Wisconsin

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Dear friends of ours are from Wisconsin and have told us about all of the neat things to do there. Top that with all of the specials we have seen on the Travel Channel featuring Wisconsin Dells and the mere fact that they are the home of cheese curds (best food on planet!) and this was a much anticipated stop on our trip for everyone!

I found a killer deal, and by killer I mean seriously unheard price for all of the fun we had in Wisconsin! Fresh off our stay in a hotel for a week, we checked into yet another one! Well the kids and I did. Craig stayed with the RV since it was in the negatives outside...(yes you read that right!!!) and we had to keep it plugged in or chance big problems. Somehow I drew the short straw that entailed late nights in a water park, showering 3 kids at 11pm and fighting over bedtimes, the tv show we watched and "I'm hungry again" while Craig got to return to the RV for peaceful nights of popcorn, movies and a place to himself! He casually strolled in every morning after a good nights sleep while I was in the midst of breakfast, the endless fight over brushing teeth and getting everyone ready!

Mt. Olympus is a kids paradise. They have a 40 slide outdoor waterpark (sadly closed for season), a full outdoor theme park (again closed for season), an indoor waterpark, an indoor theme park and a ski/tubing mountain!!! To say we had fun here is an understatement!!! Unlimited bumper cars was the hit of the indoor theme park, we closed down the waterpark two different nights and the highlight was skiing! For kids that have pretty much tried everything, skiing was the one big thing they haven't done! They were so excited to give it a try (I was dreading it as I knew they were gonna love it and see many cold trips in my future!). Having now had both ankles fully reconstructed, I have left my skiing days in the past and was happily a cheerleader, picture taker, hot chocolate runner and kid lifter all day :)  Craig loves to ski and was so excited to get his guys on the mountain with him. They all took to it immediately. Matt and Luke skiied while Brian snowboarded. You would've thought they had all done it before cause these boys just took off down the mountain! I had to close my eyes in fear by the end of the day as these 3 boys are fearless...Luke particularly terrifies me as not only is he fearless, he is 8 year old stupid! Doesn't even cross his mind that he could get hurt...ugh! These three are gonna make me gray and drunk by the time they leave for college :) They skiied for 8 straight hours and I see some sore little people in our future!

Our last day in Wisconsin Craig had to work so the kids and I made our way back to the mountain for tubing! How Craig keeps managing to weasel his way out of the activities that involve complete exhaustion is beyond me?!?!?! The good news is Mt. Olympus has a tube rope so you can be slightly lazier :) We had an absolute blast flying down their 6 tube runs and the kids even convinced me that tying all our tubes together was a good idea as I flew down the chute backwards with the 3 of them laughing like fools:)

Favorite moment of Wisconsin has got to be the morning after skiing. I have 3 kids beyond unconscious thanks to the full day of skiing. I get a phone call waking me up at 8am from the RV service center 45 minutes away that they can get Craig in at 9:30am. (Let me backtrack for a minute...So after getting RV fixed and leaving it for 6 days, they managed to return it to us with the water pumps not working meaning no running water. We tried stopping to get this addressed on our drive to Wisconsin but the service center had sent their staff home early due to bad weather. We even went as far as calling Forest River for an emergency call that night and they sent us the biggest jok on the planet...took our $100 fee for coming out, looked at RV and said "I can't fix this, I can't access that panel" (I kid you not...these things only happen to us!) We could not all return to RV with this still broke and getting it fixed was somewhat of an emergency.) Back to story...so I get this call and the man says "I couldn't get ahold of your husband" (my first thought was "I;m going to kill him when I do!" I assure this man that I will get ahold of Craig and he will be there with RV. Thirteen phone calls later and 10 text messages later, I have determined that Craig is asleep with his phone off! I literally was ready to kill him at this point as I got to wake up 3 sleeping kids, who are completely exhausted, and drag them into the snowing 6 degree weather to drive 15 minutes to wake up sleeping beauty! Wake up was as hideous as you could imagine...Luke was sobbing, Brian was furious and Matt was glaring at me. I pile the kids into the car, make our way into traffic to FINALLY GET A CALL FROM CRAIG! He is laughing, telling me he is sorry he fell asleep with phone in airplane mode. Yea...cause that makes up for my morning so far! I turn car around, pile kids back into hotel, they climb back into their beds and get all snuggly (I was blessed with excellent sleepers!) only to have my phone ring again! Craig was calling to inform me that he had left his Jeep keys with me when we dropped him off last night and yes, the RV keys were on that ring as well!!! (I cannot make this stuff up!) You guessed it...I got to get kids out of bed for a second time, drag them back into snow and drive the keys to my "dear husband". We finally make it back to the hotel to get dressed at this point and find that we have managed to lock ourselves out of our room. I got to finish my morning with a trip to the lobby, dressed in my pajamas with sneakers, topped off with my uncombed bed head to get a replacement key! Yep...I am living the dream people!!!