Several weeks ago now, Tim and I were determined to take our kids on our first ever Schramm family vacation. I had found a voucher online for over 50% an indoor waterpark and hotel stay in Indianapolis and decided that was the perfect and most affordable option for us. We have been to the indoor waterpark in Columbus a couple times and have loved the experience both times. Megan and Tyler both love the water. The voucher had specific instructions that said you had to arrive on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Sounded perfect! Tim is off Sunday through Tuesday. So, after church on Sunday morning, we started our trek to Indianapolis. I needed to get Morgan's 9 month pictures taken so we stopped at a super fun park in Brookville, about 15 minutes away from our house. It was one of the warmest days we had had so far this year, in the 60's, but was breezy so it made it pretty chilly for trying to get pics. Morgan was also SOOOO distracted by the rubber mulch they had and would not stop trying to put it in her mouth. After about 20 minutes of trying, I gave up. :) Here are the few snapshots I got of her though. No editing done to any of these pics...didn't feel like taking the time. :)
Yes, the activity that was sooo frustrating but with Morgan is not at all surprising. She, more than any of the other kids, puts everything in her mouth! EVERYTHING!
At least her hair was cute. :)
Tyler and Megan had a blast! I'll let the pics speak for themselves. :)
oh how I love this crooked face he gives sometimes!!
crazy kid...
Not posed at all pic...this is a normal everyday moment between these two and I am sooo glad I finally captured it!
bliss
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The best pictures we got were at the park, hands down. After we got to our hotel in Indianapolis, we headed down to the waterpark. The kids played for a little less than 2 hours. Our voucher included a pizza, drinks, and arcade passes for $10 worth of games. We decided that pizza for lunch the next day made more sense and also saved the arcade passes for the next day as well.
So, after 2 hours of waterpark fun (that I didn't take many pictures of because I figured I had all the next day to take pics as well), we got the kids dressed and went out for a nice dinner. After that, it was baths and beds for all. This was our first ever attempt to have all 5 of us sharing one room. There was a pull out sofa for Tyler and Megan, a King size bed for Tim and I and Morgan was in the pack-n-pay.
Tyler and Megan loved sharing a bed...Tim and I, however, hated their little slumber party...even though they had only cat naps during the day and played hard at the park and waterpark, they would NOT go to sleep!
To make matters worse, there was absolutely NO noise in the hotel...you know how most hotels have an option for a constant fan on the air conditioner? Well, this one didn't have that. It just had a heater that kicked on and off all through the night. I could practically hear the kids breathing all.night.long. Every time that heater kicked on, I would wake up. Thankfully, the kids slept pretty good and even slept in the next morning. I was SOOO tired!
Once the kids woke up, Tim turned on the TV to entertain them while we packed everything up. We knew check out was at 11 and we wanted to have all our stuff ready to go so that we wouldn't have to leave the waterpark to just clean the room out. That's when, on the hotels TV channel, Tim saw, "waterpark closed Monday through Thursday." I was like, um, no way is it closed today. The voucher said that Sunday was one of the days that we would have to arrive and that the waterpark access was from 3pm the day of arrival till 3pm the day of checkout. I.was.livid. To make matters worse, the arcade voucher that was included in the price was part of the waterpark meaning, we had no access. We talked to the front desk people (who were all of 17 and NOT helpful) and she tried to get her manager who was supposedly at the bank. She started the conversation with, "there is another family upset about the living social voucher" meaning, we weren't the only ones upset and confused by the offer. They could do nothing for us, of course, and just said, "well, the voucher doesn't expire for the arcade so you can use it next time you come back." I politely told her there wouldn't be a next time and that I was not pleased with the service or experience at all and we left. We did get our free pizza though...it was awful. We thought, well, Indianapolis has a zoo or maybe even the Children's museum that we could go to today instead. We had heard good things about both. Guess what? Both are closed on Mondays. Sigh.
There were other little details that made it frustrating and added to the disappointment but now, looking back at the pictures and remembering the moments our family shared, it really was a special vacation for us. It was our first one and the kids loved it. They were disappointed that we didn't get to get in the water the second day but overall, they enjoyed the change in routine. We were blessed to have the chance to be off together for the weekend and for that we are thankful. We just won't ever go back to that waterpark again. :)
There were other little details that made it frustrating and added to the disappointment but now, looking back at the pictures and remembering the moments our family shared, it really was a special vacation for us. It was our first one and the kids loved it. They were disappointed that we didn't get to get in the water the second day but overall, they enjoyed the change in routine. We were blessed to have the chance to be off together for the weekend and for that we are thankful. We just won't ever go back to that waterpark again. :)
