Our Family's Great Escape.

Our family did something that we've been wanting to do for a long time: head an hour north to Lake George and visit the indoor water park at the Great Escape Lodge. We booked for one night, which gave us time in the water park on Friday and Saturday, and turned out to be a perfect amount of time. We packed for what seemed like an expedition to Mount Everest (Really? We need all this stuff to spend ONE NIGHT away?), I picked up the girls at school, we picked up Daddy at work and we were warm, in our bathing suits and wet by 5:30pm.

It's a really nice facility with a nice hotel and good eating options. Dan and I were most happy to find out you could order Sam Adams Noble Pils at the Johnny Rockets that is attached to the hotel.

These were a few of the take-away points:
1. Mommy is not ready to take a week-long vacation anywhere with three kids under 10.
2. Alec is at an age where he can wake up, not recognize where he is, and freak out about that.

3. Nothing is as fun as riding the lazy river while lounging on your mom.

4. It's really relaxing to go on a lazy river with one of your babies keeping you warm on your lap.

5. If you have a nine and five year old and they are required to wear a neon bracelet proving their parents paid for their admission to a theme park and said bracelet has a long "tail" at the end of where it is attached, your five and nine year old daughters will fixate on the high level of annoyance the tail provides them until you finally, in desperation, beg for two pairs of scissors: one to cut the tail off and one to jam into your own eyes, because that would end the whining about the tail.

6. If you are a one year old boy, the phone in your hotel room is a source of endless fun. We had to unplug ours because we were convinced he would eventually figure out how to order room service.

7. Going to a water park in the winter is a wonderful reminder that people come in all shapes and sizes, and not everyone (in fact, barely anyone) looks like people on television, in magazines, or in movies.

8. Along the same lines, more people have tattoos than I realize.

9. If you are videotaping an adorable, placid scene of your daughter and son frolicking on a small kiddie slide inside a water park, and at the end of the video, your son climbs up the ladder for the slide and then falls completely backwards off the ladder, A) your son will be just fine, and B) you can feel better about what kind of a parent you are because even though your kid almost got a traumatic brain injury right in front of you, at least you had the where-with-all to immediately stop filming.

10. There is nothing like a little break from the routine (and by little, I mean 22 hours) to remind you how much you and your children love your routines.

11. If your children love the SpongeBob Squarepants episode wherein Squidward tries to conquer the skill crane machine at the Krusty Krab and you go to an arcade that has video games and skill cranes, your daughters will spend $10 in tokens only on winning a "prize" from a skill crane machine.

12. Water slides are really, really, really fun.