Add this to your bucketlist while I check it off mine.

You must go to The Great Wolf Lodge!  It is a kids paradise and grown ups love it too.
  Where else do you see children, in their pajama, running through the halls playing MagiQuest at 9:00 at night?   And playing all day long in an amazing water park that includes a wave pool, a huge bucket that dumps water on you and tons of slides that are a-maz-ing!  We loved every minute of it!!  I was super impressed with how clean it was.  I borrowed Ranee's water shoes and didn't even wear them in the water park it was so clean  (I just wore them in the bathroom-which was equally as clean. . . but it is a bathroom) .  That is a huge deal for me.

**This is not a paid advertisement for The Great Wolf Lodge-we just love it!  :) **  Three weeks out of the year they offer HUGE discounts for homeschoolers.  We got a room that sleeps 8 (king size bed in the bedroom, which I forgot to take a picture of, 2 queen size beds....

  . . . a queen size sleeper sofa), and water park passes for up to 6 people were included for both the days we were there.  The regular price for the room and passes was $329 (not bad for all that is included), but we got it (with the homeschooling discount) for $139!  There are taxes and a booking fee that increased to $175 but those same fees would have been applied for the regular rate too. 


 

 You can check in at 1:00 on your arrival day and play in the park up until it closes at 8:00 if you want!  We were SO ready to get wet!

You can always tell where Jake is because of his lime green rash guard on.  That is me next to him getting dumped on.  I can't even count how many times we got dumped on.  A bell rings to let you know it is about to dump and people flock to it.  :)

 The wave pool is so fun.  It has different setting that switch ever five minutes.  We like the side waves the best because you could ride them all the way in to the "shore".  I think this was the only time the pool had so few people, but even when it was more crowded there was plenty of space for everyone.  See the lime green Jake?

Friends of ours were there the same days so we had fun riding on the slides with them.  This was "The Howlin' Tornado" and there are no words to describe this slide!  First time down: shear terror/fun!!!!  You don't know what to expect even when people tell you.  Heads up: huge drop followed by flinging back and forth up the sides of a HUGE bowl.  You are warned but you still won't believe it.  Even if it scares you half to death you have to do it a second time. . .

Just ask Jake.  He almost cried the first time (to be honest I did too) and the second time he was laughing his head off.  Warning: going with 4 adults is ridiculous!!!  More weight makes you really feel like you  may flip.

 Aaron had to take a break.  It wears you out!  You have to walk up a lot of steps flights of stairs (literally) to get to the slides, but it is well worth it!

That evening we did MagiQuest.  It was so much fun.  It is basically a three story virtual scavenger hunt. 

 This is the main hall.  It is really a beautiful hotel.

 Jake's game name was "Link", as in Link from the Zelda games. 

  I love this shot of Jake and Aaron running from one hall (around in a U-shape) to the one I am on.  They had to make it in 30 seconds to finish a quest.  There was another father and son waiting to see if they made it and cheer them on.  It was so fun and yet another way to get totally worn out.  I doubt anyone had trouble sleeping that night. 

Here is Jake coming around the corner and getting ready to head around another corner to get down the hall in time.  He made it. :)  Aaron was just a little ways behind him.

Later on Carter and Cooper (our friends that where at the same time) came to join the fun.  Aaron and I took a seat on the middle floor right by the elevators to take a break.

This is pretty much all we saw of them for about an hour.  Too fast to focus.  :)

The next morning we were ready to show Nee and Papa Magiquest, to slay a dragon, and to hit the water park again.

 We also had to take some pictures of the awesome statues outside the hotel.

 The big bucket dump is a favorite of everyone's-even Papa G!

This is the face of a very tired and happy boy. 

The Great Wold Lodge is 2nd only to Camp as far as awesome vacations.  We will definitely go back on another homeschooling week and make some more memories that will last a lifetime.