We went to the waterpark again today and again there was no camera to document our memories. That doesn’t mean I can’t write them down. We do need to buy a waterproof one-time-use camera to take with us sometime. We tried going after naptime and it seemed to work for us.

Both kids had fun and Julia kept doing funny and impressive things. For one thing, she walked most of the time. My back has been hurting lately, so taking a break from kid-lugging was important. We had to go pretty slow and make up games for staying inspired, but we made it and she did great. Julia must have grown or I haven’t been watching. She suddenly passed the 36” height marker. Because of this we tried one of the big rides with her. The three of us came through a tunnel float ride with excited girls. Julia was a bit overwhelmed, but when I asked, she said she liked it.

The funniest thing of the day was how excited she got when she saw Emily come down the slide. She was excited and wanted to give Emily a big hug and then she floated around hugging and kissing her. Who knows what is going on in her head? It was so sweet and Emily loved it. For all the impressive things, she did she would not go down one slide despite really wanting to. We tried three times and each time she balked. The lifeguard was great to encourage and try to help the mom with two little girls. We even saw him in the parking lot at the end of the day and he checked with us to see if she ever made it. I wasn’t allowed to go down with her and she just couldn’t do it by herself.

Emily likes the waterpark a lot. She is a fun age for doing these things. She notices interesting things and is able to do a lot more on her own. Her comfort level in the pool has grown too. She asked to go to a deeper section to “swim” and is still enjoying putting her face in the water. When we rode the “big” ride she used the tower we climbed to scout out the park. She was really sweet with her sister. About the only thing she wasn’t interested in was the big kid safety discussions we had to have.

Mama was sad that Julia fell asleep in the car on the way home and missed out of telling her Daddy about her day. She was exhausted though and needed to get her sleep. Emily got keyed up just in time to see her father. She seemed to go to sleep quickly when it was time. Playing is hard work!

Hot days make for fun backyard pool days. The girls were being sweet with each other. The thing they seemed to enjoy most this day in the pool was the freedom to splash and pour water outside of the pool. In the bathtub they get in trouble for making a big water mess, but it was actually encouraged this day. They loved it!

I know this is not your typical photo from a day at a water park, but it is the only photo I have. We spent most of a day last week at the local waterpark called Splash Country. We went last year and this year we got season tickets again. The day we went it was over 90 degrees and sunny. It was the perfect way to enjoy the hot day. We went with our friends Elena and Maeve.

It was fun to see the difference in the girls between the two years. Both are much more confident in themselves. Last year Julia wouldn’t go off by herself much at all and had to be held a lot of the time. This year she wore her lifevest without a complaint and didn’t need to be held unless she was tired or walked slower than Mama wanted. She still needs to work on the idea of standing in line for a slide. Emily loved being there with her friends. She loved sliding by herself and I found that I had to watch her more closely because she would just take off to go and slide. She didn’t have any trouble with standing in line and taking her turn at the slides. That was quite a relief for the Mama. Emily’s favorite play area is the same as it was last year, but she played a lot more at the firetower area than last year. Having water splash her in the face wasn’t her favorite thing, but the slides were enticing enough to get her up in it. They enjoyed the lazy river more this year. We are all looking forward to our next trip. We found that there are several rides the big girls can ride with an adult. It will be fun to explore these rides with them.

We stayed at the park until Julia had absolutely given out. Emily never slowed down with her playing and did very well playing by herself (with supervision, of course) while Julia rested in a chair. Julia fell asleep in Mama’s arms as we walked out of the park. Emily took a while to fall asleep in the car, but when she went out she was gone. After getting home Mama put them on the couch so they would be easier to wake up. They didn’t wake up until forced and when Emily did get up she wasn’t much fun. Maybe next time, I will put her in bed for the night when we get home.

Every trip the girls and I make to Dollywood is fun, and Emily asks if Daddy is coming with us next time. When we told her that we all were going to Dollywood together, she was so excited! As we entered, she got her map and then started to tell us where to go. We had been hoping for cooler weather on the day we went, but it was very humid and pretty miserable to be walking around in. We were good sports and covered more activities than we have ever done in one visit. Despite the humidity and the threat of rain later in the day, everything worked out just fine. Robby got to try the rope course and gave it rave reviews. We were so proud that Emily ventured onto new rides for her and that Julia was willing to try anything that we encouraged her to do.

We decided to try the car ride off the bat and beat the lines. Emily wasn’t sure that it was her choice for first ride, but was willing to change the plan. Julia drove the car while I was the passenger. She became pretty disinterested in driving pretty quickly and wanted to look around. It isn’t so easy to drive a car from the passenger seat, take pictures, and point out the scenery.

Emily had the priveledge to drive with Daddy. She was disapointed that her car wasn’t more fun of a color. I was just glad that Daddy fit in the car.

Emily is so hard to get a photo of these days. We were lucky that she looked at the camera long enough to get one. She has such a pretty smile, but sitting still and focusing on any one thing is hard when we are in our independent stage of life.

Emily is such a Daddy’s girl and Julia is a Mama’s girl, it just made sense to split ourselves up that way. Emily’s prince was informed of which horse he had to ride, even if it was the smallest on the carousel.

For some reason Emily was expressing fear at riding rides this trip to Dollywood. It was odd that she did it for rides she has ridden before and liked. When it came time to ride the bumble bee ride, she didn’t want to ride. We asked Julia if she wanted to ride by herself and she said yes. She seemed a little lost in the bee by herself, but occasionally waved at us. I was proud that she would do it alone.

We found this awesome union to join. It was next to a deck filled with rocking chairs. We took a break to cool off and do some rocking. The sign was too funny and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to enjoy the laugh forever.

The girls and I have watched the River Battle ride before, but never ridden it. It was great that Emily was willing to try it with Robby. We didn’t mention to her how wet she would get, knowing that she would decline to ride if she knew. She tried to hide from the shooting water by curling up next to Robby, but still got soaked. The side effect was that Robby got to shoot twice the water. She didn’t know how to walk with wet pants and was hilarious to watch after the ride was over.

Our little wet girl was willing to hang out in the owl nest for a photo. She liked the idea a lot.

They have a fun educational boat floating game for the kids to play. Emily loved watching the float she started at the top work it’s way down the sluice. It had to work around objects and get help along the way. This area had the coolest playground that Emily loved playing in. Of course she found a house that she could be the princess of. She played house with Robby until the weather turned and we had to make our way out.

Sweet Julia played hard and just couldn’t make it the whole day with out a nap. She fell asleep after a snack and stayed that way until we worked our way out to another snack. Clearly, she has her priorities in order and is a child after my own heart.

The girls and I have been able to go to Splash County for the summer, but I have been a little apprehensive to go alone with them and not know what to expect. I was so pleased when Robby was able to go with us. We learned a lot about our girls and water parks.

• Everyone loved it!
• I can take them by myself now and will.
• Emily loves wearing her life preserver and Julia does not. I think Emily learned that she felt safe in the pool with it on and was able to do a lot. She was given a couple of opportunities to take it off and she always chose to leave it on. Julia hated being restricted by it and fussed non-stop when in it. With Emily safe in one it wasn’t as big of a deal to leave Julia out.
• The girls think sliding is fun. There was one slide Julia could do by herself and one she could do with a parent. For Emily her options were seemingly endless. Sometimes the slide required being spattered with a lot of water to get to it and those she wasn’t as excited about.
• Julia could take a nap on a lawn chair if she is tired enough. Emily on the other hand was not able to sleep, maybe she wasn’t tired enough.
• You can apply enough sunscreen to a kid all day long to allow you to stay at a water park all day. The only spot that got too much sun on Emily was her nose and it wasn’t even that red. Julia didn’t get any red spots. Now the parents on the other hand both missed spots and didn’t reapply enough.
• Julia can sit still long enough on a lap to ride around a lazy river.
• The wave pool was a little too wavy for our little ones.
• Emily was brave enough to ride the one “big” ride with her Daddy. When she was done she informed us that it was a little scary. (Daddy says: She also informed us that she said, “ahhhhhhh” all the way down the ride.) Since that day she has asked to ride it again though.

The city of Miami has made an old tropical destination into a fun park and splat pad. Pinecrest Gardens are free to visit and the splat pad is inexpensive to play at. As we walked the gardens we found colorful fish to watch and a lot of turtles including one who was taking a walk on the path. The splat pad had a lot of fun water features to play in. Julia was a little tired so she was slower to want to play, but after she got her bearing she was off enjoying herself. Emily loved walking in and out of the sprays, under towers, and even made some friends with the other kids.

It was a great way to wear off some energy and cool off on a hot day. When it was time to go neither of the girls were ready to leave. I think this place is on a short list of places we will visit when we are in town. Lots of fun!