Great Wolf Lodge: What to Pack

5:55 PM
I was offered a discounted room rate, though I did not use because of preferences of room. We were presented with small a gift upon arrival of  our room. All opinions & review are of my own.

We just got back from our vacation at Great Wolf Lodge! We had a blast & I have tons of questions about the Great Wolf as whole & lots of other things! I have broken down some info I thought would have been helpful for us & our visit into a few posts so its isn't one giant one! All the fun pics will be the last post, so look out for that one!!

We had 3 lodges relatively close to us. We of course choose one that was the farthest! It was just short of a 5 hours trip! These tips will help for your preparation, drive & what to pack for your trip to Great Wolf Lodge.


If you aren't planning the trip as a surprise, I suggest showing your kids pics & videos of the lodge prior to your arrival! It got the whole family excited for our trip & got the girls familiar with the characters! We found some great ones on their YouTube channel and on their website where they tell the story of the lodge & have a few songs!


Coloring pages! I printed coloring pages from there site HERE, grabbed some clip boards & crayons for the trip! They had so much fun coloring & it got them excited to meet everyone! {violet is their fave} They also have some fun activies to do on your drive! My girls were a little small, but one game that was already was a favorite is the color car game!


You will want a bag of bathing suit & all your pool stuff ready when you arrive! You get to go into the park at 1 the day of your arrival even though check in is 4! Your room may or may not be ready, ours was but in case it isn't have a bag so all the luggage can stay in the car! Same goes for the day you leave, check out is 11 and you get to stay at the park til it closes! So have a bag of dry clothes & a sack for you wet clothes for when you leave!!



Make sure you pack more than 1 bathing suit for you and the kids! Even if you staying for one night! No one likes a cold wet bathing suit! There was a few times that we went in the morning then came back from lunch & a activity then went back swiming later than night! It was nice to have a dry suit to change into!


                                                                                                                                       

Even though the water park is a warm 82 every day, it gets chilly in the hallways & out of the pool! So bring cover ups & flipflops for no only the kids but for mom and dad too! And if you are anything like us you are running around doing the other things the resort has to offer! We didn't do Magiquest but if you have older kids you will want this too!


Great Wolf Lodge has LOADS of towels dry & ready for you in water park, but they have to stay in the water park! I brought  2 for the girls to dry off before getting into their cover ups on or when we would get a snack from Spirit Island! 

These refillable cups at Spirit Island snack shack were a big hit with the girls..naturally.


Speak of food, if your on a budget bring your own food! They had a restaurant on site {which was delicious} horrible service but delicious food, but for lunch or in between snacks {my girls are snackers} we bought fruit, juices, sandwiches & beer/wine to have at the room! We also brought some breakfast food although we did hit up dunkin donuts for coffee {they have a deal where you buy a cup & get free refills during your stay, YES!} and donuts for the girls for one morning! For a also easy lunch or dinner & cheap is getting pizza from Hungry as a Wolf! It was delicious & you can take into the water park, your room or even the lobby! A large was 11.99!!                           

In resort I was SO pleasantly surprised that I was hit in the face by the smell of chlorine upon walking in. But chlorine is always going to be a pool, & even tho I couldn't smell it im gonna assume a large amount is used in such a environment. Both the girls & I skin would get very dried out not to mention the hair, oh kennedys poor curls! Bring a good lotion & load of conditioner

Cute Jammies! OK so this one isn't really a must. But when everyone is meeting in the lobby for story time & posing for pic you don't want your kids in the old mismatched jammies now do ya? ;)  Don't forget the slippers! The girls absolutely loved this every night! The clock tower show was so fun & Kennedy was just head over heels for the characters. Kensley would either SCREAM or wave from a very very far distance 


Some other helpful things would be a waterproof phone case or waterproof camera! So many fun moments that will happen during your whole trip and a good hunk of them in the park! I didn't have either & wish I would have, the few pics I have in the park are great but would have loved to get some while in the water with the family!! I ended up waiting  too long for shipping but also I think it would be fun to have a stuff animal & wolf ears ready to go to wear on the way there! Although the girls did have fun picking out their stuff too at the store!


Hope this is helpful for anyone planning their trip!! Next I will posting about what there is to do at the lodge!!

Easter

12:21 PM
Uh? Better late than never?
You could just ignore this post. I just need it in my archive to look back on!
Easter was the day after Kensleys birthday party. So we celebrated with the inlaws, Friday because Jessi was still in town then with my family on Sunday! 
& now I flood you with pictures!













 hardest thing in the word getting all 3 to look and smile!!












Kensley found the golden egg!
 Easter morning!







The secret to the cleanest looking grout!

5:35 PM
Grout will be the death of me.
I get down and scrub the grout about every 6 months.
Spring cleaning it's always taunting me waiting for me to get down and have aching back & knees, cursing my house,floor & tile. & promising our next house? Lord, our next house will never have any tiles!
Sigh..
I have tried it all, every pin on Pintrest, bleach gel pens..you name it I've tried it.
A large portion of our downstairs is tile, so the job is tedious & time consuming.
I hate that grout can make your freshly mopped floor look dirty!
I'm getting upset just writing about.

All the products I've used have never given the results like I'm about to show you! Please don't judge me by my previous grout..so embarrassing! Also, I hadn't mopped. Looking back now I should have, but the grout has to be bone dry when you use this magic potion! 
& it is only 12 DOLLARS ya'll!!!

What is this amazing product you ask?
PolyBlend Grout Renewal..can you hear the angels singing? You can find it at your local home improvement store with the tile stuff! Another reason why my before is SO different is my grout is normally gray, but I bought the Grout Renewal in Snow White. I think it looks better! It does come in about every color you can imagine to match your grout!


 How does it work? Well its actually more like a paint then anything. You will need a toothbrush, & LOTS of wash cloths & fresh water new by. I set up shop with Kate & Plus 8 and made a day of it!

First, like I said above the grout HAS to be bone dry. Take the toothbrush & brush back & fourth several times to get it really in the grout. DO NOT let it sit for more than 3 mins. It WILL stick to your tile, you can get it off with a razor blade but trust me when I say just avoid that. After you do about 4x2 radius take a wet cloth & wipe off the tiles. I found it best to rub lightly in circular motion so it wasn't bring it up from the grout.
  I ended up doing 2 sessions a few weeks apart to get the final look I wanted {in the after} because my grout is gray & its was BAD. So it took more coats, again kinda like painting a wall! Make sure you wait over 48 hours before you mop for it to properly dry & adhere to the grout!

 Also, the grout renewal seals & protects your grout so you will not be doing this every 6 months, if you are anything like me before, again the angels..do you hear them? I am going on 3 months & my tile looks like it had just been grouted & laid. {they are over 10 years old} Hopefully this will help someone out somewhere!  You can thank me later! ;)
If you end up using this method let me know how it works for you!


IG @MRSMUMAW