Santa's Early Christmas Present

We woke up on Wednesday morning to find something strange. Our elf Jumpin' Jasper was sitting the on the fireplace with a present in his hands.
We opened it to find a letter inside from Santa.
Benjamin read the letter and discovered that Santa gave us an early Christmas present of going to Great Wolf Lodge to stay for one night!

We got our suitcases packed and headed to the Lodge, and once we arrived we found some very exciting things. The first was this life sized gingerbread house.
Then we headed to the magic shop to get a wand for Benjamin and a princess hat for Emma to do Magi Quest.
We found treasure!
Magi Quest kept us busy for awhile and then we changed in our suits and headed to the indoor 84 degree waterpark. I didn't take a single thing with me including the camera so no pictures of us swimming. We had a great time in the wave pool, the water slides, and the kiddie playground. After swimming we headed back to change for dinner at the Critter Grill. We had some surprisingly good food (our expectations were really low and pleasantly surprised with some above average food). After dinner we explored more of the hotel by accomplishing more quests with Magi Quest and then got into jammies and ready for a visit with Santa and the Storytime Bedtime show.


This was Jacob's face when he saw Santa. He got so excited and said "Santa." He is not so much a fan of getting closer though as you can see from the pictures.This one is my favorite. I love Santa's face looking at Jacob. Classic!
We thanked Santa for his early present, and he gave us the best advice ever about Christmas. He told the children that Christmas isn't about the presents, trees or even Santa. He told us that Christmas was about love. He said the to the children "Now I want you to always remember that. Christmas is about love." I had a little tear well in my eye as he spoke. My children listened in awe. What a wonderful gift of words Santa gave us as well.
After our Santa visit we had a few minutes for another quest and then down to storytime.
It was pretty crowded luckily Emma, Jacob, and I got there a few minutes early to get a seat.
We came home singing "There's nothing to be scared of here. Trust in Mother nature . . ." for those that have been and seen the show.

Then to our delight while we sang "Let it Snow" we began to see snow inside!



After the show, we headed over get some ice cream which Benjamin threw up as soon as we got to the room. Uh-oh!
We went to bed very late and the kids all slept very soundly thanks to our two loud and strategically placed sound machines that we brought despite all the running up and down the halls and slamming doors. Benjamin seemed to be feeling better in the morning. We got up early, headed to breakfast, and then straight to the waterpark when it opened at 9:00 a.m. It was so the right decision because no one was there early. We swam, did the big tube waterslides including the Howling Tornado for Benjamin and Dad, and played in the wave pool until 10:30. Then we needed to go pack up and get out of our room. You can see the water park behind us in the picture. It is the only one that I took because I didn't take anything to the pool with me, no camera, no purse, no phone, nothing. They have an ingenious system of wearing wristbands that is your room key and charge card within the hotel. I have never gone to the pool without a huge bag of things so this was so nice!
After showering and dressing for the day, Benjamin wanted to finish his quests so that he could be a Master Magi and defeat the dragon. At first we tried to all go together but soon realized that it was too much for the littlest two. So we took turns hanging out in the lobby and then Dad and Benjamin finally got to go defeat the dragon. Benjamin was very excited!
We were all sad to be leaving but so thankful for the chance to go. We have lots of holiday memories from our time together at Great Wolf Lodge. When I asked the kids Benjamin said that his favorite thing about our time was "Magi Quest because you get to do magic like making things talk." Emma said "the wave pool because it was so fun to splash in the water."
Our next stop was down to visit Andrew, Kelly, and Logan. We got to see their house and go out to a late lunch with them. After lunch Benjamin started to feel really sick again so instead of staying the night with them, we headed for home. Benjamin sat with a sick bag next to him the whole ride home which thankfully didn't get used. It was so fun to be together, see family (once again no picture with the Clarks Ugh!), and make memories!