was really fun.

What a pair these two are. They conquered these little water slides together and had a blast! (Wyatt couldn't go down any slides. Just a few months from now and maybe I would feel comfortable sending him down one with someone to catch him, but his slide skills aren't good enough yet),

The Great Wolf Lodge had lots of fun activities for kids to do, some were for extra money and some were included. We did have the boys check out Story Time in front of the Great Clock on the first night and again in the morning they did a Wolf Walk the next morning (although not much walking happened, it was more like the Story Time). I think they enjoyed it and learned a few cool facts about wolfs and beavers.

Reese and Clayton after morning story time in the lobby

Zoned out watching some TV in the room.

Amy was in charge of entertaining Reese while we waited to be seated at Famous Dave's Friday night.

The last morning we were there, we packed up and loaded the car first thing since checkout was at 11 am, but we were able to stay and play as long as we wanted that day, we just couldn't go back to our room, but there were locker rooms to shower and change in. That last "session" in the water park area, Wyatt seemed like he was finally warming up to the surroundings and would have been ready to play and have a little more fun. He didn't not have fun, but he did spend most of his time clinging desperately to mommy or grandma or daddy.

He did venture off at one point, only to slip backwards on the wet tile and bonk his head. He had a good cry and then fell asleep on mommy in the hot tub! I only let him sleep for about 30 min. since he had just hit his head, but he perked right back up and was ready to play for a few more minutes before it was time to leave.