Friday Funnies: My little "men"

Me: What are you boys doing?

Asher: Don't worry, Momma, I'm just teaching him how to be a man.

And we have a reader...

Hey there, Mr. Too-Big-for-Your-Britches,

Who told you that you could get so big?...Or start reading for that matter?  We are not supposed to start Kindergarten for another TWO weeks and teaching you to read just happened to be one of my goals for this year.

Last Sunday afternoon you came up to me and said, "Hey, Momma, I can spell 'hat'." Then, you spelled it as you sounded it out. I quizzed you on about 12 more three letter words and you got them all right. And,  then it occurred to me...if you could visualize these words in your head, then surely you could read them on paper! So, I pulled out the first of the five sets of BOB books that I'd snatched up at a garage sale at the beginning of the summer, and you read through the first set of 12 books in two days! I was in total shock.

And, then the Mommy-guilt started to creep in.  How long had you been able to do this? I know you're often overlooked these days because of the babies...but could you have been reading all summer, had we just tried? I know it's not a race. I just never imagined that reading would come so easy for you.  (Now, I'm feeling pretty foolish for all the time I'd spent agonizing over selecting the perfect reading curriculum. Sheesh!)

You've been showing off your reading and spelling skills ever since. You are so proud of yourself. Realizing you could read was a bittersweet moment for me....so proud of and excited for you, yet slightly (okay, maybe a little more than slightly) annoyed that you didn't "need" me to help teach you...or maybe irritated that you couldn't just hold off a couple weeks and let me think that you did, indeed, need me? I did make you promise that you would still allow me to hold your big five year old self in my lap, every now and then, to read to you. You sweetly obliged to my request.

I give all the credit to Letter Factory for teaching you your letter sounds in combination with the brilliant mind that God has given you...that mind that can't stop trying in invent, create, and figure things out on your own. May the Lord use that brilliant mind for His glory one day, smart boy. I have a feeling I'm going to continue to be shocked a bunch in my life, as I discover all the things that you can do.

All My Love to you, Smartie Pants,

Your Super Proud Momma

First Day of School 2011

We started "school" two weeks ago.  This is our first "official" year in Classical Conversations. 


Let me back up...some of you may know that we had a unique opportunity to join a homeschool community called Classical Conversations last Fall.  Children don't start CC until they're four years old, so my kids were too young to begin last year. BUT...the younger siblings of CC students attend an age-specific pre-school class. Last year, Amy, the director of our B/CS CC campus, asked me to teach the three-year old class, so Asher was one of my six students.  We got the benefit of observing the community and the way that CC operated without committing to it, entirely.  Teaching Asher's class was SO MUCH FUN for both of us! (I was actually surprised by how much I LOVED teaching preschoolers!) It was a fun way to channel my creativity/detail-oriented/party planning passions and a sweet experience to share with my little smarty-pants.  McKlayne attended the two-year-old class which was pretty much just structured play.  But she adored.every.minute.of.it.


So...after prayer and much dialogging back and forth, Charlie and I believe that classical education is the route that we want to take with our children.  I know there are MANY STRONG opinions out there about education models and methods.  I'm not trying to say our way is better than yours.  We believe that, for now, this is the route for us.  We hope that our kids may truly learn how to think and articulate (I still don't think I have :) through this classical process of gaining knowledge (grammar), understanding (logic), and wisdom (rhetoric) based on the trivium. Heidi does an excellent job of explaining it all here.


This year, since Asher's still only four, we're just getting our feet wet. It's a learning year before we jump in full-force.  Meaning, the only time that we're doing much of anything Classical Conversations-related is the 3 hours one day a week, that we come together as a community.  (Other than listening to memorization cd's, occasionally, while he colors or plays in his room.) We have other big aspirations the rest of the week, such as perfecting handwriting and learning to read and explore the world around us.  And, honestly with three children four years old and under, life is busy, so I'm not stressing out about adding one more thing to our hectic schedule.  A stressed out Momma never makes for a pleasant day for anyone around here.


Okay, so I may have fibbed just a bit about saying "the only time that we're doing much of anything Classical Conversations-related is the 3 hours one day a week".  But I wasn't fibbing about life being ridiculously busy.  Charlie is fortunate enough to be the teacher (the students refer to him as their "tutor" since generally their mom's are their primary "teachers" at home) for Asher's class.  (Charlie's boss has been so flexible and generous to allow him to make up the four hours that he misses on CC mornings, at other times during the week.)  Asher, of course, thinks it's the coolest thing EVER that his Daddy is his teacher and the other students in his class have responded really well to having a male tutor.  I mean, who wouldn't love a teacher who will break out in a Barney voice to get their attention?  I'm also the Nursery Director this year. So, when I'm not needed down in the Nursery, I'm in Asher's class to help assist either of my guys.

McKlayne graduated to the Monkey Class this year.  And, if you can't tell from the big grin on her face, she is just tickled about this. Her class is "rowing" Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear? this month.  (I'll tell you what that means at a later date. What?! You don't believe me?)

And, if you haven't noticed, she had LOTS of fun posing for the camera....she is quite a little camera ham, these days.

After the picture above, she tossed the chalkboard aside and said, "Mommy, I want one like this now...."

Maybe she thought it would make her arms look more flattering? I don't know where she's seen that before...

I learned something new on the first day of school:  My four year old can draw, and I had NO CLUE!!  (I don't know why this came as such a surprise considering who his Daddy is and that he is self-taught in handwriting, but still...) The Fine Arts for this first 6 weeks is Drawing.  When I came back up to Asher's class after checking on the Nursery classes, I was shocked to see these:

I asked Asher, "Did you draw that? By yourself?" (Did I mention that I was very skeptical?)


A: "Yep!" (with a big grin on his face.)


Honestly, I didn't believe him. I thought that he must have either traced them or that Charlie had helped him.  So, then I walked over to Charlie and asked, "Did Asher free-hand those?"  


C: "Yeah, all by himself! He just looked at a picture and copied the shapes to draw the animals."


I still didn't believe it until Charlie got home that night after work.  "Are you sure that he didn't have any assistance with those?"


C: "No, Kirby! He is just a brilliant artist and we had no clue!"


As thankful as I was to discover this new-found gifting, I kind of felt like a loser of a mom!  We paint and cut and color and glue and craft and write and create ALL.THE.TIME. at home...but never do we DRAW!  (I guess that's because I'm not very good at drawing.)  The mommy guilt began to set in: It's like there's something that's been hidden inside of him, all bottled-up, that nobody knew was in there, just waiting to be discovered.  And, I, of all people, had missed it!


I decided right then and there, that we were going to make time in our daily schedule for him to draw, if he wanted to.

He drew this last week after looking at the goat in The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle.

This monkey was from the second week of class when they worked on drawing mirrored images.

So...all you Mommas, out there...have you ever been surprised to discover a gifting or passion of your child that you didn't forsee? Or am I the only negligent one?

Summer of Celebrations (Part V): Yonderway Farm

So...do you remember the Summer of Celebrations series that I started...oh, you know, a long time ago? As I was making scrapbook pages in Picasa for my hopscout video, I was reminded of how I have NEVER posted some of these things I actually finished MONTHS ago on my blog.  So, if for no one else, they'll be documented for my family for years to come, but get ready for the rest of my posts. This first one was dated January...I don't know why I never posted it!

I have not been NOT blogging for lack of nothing to blog about, but wondering how I will dump all of these thoughts down before they leave my memory.  I am well aware that pregnancy, children and age all cause holes in my memory...so I am bad combo of sorts for remembering little details right now.  The whole reason, I started (and continue) to blog in the first place is so that I can remember these sweet and sometimes difficult years of having young, funny, precious little ones. And for those precious ones...I want Asher, McKlayne and Baby #3, even if they can't remember, to be able to read back over the funny things they said, and look at sweet pictures of themselves and get a glimpse into this crazy home of two sinful parents who desperately loved them and tried to teach them to love Jesus, as best as they knew.  (And hopefully, they will all be able to overlook my, sometimes, poor grammar and constant overuse of "......"  I know it. I admit it.  I'm a lover (and abuser) of the "dot, dot, dots" and just cannot forsake them.  As long as I type, they will always be there, so if you've been reading this blog for longer than two posts, you've maybe learned to overlook my misuse of them, as well.)

So, for now...as this new year begins, I will continue on in what Charlie and I decided months ago was our current life motto, "To be finishers..." I will finish blogging about our "Summer of Celebrations" before these sweet memories escape me...and maybe, just maybe, you won't feel so dreadfully cold in this crazy winter weather as you browse these pics from our warm summer days.

Next stop: Yonderway Farm.  Two of our very dearest of friends lived there this summer and they just so happen to be related: the Kramer's, who permanently live there, and who my kids refer to as "Farmer Jason" and "Farmer Lynsey" with their three beautiful (and about to make it four...Lyns is due two weeks before me!) girls.  Our beloved Hendrick's (Jason and Heather are siblings) lived on the farm this summer before they moved to Haiti (click on that link to read more about how God lead them to Haiti) with their four precious (and oh, how we miss them already, again) boys.

Between all the shower throwing and matrimony making, we got to sneak out to the farm for a few days and just soak up our friends...sweet friends that have become like family to us over the last almost seven years.  Somehow, long ago, even before I knew that I would marry my Charlie, when I was a silly, wreck of a college girl, Heather adopted me.  I, quickly, got to know and adore Lynsey, who is a wealth of information of all things natural.  (When needing a natural remedy or recipe, this is the girl that I call.  I also adore her for so many other things....but that's a whole 'nother blog post.)

These several days at the farm, were complete bliss spent with precious friends treasuring the last days of possibly forever living in the same town, laughing, dreaming of what the next several months would hold, remembering how deeply God had used these people to help us rethink how we live life and retrain our thoughts on family and marital roles, eating bowls of husband-sized portions of Blue Bell,  watching those boys love on my children...trying to preserve those moments in my mind, and even some ugly crying.  The kids roamed the farm in wonder of all the animals, the acre upon acres of beauty to behold, and rode in "the buggy" as many times as an adult would drive them around.

(Want to know what makes me want to ugly cry some more? I only have ONE picture from the entire time we were there. ONE picture...and it's of our family...not even of all the people that we love.  I must have been soaking them in so much that I thought that I'd have a permanent imprint of them in my mind.  Sadly...it's fading.)

I discovered that I do have pictures from the Summer of 2009 out at the farm:

Asher was so blonde and LITTLE here!

My precious boy.

(I know I took this exact same picture this summer except with more kids piled on...Heather, is it on your camera?)

When our babies were still babies!

************

Okay...back to Summer 2010...here are a few things that were documented.

Asher perfected his swimming at the farm:

We also made strawberry jelly...and lots of it.  I believe this was our third batch to make in the last year and half and Heather decide that it finally needed to be documented so that we could look back at it the next time we made some, so I am completely hijacking the following from her blog:

STEP BY STEP JELLY HOW-TO

Before making your jelly for the love...start with a crystal clean kitchen.  Trust us.  This makes a huge difference.  If your kitchen is a mess before starting...warning...you will break down and lose it once your jelly making is in progress.  Jelly making is messy.  Kids decide to do the most awful things when momma is in the kitchen making jelly.  No matter how excited you are to get started, trust us...clean that kitchen up little lady! 

What you need for one batch of jelly (four 16 oz. jars):

2.5 one pound cartons of strawberries
1/4 cup lemon juice
7.5 cups sugar (you will need a four pound bag of sugar per batch)
2 pouches of certo (liquid fruit pectin)
4 mason jars
4 rings
4 flat lids
large canning pot (try to use a real canning pot with some sort of rack in the bottom of the pot so that the glass jars do not get too hot)
jelly funnel
jar gripping tongs
lots of clean dishtowels and rags on hand

Wash your jars and rings in the dishwasher.  Start making jelly once your jars are drying on high heat in the dishwasher.  Keep the jars toasty hot in the dishwasher until you need them.


Put water in your canning pot and begin to bring it to a boil.  This takes some time.  Add the lid to speed up the boiling process. 

Wash strawberries. Remove tops.  Cut in half.

Put strawberries in a food processor.

You have to take it easy with the food processor.  You want the strawberries to look chopped...not pureed.

Your mixture should look like this....

From your blended strawberries you need to measure out 3 3/4 cups.  Pour 3 3/4 cup chopped strawberries in large bowl.  Add 1/4 cup lemon juice and 7 1/2 cups sugar.  Set aside.


That's a lot of sugar.  I know.  You are welcome to experiment with other sweeteners, however changing the kind of sweetener or reducing the amount of sugar has the potential to adversely affect the way your jelly sets.  We can only guarantee your jelly if you follow these directions exactly.  If anyone experiments with other healthier sweeteners and your jelly sets up well, please let us know.  We'll gladly try your recipe and link to it.  We have used organic sugar and it worked great, but have been too chicken to try other healthier sweeteners.

Boil a small saucepan of water.  Once the water is boiling, turn the water off and place your flat  lids in the hot water.  Let those sit in the hot water until ready to use.

Once the water in your large canning pot is boiling, turn the water down to simmer.  Now it is time to start cooking the strawberry mixture.  Place the strawberry/sugar/lemon juice in a large, separate pot.

Bring mixture to a full rolling boil (a boil that doesn't stop bubbling even when you stir it).  Use high heat.  STIR CONSTANTLY.

Here's where things get a tad pit stressful.  It's only stressful for a few minutes though.  Sort of like a jelly making contraction.

Get your certo packages ready.

Once the strawberry mixture is boiling (full rolling boil) stir in two packages of Certo quickly.

Return to a full rolling boil and then boil exactly 1 minute (set the timer on the microwave or your phone).  Stir constantly.  After one minute, remove from heat.

With a metal spoon, skim off any foam.

Put the foam in a small bowl.   Once the foam cools, find a cute little kid and let him eat it right out of the bowl with his finger.  It's a must.

Remove four hot jars from the dishwasher.  There are six in this picture, but you get the point.

Pour the heated strawberry mixture quickly into the jars using your jelly funnel.  Leave 1/8 inch of space at the top of the jars.

With a wet rag, quickly clean the tops of the jars.  The tops of your jars need to be nice and clean so wipe off any jelly that got on the tops while you were pouring the mixture in the jars.

  
Remove flat lids from hot water and dry the rubber seals really well with a dry rag.

Cover jelly jars with two piece lids.  Screw bands tightly.

Using your tongs, place the jars of jelly into the canning pot and bring water to a boil.  There needs to be an inch or two of water covering the tops of your jelly jars.

As soon as water is boiling, set a timer for 5 minutes.  Let the jelly sit in the boiling water for a full 5 minutes.

After five minutes, remove the jars of jelly with your tongs.  You may need to set the jars on towels so they don't harm your counter tops.  Let cool.  After the jars have completely cooled (this takes several hours), check the seals by pressing on the top of the seal.  If the seal pops up and down, the jar is not sealed.  If that happens, place the unsealed jars of jelly in the refrigerator.  For the jars that have sealed, let them sit for 24 hours before moving them.  Then you can store them in your pantry up to one year.

Random tips:

We bought tons of mason jars from garage sales.  That's the way to go.  Then all you have to buy is new, flat lids.  The first time you make jelly it will be more expensive because you'll have to buy jars.  However, once you invest in jars, you'll use the same ones over and over.

You can use your rings and jars over and over again (unless the rings get rusty).  Every time you can something you have to buy new, flat lids.

Borrow.  Borrow.  Borrow.  This is the perfect time to email all the older ladies in your church and ask if they have the supplies you'll need for making jelly.  Maybe you could even ask them to come help you.  Once you decide if canning is going to be your "new thing" then you can slowly collect the canning items.  We bought lots of supplies (big pots, pressure cookers) at garage sales. 

We've been told that Certo is the best liquid pectin if you are trying to eliminate high fructose corn syrup from your diet.  The other brands are basically high fructose corn syrup...so what's the point?

For jelly, we have found that the jars need to be no bigger than 16 ounce.  Any larger and the jelly does not set well...probably from not getting hot enough in the hot water bath (the method for canning we use for jelly).

It's no fun to make jelly by yourself, and may be impossible.  Invite a friend.  You'll need extra hands.  If you have small children you will need someone there to watch them.  For real.

Jelly making is fun, rewarding but a huge mess.  We make giant batches.  This time we made 29 jars between the two of us.  However, you should only do one batch at a time (no doubling or tripling the recipe.  It will mess up.)  Kirby and I will make jelly one more time this summer with peaches and do about the same amount.  So...two jelly days for us and we have jelly for the entire year and some to give away at Christmas.  We have found it's better to mess up the kitchen twice and have a couple long days than to make a huge mess several times a summer.    

The end result.  Yum.  Who wants a biscuit?

************

This post was written MONTHS ago, but I just realized that I had never posted it.  Not sure why...but now the countdown is on and in 2 weeks the Hendrick's will be home from Haiti for the summer and we'll be packing our bags to live for DAYS at the farm.

Get ready, Lyns and Heather, we may just never leave Yonderway.

Great Wolf Lodge

We decided to forgo another frigid, outdoor January birthday party, and take the kids to Great Wolf Lodge for a night to celebrate Asher's birthday instead.  And, let me tell you, it was worth every penny.  We had such a great time and the kids were beside themselves with excitement and wonder.

Have you ever heard of Great Wolf Lodge?  It's a hotel with an extreme indoor waterpark that is kept at a comfortable 84 degrees; there are locations all over the U.S., and there is one in Grapevine about 4 hours from us.  My sister's family had gone to GWL over summer vacation about a year and a half ago and they'd had a blast, but we were a little unsure if there would be enough for our two young kids to do.  And, boy, were we mistaken and blown away!  Having a two and almost four year old (I had to let him remain three as long as possible), (and with me being 8 months pregnant) really probably couldn't have survived more than one night's stay.  Two days of playing in the waterpark was so much fun and the accommodations were so nice, but it was PLENTY...it wore us out!  Let me give a disclaimer here: our kids are WATER LOVING KIDS.  If yours aren't too fond of the water, I can't promise that you'll enjoy your stay as much as we did.

The lodge is so beautiful and we were extremely impressed with all of the detail that went into everything...we felt like we were at a Disney Resort!  Unfortunately, I was too busy taking it all in that I didn't get any pictures of the lobby/family area.  The lobby was decorated in a "winterfest" theme with Christmas lights and snowflakes everywhere and several times a day it would "snow" in the lobby.

Our little wolf pups with their wolf pups.  We referred to Asher as either "Baby Wolf" or "Brother Wolf" and McKlayne as "Sister Wolf" or "Babygirl Wolf Pup" the entire trip.  They chose those names and would answer to nothing else for 30 hours.

As soon as we checked into our room and the kids saw that we had reserved a Wolf Den Suite, they were already asking when they'd get to sleep in their bunk beds in the wolf den.  (Totally worth the extra $40! Each time they went down for naps/bed they were asleep within 5 minutes. It was nice to have them "walled in" on three sides in a dark "den", so that we could freely move about/have lights/tv on without having to worry about waking them up, etc.)

Like I've already said, the waterpark had SO MUCH to offer: lazy river, wave pool, tons of slides, splashpad and pool area just for toddlers, a pool with basketball hoops and logs that you could jump across, a huge fort with a ton of different water gadgets and contraptions, hot tubs, and more.  Asher could go on almost every ride/pool area b/c he's taller than 42 inches, while McKlayne was more limited.  But, honestly, there was nothing that she couldn't go on, that she desired to, so it worked out well.  We certainly did not run out of things to do!

McKlayne's two favorite areas were:

1. Fort Mackenzie: the three story treehouse where she loved standing under the giant bucket that poured a TON of water out and dumping water on each of heads as we went down the orange slide on Totem Towers.  Each time she'd hear the bell ringing, signaling the giant water bucket dump, she'd run down towards the bottom of the fort to stand underneath the rush.

2. Whooping Hollow: She was happy to be able to freely walk about, crawl on her hands around the beach front entry like "Ariel", sit in mini fountains, shoot water guns on jet ski's and slide down the mini slides.

Asher loved it all, but his favorites were:

1. Fort Mackenzie: He enjoyed turning on all the gadgets that sprayed water out (it amazed us that our kids knew how to work these better than we did...maybe because they were just above eye level for them?!)  and racing us down one of the slides on the Totem Towers.

2. Slap Tail Pond: Asher could not get enough of the wave pool.  He loved being able to jump the waves, like at the beach, without having to worry about being stung by a jellyfish or being tossed around on the wild waves in a tube.

3.  Coyote Canyon/River Canyon Run: Though he was not a fan of climbing 4-5 flights of stairs (and he didn't have to very often because one of us would carry him up) he LOVED the tube rides.  He would scream the whole way down, with his arms up in the air, saying, "This is so much fun!"

Charlie and I enjoyed it all, too, but our favorites were Fort Mackenzie and riding any of the tube rides.  The only problem was...we didn't want to go by ourselves on the rides (what fun would that be?) so our only other option was Asher (since we couldn't neglect both of our small children in a waterpark to go with each other, though we did consider it...) but he wasn't a fan of climbing the 4 or 5 flights of stairs (depending on the ride) to get there.  So, as desperate as I was to go ride these things (they were so fun!) I'd promise Asher that I'd carry him up the 4-5 stories.

I climbed these stairs four times over the course of two days while carrying my 42 lbs almost four year old.  (You should have seen my feet and cankles the day after we got back from our trip...I looked like the Michelin Man...really!...ask my friends..and this was the first time that my feet had even started to swell this pregnancy!!)

After climbing the stairs, I thought that I would enjoy the lazy river with McKlayne while the boys rode a few tube rides, but let me tell ya...you think getting yourself situated in a tube is awkward enough while trying to juggle a child on your lap?  Try it 8 months pregnant, when you have no core to help you maneuver and a big ol' belly in the way where your toddler wants to sit!  After several failed attempts, we resorted to the wave pool.  Seriously, if it wasn't for Crossfit, this pregnant momma would not have been prepared to help tow two little ones around a waterpark for two days...so, be warned, if you're hugely pregnant and wanting to go here, it is hard work!  My kids (and I) didn't last much more than 2 hours at a time in the waterpark.  There was so much to do and we were loving every minute of it, but we just couldn't survive the exhaustion.  So, we pretty much planned our time in the park in two hour increments.

At 8:00 each evening, you're encouraged to show up in your pj's for a show at the Clocktower, followed by Bedtime Stories where either Wiley Wolf or Violet Wolf make an appearance.  Our kids were thrilled to get their picture taken with Violet. McKlayne, of course, adored her bows and "cute crocs".

Our two tired, happy little wolf cubs howling about how much they loved Great Wolf Lodge...

They still can't get enough of looking at themselves in their wolf ears...and with those sweet faces, neither can I!

We're thankful for such a sweet time spent enjoying each other and exploring all the fun that God created in the world of waterparks.  What a wonderful Creator, He is!

***************

Here are some tips that I wish someone would have given me to schedule our days with two young kiddos to maximize our time at the park/budget.  We'd planned beforehand to eat one meal out, so I packed everything else for breakfast, lunches, and snacks and kept them in the mini fridge/cold bag in our room.  The entire staff was so friendly and laid back. My sister had told me that outside food and drinks weren't allowed in the waterpark, but after seeing several families with their snacks and lunches inside, we opted to try and bring our food in the second day. No one searched our bags or even gave us weird looks as we sat at the tables and ate our lunch.  (We also went during the "off season"....so maybe that's why they were so lenient?  The occupancy was only at 20%, so that was VERY nice and we will definitely plan on going in the middle-end of January in the future.)  If no one else benefits from my ocd planning, at least I can look back on this as a reminder for future trips:

-Plan on arriving at 1 p.m., in your bathing suits and fed, so you don't have to worry about stopping (or paying) for lunch and have one spouse get the kids started in the park while the other spouse gets all of the luggage/food settled in the room.
-Play for two hours in the park and go back to the room for a short nap around 3 p.m.
-Clean up and go eat dinner around 5 p.m..  There are several restaurants at the hotel, but since we were trying to save money and eat somewhere we know that we'd enjoy the food, we ate at a Fuddrucker's about 2 miles away.
-Go back to GWL around 6 (with bathing suits and pj's packed, so we don't have to go back to the room) and go play at the waterpark for a bit/explore the cool hotel.
-Report to storytime at the Clocktower with kid's in pj's at 8 p.m.
-Head back to the room by 9 p.m. with kids in bed.

Next morning:
-8 a.m.: Mom: get dry pair of clothes (and undies) and bathing suit set out for each family member and pretty much pack up and gather things to be ready to check out.
-8:30 a.m.: Eat breakfast in the room, dress for pool, call front desk to request a later checkout (they moved it back an hour to noon, which was what we were hoping for!) report to waterpark when it opens at 9 a.m.  Play for two hours.
-Head back to the room around 11 for snacks and to take a short nap/rest.  Change into dry clothes and have either another pair of bathing suits ready to put on or send husband with $1 in quarters up to the 6th floor to dry everyone's suits.
-Mom: while children are resting/napping pack up the room and make lunch: make sandwiches and cut fruit, fill up nalgenes. Have a bag or two with the essentials that you'll need for the waterpark: suits, lunch, snacks and dry change of clothes for car ride home.  Anything you won't need until you get home, goes in the suitcase to be packed in the car.
-Dad: Load up the car and checkout at noon, while Mom wakes up the kids and changes them into suits to go play some more.  (Once you check out, your wristband, which acts as a key to unlock your room door is deactivated, so make sure the other adult with the wristband is still in the room so you don't get locked out.)
-Head down to the waterpark around 12:30ish and eat lunch. (We were able to eat inside the park with our own food and drinks, but maybe they were just laxed since it was the off-season? Either way, we were thankful.  You could easily just eat at a bench/table on the first floor.)
-Play some more from 1-3 p.m. Change, get snacks, load up for home.
-Head for home with two very sleepy children.  Stop halfway for dinner. And be home by 8:30 p.m.