Greer's Ferry, Branson and Los Angeles (oh my)!

Well, we finally arrived home on Saturday night, exhausted, but home!! We had a great Fourth of July at the lake with the fam. It rained some, but we still managed to eat, swim and see fire works (that's the important stuff). On Monday (July 7), we left Greers Ferry and took off toward Branson. When we got to town, we first went to the Kirby VanBurch Magic Show. If you know anything about my boys, you know that they love magic (actually, Chris loves it too)! Well, Kirby and Bambi (his wife), did not disappoint. The show was very entertaining, and the boys were amazed. He even made a 500 pound White Siberian Tiger disapper from the stage. He switched heads on his assistants and also on a chicken and a duck! But the biggie was when he made a helicopter "magically" appear in the middle of the stage! Big hit! However, the boys did manage to spend ALOT of money at this show. They had to have magic landing lights (3), a stuffed tiger (1), an instructional dvd (1) and a "magic" coloring book. Ben even stood in line to get a picture and autograph from Bambi! After leaving the show, we went and settled in at the hotel and let the boys swim a while before dinner. Later, we met Candy, Ralph, the girls and my cousin's family (live in Springfield) at Branson Landing for a nice steak dinner and a light show at the promenade. We ended the night with ice cream! Tuesday was White Water day. We got to the park bright and early and spent the day playing on all the attractions. I actually spent the ENTIRE day in the kiddie pool and lazy river with Owen. Chris and Ralph took the bigger kids on all the slides and stuff, and poor Candy laid in the lounger ALL day and read a book (she also got to take a nap)! Who takes a nap a white water with 5 KIDS!!! That night we had pizza and more swimming to celebrate Anna's 10th birthday! On Wednesday morning, we woke up to rain so we did some inside stuff. We first went to the Bass Pro Shop and explored the area and looked at the cool aquarium. Next, we took the boys to a Dinosaur Museum (big, big, hit with Matt) and lunch at Joe's Crab Shack. Just so you know, not all of the boys enjoyed the dinorsaur museum. My little red haired, blue eyed middle child was afraid of the dinosaur replicas and hid behind me the ENTIRE time we were there (not to mention the crying)! Once we left, it stopped raining enough to try Silver Dollar City. However, once we drove out to the park and got parked and trammed inside, it had begun raining again. All the rides were closed so we just looked around at all the "old time stuff" for a couple of hours. We went back to SDC on Thursday, and were able to ride some rides. Matthew braved the roller coasters with Candy, but Ben and Lilli cried when they tried to ride one (imagine that). Matthew said that the rides were "extreme". Owen rode the kiddie stuff, but he was not vey patient while standing in line! Anyway, we ended the trip by traveling back to the lake and spending two more days on the water. We were readay to get home.

However, our latest big news is that Matthew left today for LA. This was his first time flying on a plane and he was so excited. In fact, while I have been writing this message, Matt called and said that they had just landed and were getting off of the plane. He even got a set of "wings" since it was his first time flying! He said he got to see the city lights as the plane was landing. I am so excited for him as his dream is to go to Hollywood!

As you can tell, I haven't posted any pictures of our trip b/c I forgot to download them from the camera before I sent the camera on a trip to California! I'll put picutres up as soon as Matt gets back-maybe he'll have some cool stuff to post by then! Until next time...