Full Bloom Blog

I wouldn’t call myself spontaneous by nature. In fact, I have mentioned before, that I happen to love planning. I really love planning. Erik, however; is captain spontaneity. To say that this was the first weekend vacay that we planned and left for in less than 24 hours would be a lie. Between regular family trips and last minute trips, I am pretty much a packing ninja now. We decided Friday afternoon that we wanted to get out of Michigan to celebrate Independence Day. It was a little difficult to imagine celebrating our national freedom with all of the local parades and fireworks being cancelled in light of COVID-19. After researching some destinations that were no more than a couple hours drive away and out of state we quickly narrowed our choices. The Great Wolf Lodge near Cincinnati was our choice and I’m not sure who was more excited, me or the kiddos. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a regular mom that hates the idea of indoor water parks with awkward swimsuit moments, floating band-aids, and endless screaming children. I don’t know if it was the months of lock down quarantine or just knowing how excited the kids would be that had me so pumped for our little weekend getaway. So one sleep and a load of *essential* laundry later, we had our bags packed and were ready to hit the road. (May I also note, that this was considerably easier to pack for in that everything was contained on one property.)

It is worth noting that the majority of the items photographed here live in my standard mom purse on a regular basis (*denotes these items). By adding just a couple more items, I am ready to hit the road. Here is the account of all of the items that will have you ready to hit the road and tackle *most* situations adventuring with the family. (I’m working clockwise starting at the bag) ~Word Search ~Book for fun ~Book for self improvement ~the latest copy of MAGNOLIA Magazine ~Tissues* ~Pain Reliever* ~Face Masks* ~Lots of gum! *~Clorox wipes (pardon the add in – this pack was stashed in my van) ~Oil blotting sheets* ~Sharpies* ~Highlighter* ~Nail File* ~Lighter* ~Lip Stain* ~Lipstick* ~Lip gloss* (you can never be too prepared with lip products, right!?) ~Headphones* ~Sanitizing hand wipes* ~Hand Sanitizers* ~Wallets* ~Sunglasses* ~Baby Wipes* ~Neck Pillow

Saturday morning we got up, loaded up the bags that I let the kiddos pack *mostly* by themselves, and hit the road for our little adventure! It took us about four hours driving door to door. If I am a packing ninja, my kiddos are road trip ninjas. Not to say that they don’t have their whiney *ARE WE THERE YET?* or *HOW MUCH LONGER?* moments still but they pretty much understand how to hunker down and keep themselves occupied in the car. Annabelle in particular really took it to a new level this weekend…. (I would also like to note that these headphones were not plugged into anything).

Confession: sometimes we plan our driving schedules and routes just so that we can work a Chick-Fil-A stop into our trip. Priorities friends. We do not have much accessibility to this fine establishment in SE Michigan. One must plan accordingly and capitalize on such opportunities when south of the Michigan border. Plus, road trips are just better with sweet tea… until you start talking about extra pit stops 😉

We tried to plan our travels, not only to accommodate essential stops, but also to maximize fun time at the hotel on our day of arrival. Bonus for us, we were able to check in early and get settled in a little before hitting the waterpark for the remainder of the afternoon and into the evening.

Erik reserved a “Kids Kabin” room that was basically a sub room within our room that had three little beds. Totally perfect for my three little bears. We loved the set up and I especially loved that I didn’t have to share a bed with a kiddo that would treat me like a human foot rest all night. I also must admit that I have a serious love for hotels and businesses that aren’t just family *friendly* but family accommodating. I liked that the sink in the bathroom was low, but we still wound up pulling a chair from our dinette into the bathroom to work as an oversized step stool so that Torsten and Giselle could wash their hands without someone holding them up every time. To be fair, we also did this in our hotel at Disney World this year too.

While we’re on the super fun topic of hotel bathrooms here are some of my little hacks on how to make it more family friendly. Typically, I use a ceramic mug or glass from the coffee maker area of the hotel room to act as a tooth brush holder. I don’t know about you all, but if my kids don’t have a specific home to put their toothbrush when they’re done using it- it could wind up anywhere – including the floor which frankly, makes me want to cry. Or puke. If your kid puts their toothbrush on the floor of a hotel, cut your losses. Throw it away immediately and get a new one from guest services. It’s a thing. Or save yourself the hassle and show them right away their temporary toothbrush holder. In our current national climate, however, you would be hard pressed to find such a glass in your room. Right now is all about single use and disposable everything so we had to make due with the paper coffee cup.

Last topic on hotel bathrooms (you’re still with me, right?) is the soap. For years, the tiny bar soap that sits in the petri dish has always grossed me out. Actually, I’m kind of shocked that it’s even still around. I’m sure it’s the best choice from a cost efficiency perspective, but let me put it to you like this….

Saturday night, Giselle couldn’t get the soap out because it was dried and stuck to the dish. Sunday afternoon, Torsten informed me that he was able to get the bar soap out and use it because “there was juice in [the dish]”. Case closed; bring your own pump soap. Done. Okay, actually, as I learned this weekend, bringing the pump soap is not enough. You must in fact HIDE the petri dish *juicy* bar soap from your children to prevent its use.

After getting into our room early and changing, we headed down to the waterpark. I loved that they had activities and pools for every age. Erik and the girls did mostly water slides and the wave pool. Torsten and I stuck to team chill and hung out in the kiddie pool a little, but our absolute favorite was the Raccoon Lagoon outside. I loved that three out of four pool areas (not counting the lazy river) were zero entry which was so easy to maneuver even for my little guy. The outdoor pool really was fantastic. We had perfect weather and we could have hung out there all day. I have no photos of that pool, though, I was too busy having fun in the sun with my kiddos.

Other surprises for me included my chill guy *not* loving the *not so lazy* lazy river. Actually, he hated it. He screamed the whole time we were on it the second time. Yeah, I’m a mean mom and made him do something he didn’t like, twice. But also, in his defense, the lazy river would also pummel you with somewhat intense amounts of water several times on the route. Not really what I pictured with the whole “lazy” title. I was also a little surprised with the overall untidiness of the facility. Great Wolf is not cheap so to see the waterpark restrooms in such disarray was a little sad. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt this time though and say that perhaps it was a little sub par because of staffing issues related to COVID….?

Upsides though, included the very attentive and thorough life guards. Those guys are no joke. I don’t think I ever saw one on duty standing in one spot or spacing out. In fact, I would love to see the steps tracker of those people. They are *walking* and *checking* non stop. As a parent with multiple maniacs splashing around, it does make me feel better! I also really love any place that is contained- AKA no additional driving around. Single destinations are amazing especially with kiddos.

Because of COVID, not all of their regular restaurants were available, so Erik actually made a mobile order and a quick dash for pizza from a local business. The kiddos rinsed off after pool time and then we all had dinner in the room before exploring the hotel.

Quick tip, on the app, just because you select a time for an activity does not mean you have a reservation for the activity. For that, you need guest services, which conveniently has a chat feature on the app and is easy to use and they typically responded quite quickly. I was pleasantly surprised at how many evening activities we were able to squeeze in. We did story time, got ice cream, went to the dance party, explored the hotel, and saw some Fourth of July fireworks in the parking lot over the building. It was a jam packed day, but it was an awesome one.

Our second and last day started out fairly slow. We opted not to do the meal plan, so the kiddos just had their regular bars and orange juice that we had packed in the cooler and brought with us. We decided to pack up the room and check out before checking out the Clock Tower Show (which my kids found a little weird) and going to the water park for what we figured would be the rest of the afternoon.

After several hours of playing, sliding, and swimming, we decided to cut out of the park early. Since we had already checked out of our room, we had to use the changing room facility in the water park. We used a family room and while the look was very nice and updated – Erik and I have decided that if anyone is ever doing research on how to design a space like that to accommodate a family, they should consult us first. There were no hooks anywhere to hang up items, no shelves. And I think my favorite weirdness was that there was a curtain for a changing area, but the toilet was in the middle of the room…. hmmmm. Anyone else see the strangeness of that?? Seriously, hotel designers, call ME! 😉

We wrapped up the trip with a stop by the gift shop to spoil the kiddos one last time and got to grab some extra photos on our way out.

All in all, I would give the trip five out of five stars. Maybe not because the facility was perfect, or because indoor water parks are glamorous, but because having that much fun with the kiddos and being able to play and enjoy time as a family was. Most importantly, those are special memories that will stick with all of us for a lifetime. I’m sure we would have had fun if we would have stayed home, but I am not sure that we would have made the memories that we were able to on our crazy spontaneous fun trip.