Family Vacation 2015 - Day Dos - Plans change, roll with it

The person who first said "things don't always go as planned" must have had kids. It isn't that things always go bad, they just don't go like you thought they would.
Today the plan was to go to Colonial Williamsburg for the day. Probably check things out there and have lunch and come back to the hotel by nap time in the afternoon. 

We had been to Colonial Williamsburg before and had a good time just walking around. This time though, we wanted to see things we hadn't had a chance to see the first time. So, we arrived at Downtown Williamsburg and found a parking spot in the shade, which is essential if you have a black car and a dark colored car seat for your toddler. We got out the Ergo and stroller and snacks and sunglasses and backpack and diapers and juice and we were all set for an all day learning and history adventure through colonial times. We leisurely strolled down the sidewalk and Rylynn was content breaking her sunglasses in her stroller and Denver was sound asleep, sweating on momma. We ooh'd and ahh'd at the people dressed in old clothes and the horse and carriages and heavily debated touring a church which cost $1 per person, but then decided to save our money, hopefully for ice cream. We made our way to the Governors Palace, trying to stay as much in the shade as possible. When we reached the large abode we saw some people going inside the large brick wall and thought "Oh, that would be fun to go through there" so we followed them. But a Colonial Williamsburg employee stopped us at the entrance and asked for our passes, which we didn't have. "Oh yes. You need a pass for everything in Williamsburg" he explained. So he directed us to the ticket house, and we headed back the exact way we had come, towards the ticket house, but not before we snapped a great picture :) 

Once inside the refreshingly cool, air conditioned house we looked at the ticket prices and thought "I wonder where I can sell my kidney around here". The daily admission for an adult is $40.99, but kids are free! Yay! We thanked the gentleman at the ticket booth for explaining to us that there's nothing fun you can do without buying passes and quietly acted like we were discussing whether to buy the tickets, when in actuality we were just enjoying some A/C before heading back into the heat to go elsewhere. 

Not that $40.99 is an outrageous price, but just not what we were hoping to spend for probably about an hour til the kids got bored, tired or hungry. So, we accelerated our plans and decided to go to the Jamestown settlement as well. Long story short... We drove there... And there's nothing to do without buying $25 passes, but the gift shop was neat. And, actually, the drive was quite enjoyable and relaxing. 

So, by now it's about 11:30 and we had basically done nothing except get the kids in and out of the car for what seemed like a hundred times, but it was time to feed Denver and ourselves. We made our way back towards the hotel and found a nice pull off area in the shade where Melody could nurse Denver and me and Rylynn could go play on a small beach area. Rylynn had a great time playing in the calm water and digging in the sand and watching a dog shake it's wet body right in front of her. It's easy to smile when you see your child having so much fun :) 

But eventually it's time to go. I tried to clean and dry Rylynns soaked and sandy body off with a blanket we had in the trunk, and changed her into dry clothes while she screamed for wanting to stay. That's one thing that's not great; stopping your kids from doing something they are loving. But, we gotta eat. 

Yelp! came to our aid and found us a nice little diner called Five Forks Cafe. The food was good and the staff members were super friendly and couldn't stop complimenting us on our beautiful children :)

Then it was back to the hotel for nap time, and both kids were asleep before we even finished the 15 minute drive. It wasn't at all the morning we had planned, but it was a great morning nonetheless. 

Later on, after naps, we got some pizza and wings from a local Italian place called Sal's and ate in the hotel room. The wings were amazing and Rylynn had a fun time running around the hotel room as we tried to prevent her from getting pizza sauce on stuff. 

After at least 30 minutes after eating, to avoid cramping, we went down to the hotel pool. Indoor hotel pools are normally easy to find, as long as you can smell. We just followed the chlorine odor and we ended up in a loud, hot, eye-burning room with a relatively small body of water, semi-crowded with other very active children seemingly unaware of their surroundings or that anybody else exists on the planet. But, Rylynn loved it and Denever even gave it a try. 

Hoping that it would make Rylynn sleepy, we stayed at the pool for a while. Once we were back in the room, we had some snack and way too much juice and watched TV til bedtime. Denver was already zonked out so it was just the active toddler to try and relax. Obviously we had not stayed at the pool long enough, because she was not even close to tired. Finally after about 45 minutes of struggling, she was asleep, and the day was done. And no ice cream was eaten :( 

My thoughts on the day- Parenting is a roller coaster of emotions. Frustration, joy, impatience, gratitude, etc. You never know when a happy moment is going to immediately change to a moment where you're trying to change a diaper in the public bathroom but someone had to dry their hands and the electric hand dryer is loud and is probably gonna attack and eat everyone so we should probably freak out and scream at the top of our lungs! But at the end of the day, even if your plans got changed or ruined, you look at your sleeping child covered in an Elsa towel used as a blanket, and all you think about is the good stuff. At that moment, you don't care that they cried for 5 minutes because you gave them water instead of orange juice. You think about your day, and how much of a blessing it is to have kids who love you and forgive you for when you mess up. THAT is a nice thing to fall asleep to.