Just Us Four

Family vacations for us typically revolve around visiting, well, family. It's rare that just me, Bryn and the kids take a vacation by ourselves. When a friend & co-worker of Bryn's offered us their time-share in Branson for two nights we were EXCITED! This was our first trip to Branson and we really enjoyed our time there. Granted, we didn't leave the condo much because everything there was FREE (indoor swimming, park, put-put golf)! We checked in Thursday evening. After scoping out the place I think the kids were mostly impressed with the master bedroom. Tia came out of it saying, "Mommy, your room has a POOL in it!" (in reference to a big jacuzzi tub). Friday day we pretty much just chilled at the condo & took advantage of all the ammenities.

(this has got to be one of my all-time favorite pics of Caelleb, to-date)

That evening we took the kids to dinner at a hibachi grill. Caelleb had been to one before but Tia hadn't. The fire on the grill both terrified and mezmerized her all at the same time. After a great dinner we drove around Branson for awhile just taking it all in. We ended up at The Landing, pretty much by chance, but it turned out to be a great place to spend the evening. There was a water/light show which the kids (Caelleb, especially) loved!

(this is a much smaller water fountain than the one in the water/lights show)

There was marble slab ice cream involved. And the evening was topped off by some pretty cool balloons. You need the side angle view to get the full effect of this hat that the balloon man made Caelleb.Tia requested "Ariel," not bad...
Saturday we took our time checking out of the condo. Bryn and Caelleb played another round of put-put golf while Tia and I played on the playground. Before heading out of town we stopped for a round of go karts and then headed home. Branson is sort of like a family-friendly Vegas without the gambling (if that makes any sense).
I can't wrap up this post with out mentioning this restaurant. We stopped in Ozark (just 20 miles or so north of Branson) to eat dinner at the home of the throwed rolls that we had heard so much about. Oh man, serious gluttony. We liked it so much that we stopped there again on the way home, for lunch. I can't even do this place justice by writing about it. You just have to be there. . . delicious rolls being literally thrown around the restaurant. . . free refills on EVERYTHING--not just drinks--you can have as many servings of whatever you order as you want. We just laughed at that. There was no way we could do any second servings after all of the extra "pass arounds" that they walk around distributing, on TOP of your regular order. Crazy amounts of food and all delicious, for a relatively cheap price! If you do plan on going there give yourself plenty of time, there is always a wait to get in, but soooooo worth it!