The Scotts: Branson Fall Trip

It's been popsicle weather for all of September. Hot hot hot!

The girls enjoyed their accidental matching one day. Blue top, pink bottoms!

We even got a bit of pool time in. Juliet loves jumping in to her dada.

My mom got super fancy and made the kids banana splits for dessert after our regular Friday night dinner. A key element of this was homemade fudge - so so yummy!

We discovered there was a fishing derby on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend so Nathan and Patrick got up early in order to make it down to Linn Valley in time for the competition.

It worked out quite well for Patrick. He won for his age group and got a trophy and then he won a raffle prize as well! The trophy became his precious and was carried around everywhere he went for the entire weekend.

Stopping by to say goodbye to grandparents before heading to the lake. Juliet knows exactly how cute she is.

Me so happy on my paddleboard while chaos rains down on the lily pad behind me.

Juliet loves swimming with Nathan so much.

Fire! I don't think we made s'mores, not sure why we had this going on.

We got to hang out with our fancy lake friends who have parents with a big house right on the big lake. They also have a pontoon boat and the kids lost it over riding on the tube behind the boat.

They're all adrenaline junkies. Juliet opted out of this one and was happy to cuddle me on the boat.

Nathan insisted that I be the one to take the kids out on the jet ski, which was very strategic on his part because now I want one. My goal was to give the kids the safest ride possible but also to go as fast as possible on the straight, non bumpy bits. I think we hit 55 once. So fun!

Meanwhile, Juliet found snacks and was very happy.

The Monaghans ended up joining us for dinner and Eleanor stole Mabel and Patrick hung out and played games with the brothers. Patrick romance update: Mabel told him he didn't want to marry him anymore and he was a bit devastated for a few months. Then he discovered there were other women out there. He has proudly shared that he's pretty sure our neighbor Harper is in love with him and I found out at his parent/teacher conference that he had married Emily earlier that day. He notified me one morning about the Harper situation and I said, "Good, loads of girls are going to love you." and he responded to this by saying, "I know, because of my big muscles!" and started flexing enthusiastically. Heaven help us all, especially the womenfolk who can't handle the majestic Patrick muscles. He's still friends with Mabel, when he gets to hang out with her at all if Eleanor hasn't stolen her away.

I went home that evening with Eleanor and Juliet because we all wanted to sleep in comfort and the boys stayed up late and had s'mores and watched fireworks. Good times for all involved!

Juliet was rather tired that evening. I don't think I even read to her at bedtime, I ran around doing a few things before going in to cuddle her and by the time I got in there she was already asleep.

Painting time in the morning. She's fairly impressive for a three year old!

Meanwhile, the boys went cruising in the golf cart with Nathan in the morning and then came home.

We had a nice family dinner with my folks and my mom got to experience playing Hedbanz with Juliet. There is a lot of enthusiasm, particularly because the geniuses who created this game made specialty headbands for this version which includes a pink unicorn headband.

We play family tennis from time to time and I love it.

The older three are coming along! Yay tennis!!

Then the big kids begged to get to go to the library so they could pick out their own books and Nathan got a picture of me and Juliet in our reading spot. I love how much these kids love books.

Nathan got to go fix a flat I had in one of my tires and he brought cute Bradley along with him for some game hang out time while they waited for it to get fixed.

Nathan and I got a fancy date too! At a driving range. I am not particularly good yet, but I'm told it would be better to have clubs that were the correct size for me and I would perhaps have a better opinion of myself if I didn't go with someone who seems to effortlessly pop off 200 yard shots whenever he wants. It's impressive - and ridiculous. Nathan keeps saying encouraging things about the short game being what really matters but I don't have that down either. Tennis suits me so much better but I'm working on the golf thing.

More paint time with Juliet. Ten minutes of prep, ten minutes of painting, twenty minutes of clean-up. What isn't there to love?

Meanwhile, Eleanor toughs it out reading with some kitties. She had a little fever for a couple days and got to live the life of her dreams with loads of kitty cuddles and shows.

Juliet had her first day of preschool!

Was this girl ready or what?

Zero tears about being dropped off and I got an earful when she got home about all the fun things she got to do. She asks all the time now when it will be a preschool day, I'm so thrilled that she's loving it so much. She even came home chanting something about "kuh kuh cat!" because they do actual educational things at her school and she memorized Genesis 1:1 so I probably could have her reading or doing other impressive things at an early age but I don't want to. I read and play games and let teachers feel like a hero for teaching the incredibly receptive child all the things.

I did hear that recess was okay except some girl threw sand at her. I asked Juliet what she did in response and I was told that she threw sand back of course and I stopped asking questions. Except I did wonder if she had made any friends and I was told no, she didn't need any. Except I'm pretty sure she loves all the other girls in the class, especially her friend Caroline from church.

My dad went on a field trip with Eleanor to the state capitol in Topeka and they had a very nice time in the capitol building together. This was her first day back at school after being sick and we were relieved she didn't miss the field trip day!

So neat that he gets to do things like this with her. Eleanor was delighted.

Meanwhile, Juliet has become all about the platform swing in our backyard.

And sports. She keeps asking to be on a soccer team. Or baseball. Or anything. I blame Patrick.

I forced my children to go to the park with me and they ran into a bunch of friends and had a fabulous time. When will they learn to always say yes to the park?

Eleanor and her friend Eva. With Juliet.

We had a trust exercise at church that made me lose all trust in everyone but the kids loved it so I guess that counts for something? I got shaving cream to the face, an activity that I did not sign on for but oh well. It wasn't that bad and there were shrieks of glee from every child in attendance.

We went from this to a Girl Scout event and while I was checking around about an event I was considering running, Juliet ended up running on stage to help Eleanor and Daisy open up the event.

She also eagerly participated in everything else there. I'm already lined up to be her troop leader when she becomes an official Girl Scout in two years.

Meanwhile, Nathan had the pastor's kids over to play Pokemon with our children. So sweet!

Juliet has picked up on Patrick's obsession with the game 5 Alive and played a very spirited version of the game with me which I enjoyed thoroughly.

She took out the bomb card because it was scary and the favorite cards were the ones that made the other person draw a card or two. So fun!!

Lego robotics has been going really well, we have such a sweet team and Eleanor has been so happy to get to join the group. She is a strong member of the team!

Bradley has been doing really well too, he loves the practices because it's fun stuff with most of his favorite people. What's not to like? Their team name is the Super Creative Robot Masters and they are doing an energy themed challenge this year, much to Nathan's delight.

Patrick and Juliet playing jump rope together - which consists of Patrick being ordered to move the rope like a snake and not lift it up. Juliet is certainly a leader in the making.

We did a friend outing to Deanna Rose.

Juliet loves her buddy Aria quite a bit. It's actually quite difficult to go to Deanna Rose without a friend now, I hear lots of complaints about how boring it is and then approximately five seconds later she'll make a new friend at the playground.

Patrick got in a nice fishing morning with Nathan at Linn Valley.

And golf!

Bradley was there too. They spent the night. Bradley was willing to go because he has sleepovers with Patrick most nights now and was sad about his cuddle buddy being gone so he agreed to go. He has a pretty lovely time while he's there, we all do! Eleanor and Juliet are just in the same boat as me regarding the bath house showers (meh) and sleeping not in our own beds (extra meh).

Ice cream at the club house after golf!

Meanwhile, I had a lovely day with the girls. Eleanor did laundry - can you tell which pair of shorts is for the three year old and which is for the nine year old? It's not a trick question. Left one is 3T, right one is a size medium. Ahhh, fashion.

I often forget to play Candyland with my kids and am embarrassed when someone finds out that I have a board game website and yet my kids don't know how to play basic games. So I was delighted to play with Juliet the other day and was even more delighted when it was an absolute blast to play with her.

I've taught her everything she needs to know about good sportsmanship.

She has gymnastics every Wednesday morning this fall. It's so fun to watch her scamper around.

Evening scooter fun with Eleanor.

More family tennis!

Eleanor was quite the reader and when her class read a spooky book she got book two in the series and blazed through it at home. We sent her teacher a cute video about the book ... and immediately after this Eleanor had a mini meltdown about going to sleep alone in her scary bedroom. We're having her take a little break from scary books for a while.

And we had a board game party with friends that evening.

Juliet and Eleanor had fun on the swing when it was time to leave.

This is what happens when it's a library day.

And then we left for Branson for a family trip while school was out for a couple days! We stayed at a fancy Airbnb and now the kids think all of these places have arcade games.

I called this tiny storage space the punishment dungeon for naughty children and then Patrick and Juliet were desperate to play in it.

We spent Thursday at Silver Dollar City! It was a gorgeous day with a high of 72 degrees and the theme park wasn't crowded at all. Genius planning, we're going to do this every year.

Another genius move: having a group photo right when we first entered the park. Everyone was happy and ready to smile for a picture!

We enjoyed the spooky fall decor.

I got to do kiddie rides with Juliet and Patrick while the daredevil older two went off and did roller coasters with Nathan.

Quite frankly - I probably would have done better on the roller coasters. Spinny rides do me in.

The brave roller coaster buddies. Side note - Bradley forgot to pack a sweatshirt on this trip and the only children who had extra ones were the girls. He rocked Eleanor's fleece for much of the morning. He is cute but he is silly.

It's so fun that these two enjoy riding roller coasters together. They're really good buddies whenever they're at a theme park.

Meanwhile, the spinny rides. I refused to go on this one and Juliet and I had a discussion about how Grandpa would throw up after riding it and I would too so Grandma was her only adult option. After they finished the ride Juliet stood up and proudly shouted, "Grandma didn't even throw up!"

We were rejoined by the older two kids and Eleanor was more than okay with posing in front of the best Halloween decor at the park.

Then she got tired waiting for the other kids to get off a kiddie ride and did not appreciate the adorable noises I made about how cute she was in the baby stroller.

We watched a little show at one of the theater houses and Juliet was ecstatic to meet the fancy ladies at the end. She told them that pink was her favorite color and they all agreed that she was so right. Branson shows are fun but it takes a bit of getting used to when they use guns as hilarious props and jokes for much of their shows. I guess we aren't on the west coast anymore!

We followed a donkey to a little petting zoo in the theme park and were delighted to discover its name was Daisy. So I sent a picture to our friend Daisy's mom ... she was a good sport about it.

My dad thought this was the best trip ever, probably because he got so many kid cuddles. Another note about kids and packing - the only long pants Eleanor brought on the trip had a huge hole in the knee and I told her she couldn't wear them because I refused to have photos of her with holey pants which would look bad. She ended up wearing these bike shorts three days straight because she also needed good shorts for Fritz's the next day. Perhaps I still need to provide a bit of oversight for packing efforts, even for the older two.

I took this cute picture of my folks and I think it was my dad's favorite picture of the trip.

Lunch time where kids were planning out afternoon activities. Eleanor was so excited and happy and kept putting her hands on the boys' shoulders and jumping on them because Lord knows she couldn't hug her brothers but she was very excited and needed to touch them somehow. They were rather pleased by the attention and Eleanor had a fabulous day.

Another spinny ride. Nathan didn't throw up either.

The kids were good sports about the amount of time we spent on kiddie rides after lunch. It certainly helped that there were basically no lines anywhere!

We went to a toddler ride and the big kids all got kicked out of the line for being too tall. There was a rather lengthy process for loading up the little kids so I got the kids started chanting "Ju-li-et! Ju-li-et!" The ride operator got in on it and even some of the other little kids started joining in the chant. Juliet took it all for granted because stuff like this is all normal and standard business when you're the youngest.

She was very brave for all of the rides we went on at the theme park.

Next was my favorite part of the day: face painting. Eleanor was so thrilled that we agreed to do this and she got a dark blue cheetah face.

It turned out beautifully.

Next it was an overjoyed Juliet's turn. We picked a unicorn design for her.

She told the woman doing the painting that she wanted a rainbow unicorn.

But then it turned out ... it wasn't rainbow enough! Just the horn? With white on the side? NOT BEAUTIFUL.

I tried to help talk some sense in the three year old but I don't know how effective I was because I was laughing so hard I cried a little. The mirror was held up to her face and you could see the initial joy turn to disappointment and then loud three year old rage. MORE RAINBOWS WERE NEEDED! AAAAAHGH!

Fortunately the face painter was very kind and resourceful and Eleanor comforted Juliet while a bit of the white was washed away and extra rainbow was applied.

A much more satisfactory result. Yes, we ended up tipping very well. I talked to the woman a bit later and found out the last time she had a child cry after getting their face painted was three years prior and it was a little boy who was afraid of the dinosaur that had been drawn on his face. Juliet is so very much a special little girl.

Happy face painted gang.

Cute prison photo.

They were also deeply enthusiastic about the stocks.

We got cotton candy for the train ride we went on. A popular choice.

Eleanor was a vampire but Patrick and Juliet were not afraid.

I headed out with my parents and the exhausted younger two soon after this. Patrick was frantic about getting a souvenir and there were tears at the gift shop until we discovered you could purchase a $20 souvenir coin for $5. The day was saved and Patrick had a precious! Bradley was rather tired but agreed to stay on and go on more roller coasters with Eleanor as long as he got a soda. He was given both a soda and Patrick's sweatshirt because Patrick was going back to the condo and was also very nice.

They ended up having a really great time.

Eleanor had been afraid of the coasters that went upside down and ended up conquering that fear and having a fabulous time and any and all coasters.

They were slightly less impressed by the spooky Halloween area of the park. Apparently it's more impressive once it's actually dark out.

I got to play board games with my folks, which was a lot of fun.

We really enjoyed the nice condo we stayed at. We had cozy mornings and Juliet enjoyed doing some of the puzzles they had with Grandpa.

I was delighted that Nathan and I finally got to play Fantasy Realms together. Turns out it's really easy to learn the basics and it's a card game so of course I like it.

We made it over to Fritz's on day two of Branson and they had a cute fall photo spot so I made cute Patrick pose for a photo. No idea why he was the selected child - Bradley and Eleanor were there too. Juliet was off at the Butterfly Palace with Grandma and Grandpa which seemed like a really good idea but apparently they watched a documentary about butterflies while they were there and unfortunately it made it very clear that the butterfly is nothing but a gross bug with pretty wings. Juliet wanted nothing to do with them after that. So the Butterfly Palace didn't last too long for Juliet.

Fritz's was very cool. I asked the kids what their favorite activity was after the trip and the older two said Silver Dollar City and Patrick said Fritz's. I don't know that Juliet knew what her favorite activity was, she liked everything.

It's a pretty cool spot and it was fairly deserted while we were there.

Patrick ran around the entire time. He was a sweaty mess after spending 4 or 5 hours at this place. His favorite activity was the laser maze. Did he get a shower on this trip? No. We didn't bother with showers until we got home ... Patrick's hair was a little crusty with dried sweat for most of the trip.

Then Juliet showed up with grandparents! Fritz's was much more fun than butterflies!

We thought Juliet would do just a couple of the toddler activities but we were very very wrong. She climbed all over the place while following big kids around.

She did thoroughly enjoy the toddler climbing area.

It was right below the big kid climbing area.

Then the kids found the selfie cameras. Heaven help us. I selected a few of the 30+ photos that they took and then had texted to me.

Patrick was responsible for fully 90% of the photos.

Nathan was a champ and ran around with Juliet for most of the time. Here they are in an underground cave. This place is seriously so cool.

Eleanor and Bradley were excited to do the big ropes course together!

Meanwhile, Patrick did the climbing wall. We though we were going to spend maybe two hours at the place when we were planning out the trip and we stayed for so much longer. It's a great place.

The picture when they were poised and ready to do the ropes course.

More Patrick. Sigh.

However, the ropes course turned out to require a training period before embarking upon it and Bradley wasn't sure he could do everything he was expected to do so he opted out. Eleanor hung in there though.

I never would have done this at age 9, she is quite impressive.

The kids got hungry so we fed them a pretzel. Bradley ate most of it, Juliet tried one bit and screamed that she hated the salt and so I took all the salt off and she still hated it so I think she had a granola bar. Feeding Juliet was a bit of an ordeal on this trip.

She's lucky she's cute.

We had a little time to kill before we went to an afternoon show so we stopped by the outside of Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum and also checked out a nearby display of WWII vehicles.

Ripley's

Poor Eleanor barely made it out alive.

The kids played a cat head game on my phone while they had some much-needed down time.

Then we met up with my folks for an afternoon murder mystery show!

Branson ... is casual about guns. And we had toy ones for props at our table.

There was a lot of enthusiasm about the guns.

We tried to split up the enthusiasm by putting Grandpa in the middle but it somehow seemed to add to the fun.

Ironically, the boys were not the scariest with the toy guns.

Bradley volunteered to do an acting role so they made him the sheriff. He was beyond delighted.

And there was a character named Bradley in the play so we volunteered Nathan to play that role. He was pretty awesome and performed quite the impressive death scene.

Juliet insisted on cuddling on Grandpa for much of the play, much to Grandpa's delight. She didn't like loud noises so he got to have his hands over her ears for the entire time. He did not mind - Juliet cuddles are pretty fantastic.

So are cuddles with angelic little Patrick.

Literally two seconds later ...

Bradley standing up for his part at the end. He had a non-speaking role because you're supposed to be 16 in order to volunteer but he was so cute and enthusiastic they let him do it anyway. It's great that he did this because he's been saying he doesn't want to do the Christmas program at our church but clearly he is just fine with performance so I'm volunteering him for everything!

Patrick isn't particularly shy either. On day three of Branson we went to an Amazing Pets show and he got up and told a joke to the crowd.

Then we paid fifty cents to test his passion factor and it turns out he's cold. Which is accurate, this boy is always freezing. The chair speaks the truth!

Getting some hangout time in the afternoon at our condo. There was such a cool chair out on the deck!

Then we made dreams come true by taking Eleanor and everyone else to the Branson cat cafe.

It was just five minutes away from our condo and Eleanor was so thrilled. That said, those poor cats were definitely tired of all the affection by the time we got there in the afternoon and we were only supposed to pet their heads and necks and not pick them up so it wasn't exactly a cat love fest. And we own cats who are desperate for all the loves we have to give! That said, Eleanor had a fabulous time so we're calling it a win.

Next we went back to the Butterfly Palace. We promised Juliet no documentary this time so she could forget about the bug part and focus on the beauty.

That said - the mirror maze was clearly the best part about the place.

Eleanor found a cool hand chair.

Patrick was the child most excited about the butterflies.

Eleanor and Juliet did okay. Juliet was happy that the butterflies wouldn't land on her, that they would go for the flower she was holding instead.

They even got to release some butterflies!

The guy tried to get Eleanor to do some Lion King themed release of the butterflies but she refused and so he called her a booger and we love him.

Look at how much this child loves butterflies! Such a positive change from the day before.

Bradley released a butterfly and then he was pretty done. He was a very good sport about some of the little kid activities on this trip.

Patrick was a stinker while releasing butterflies. Shocker.

Checking out cowgirl hats while waiting for Dolly Parton's Stampede!

It was so much fun.

And I was a complete sucker and ended up paying for the tourist trap photo they take of your group as you walk in, but then it turns out they send you digital copies and they're pretty fun! So I'm thrilled with it and would definitely do it again!