Credle Family: Great Wolf Lodge

We had so much fun when we went to Great Wolf Lodge in 2014 for the kids' birthday. You can read about it here and here. Every year since we've talked about returning, and this year we finally did.

Lunch at Cracker Barrel on the way there.

We left early enough so that we could eat lunch and do a little outlet shopping before check in opened at 1pm.

The check-in line was long again, but not as long as it was in 2014.

We were at the water park and in our swimwear by 2pm!

They both jumped right in and had a blast!

This big kid had fun too!

Glad I got this picture quickly because apparently this isn't allowed and someone got in trouble from the lifeguard. Oh, sorry.

I love how they waited for one another at the bottom of the slide.

They both had fun on this:

The kids loved the water, but they were equally excited when they heard the room was ready. What is it that is just so fun about staying in a hotel room?!

Last time we upgraded to the Kid Cabin, which was more than we really needed, but well worth it because the kids just loved it. This time we booked the Kid Cabin from the beginning. I used a Groupon so we got a decent deal.

They were on vacation....it's not like they ever get to watch TV from home or anything.
At least not together from the top bunk of their own "cabin."

Before long, we were ready for dinner.

Ever since we got these matching leggings, Anabella asks me to wear them with her. Figured this was as good an occasion as any! Twins at Great Wolf Lodge!!

The dining choices, which we remembered reading about before, leave a lot to be desired at such a nice family friendly place. They pretty much force you to go to the overpriced buffet as it's the only sit down restaurant in the whole place. But, we're not big fans of buffets and figured the kids wouldn't eat much anyway, so we found this Hungry as a Wolf pizza joint that had a few tables so we snatched one up.

Hungry as a Wolf Dan Credle (who was getting testy at this point because he was.....well, hungry as a wolf!....heeheee).

The pizza was actually pretty good, I think because we were so hungry. We split a Greek salad too. Then, we went back to the room to let the kids change into their PJs, which we remembered from before was the thing to do before partaking in the hotel fun in the lobby.

They were so cute holding hands down the hallway in their PJs.

Not an ounce of shyness this year, they jumped right up front for the dancing.

NCAA basketball tournament and guess who was carrying around an iPad at Great Wolf Lodge?

Bubbles!!

Next, we took our seats in the lobby to watch the Come Alive Show, followed by a Story Time.

Story Time

After Story Time, all the kids formed a line to get a picture with the mascot.

It was about 9pm by the time they got their pictures taken, but we had promised them the arcade and they didn't forget, let me tell ya!

We've never really been to a real arcade before, so I think this was their first time at one. We've been to Chucky Cheese but that's about it.

They had a lot of fun. Chip gave them an equal amount of tokens and they were each able to do about 4-5 things. They were content with that and didn't request any more, which was nice. They were super excited about earning tickets and we decided to split those equally too because Daniel had earned a lot more and we didn't want there to be friction. They were good with that too. So proud of our sweet 7 year olds. They are pretty good kids if I do say so myself.

Okay, so maybe a little jealousy here, but there really weren't any complaints when we told them we were splitting them equally. I suspect if the one on the left had earned more then there might have been some "that's not fair", but fortunately for us, the less competitive child earned more and happily split with his sister. Smarties and tootsie rolls for both!

Day 2:

No fire alarms that night (thankfully!!). You can read about the fire alarm experience from our 2014 trip.

But, we did wake up hungry. Imagine that.

Chip's co-worker had told him about a diner that she and her family had visited when they were at GWL recently, so of course we had to try that out for breakfast.

It was called Shorty's Diner and it was yummy!!!

Pictures outside the lodge when we returned:

On Day 2 we were in the water by 10:30 am (it opened at 10am). They were all about it and even made a friend. I didn't take any pictures on this day because I was in the water too (we enjoyed a few family rides), but Chip got a few pictures.