A few months ago I got a call from the time share people. It is a call that I've turned down many times, but they caught me in a good, "why not" mood one day. We decided to squeeze in out Branson trip on the front end of our family vacation in Arkansas since it wasn't much more of a drive. We were able to stop briefly in Joplin to see the tornado damage and visit with Gail. We saw horrible sights on the way in. There were strips of land where houses had been that were just flattened as far as the eye could see. Gail drove us down to the high school and showed us where the stake center was. There was little left of it. We got into the area about 8:50 and there was a 9:00 curfew in place. The police showed up exactly at 9 and asked us (very nicely once they saw that she was with the Red Cross) to leave. As we pulled out of the area I was surprised to see the entrances patrolled by the National Guard.
We spent a day and a half at Silver Dollar City and had a blast. We wore ourselves out well and I still feel like there was more to see that I missed out on! The first day we had Harrison with us and he loved it, but it made things more difficult. The second day we found a girl from the local ward to watch him... we were all happier that way!
The boys saw two magic shows in one day. We had the star of one of the shows come and offer us really good coupons at breakfast on Saturday. We thought it would a great activity for one of us to take the kids to while the other napped with Harrison. The boys enjoyed it, but were done at intermission. I told them that dad wouldn't be able to pick us up because Harrison was still asleep so their choices were to stay and be entertained in the air conditioning while waiting for our ride or walk in the heat. Lincoln wanted to walk. It was a little crazy walking the strip with them. They got a close up look at all of the tourist attractions and picked out several that they really wanted to visit. Time, money and a strong desire NOT to see pets jumping through hoops kept us from adding anything to our schedule.
I was quite surprised when they stayed for the entire 2 hour show at 8pm!
We met some church members on a ride the first day and he told us about the meeting schedules. It was interesting to attend a ward where 1/3 of the people are visitors. I was surprised that they took the time to let everyone introduce themselves! When we were driving around before church Jackson asked, "does Jesus let you get food if you are at a hotel and they don't have any dinner?"
We were about 40 minutes early to our time share presentation and made a phone call to make sure we could get in early. They said we could and we waited and waited. Lots of people came in after us and were taken back, but we were trying to entertain ourselves in the foyer until our actual presentation time. We mentioned our frustration about the wait and just then Jackson picked up a baggie of cookies spilling crumbs all over his own lap. I scooped him up and took him outside to dump them off and while I was gone someone asked, "what happened?" An onlooker replied, "he spilled his cookies." We were quickly taken back, given our gifts and sent on our merry way with no presentation. No complaints from me!
A few months ago I got a call from the time share people. It is a call that I've turned down many times, but they caught me in a good, "why not" mood one day. We decided to squeeze in out Branson trip on the front end of our family vacation in Arkansas since it wasn't much more of a drive. We were able to stop briefly in Joplin to see the tornado damage and visit with Gail. We saw horrible sights on the way in. There were strips of land where houses had been that were just flattened as far as the eye could see. Gail drove us down to the high school and showed us where the stake center was. There was little left of it. We got into the area about 8:50 and there was a 9:00 curfew in place. The police showed up exactly at 9 and asked us (very nicely once they saw that she was with the Red Cross) to leave. As we pulled out of the area I was surprised to see the entrances patrolled by the National Guard. 
The boys saw two magic shows in one day. We had the star of one of the shows come and offer us really good coupons at breakfast on Saturday. We thought it would a great activity for one of us to take the kids to while the other napped with Harrison. The boys enjoyed it, but were done at intermission. I told them that dad wouldn't be able to pick us up because Harrison was still asleep so their choices were to stay and be entertained in the air conditioning while waiting for our ride or walk in the heat. Lincoln wanted to walk. It was a little crazy walking the strip with them. They got a close up look at all of the tourist attractions and picked out several that they really wanted to visit. Time, money and a strong desire NOT to see pets jumping through hoops kept us from adding anything to our schedule.
I was quite surprised when they stayed for the entire 2 hour show at 8pm!
ether. We met their new dog Skippy, who is very sweet and great with the kids (poor guy was well loved and followed by Harrison). Twice we looked up and said, "where's Harrison?" and we found him in Skippy's cage - with the TV remotes - his favorite toy at grandma and grandpa's house..
