Springfield, MO second time around
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Lodging
Around Town
What We Did
We left home around noon, got E-85 gas for $3.21, and had lunch before hitting the road. Headed south and got into Springfield, MO, around 5 p.m. and check into our hotel Angler's Lodge. We had patches of rain the whole way here. The boys did great; we watched a couple movies and eventually fell asleep for part of the ride. Our original plan was to not get into Springfield until 2 a.m. on Saturday, but due to the weather, we decided to skip O's baseball game. Good thing we did, because just before 6 p.m., it had gotten canceled due to lightening. For dinner, we got Domino's pizza, but after a quick stop at Target for a couple things, we forgot. Friday night was pizza and a movie in the hotel.
The boys woke at their normal time, approximately 6 a.m. After telling them to stay quiet and get dressed, we headed downstairs for breakfast. Just after 9 a.m., we headed across the street to the Wonders of Wildlife Natural Museum and Aquarium. This is our second time being there; the last time was 3 years ago, when T was almost 1. The boys enjoyed every minute of seeing the marine life, and O kept saying those were not real (to the taxidermies). It took us about 2–3 hours to go through the aquarium; we didn't rush through it and stopped and paused a few times. This is one of our favorite aquariums we have been to because of its size, family friendliness, and conservation. There are a lot of photo opportunities and kid tunnels that we can go in and pop up in the tank. After finishing the aquarium, we walked through Nature's Best Photography and saw some beautiful images of animals in the wild. This then led to the Wildlife Galleries, which we went through quicker. T was starting to get tired, grumpy, and kept saying "my legs hurt," which meant carry me, so I would pick him up and carry him for a while, and when I carried him, he would put his head on my shoulder and his thumb in his mouth, and we could tell he needed a nap. This starts with Native American displays, from an American Buffalo display to various displays of animals found in both America and all over the world. There are live penguins, with kids tunnels for them to get a different view of them. A and I dropped the younger two and Cody off at the hotel, then headed out for our little tradition of finding coffee and a bookstore. We went to Bookmarx but drove right past it at first, eventually finding a parking lot a couple blocks away. Since it was nice outside, we decided to walk. When we reached the first door and peered through the second one into the store, I thought, "This place isn't very big—won't take us long." Those first impressions were completely deceiving. It turned out to be a good-sized bookstore with both new and used books. We walked out with five books for a good price. On our way to the bookstore, we saw a shop that looked intriguing, so we decided to stop in. It was called Queen City Collectors, and it had various used, old, and unique items, we then stopped in at Next to New. We hopped back into the car and headed for Classic Rock Coffee, and after we grabbed our coffee, we realized that there was on Walnut Street, near where we had just been at Bookmarx. We got back to the hotel to find O and T taking a nap and read our new books. When the boys woke up, we went to the Bass Pro Catalog Outlet, then to Colton's for dinner, then back to the hotel for a movie night.
The boys woke up around the same time, and we went down to breakfast. Around 10, we went to Bass Pro Shops across the road from the hotel. After we had lunch at Whataburger, we drove down to Branson. I tried to see Big Cedar Lodge but was unable to get in due to fireworks at Table Rock. So we drove around the lake, Branson area, and Silver Dollar City. Headed back to the hotel for a bit and decided to go to Lambert's for dinner. After a 30-ish minute wait, we got in and had dinner; it was very good. O, T, and I missed the other two catching throwed rolls. As we were leaving, we heard the rumble of thunder, and it started hailing on the way back to the car. Skipping the Springfield Cardinals baseball game was a good plan. By the time we got back to the hotel, it had stopped raining.
The boys woke up a little later this morning, but once we were up, we went downstairs and got breakfast, packed up, and headed out. Before we left town, we stopped at Hurts Donuts for a dozen donuts to take home. All the donuts sounded good, but we went with a mix of glazed and old-fashioned donuts.
Planned vs. What Happened
"We loved WOW again, the Angler Lodge was a nice hotel across the road from it."
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