Branson

 After spending three nights in St. Louis we traveled south to Branson for three more nights.  Branson reminds me of the Gatlinburg/ Pigeon Forge area in that there's a lot of "touristy" stuff but there's also a lot of natural beauty.  We had a lot of fun during our time in Branson.  On the afternoon that we arrived we visited a go-cart place.  This place had several tracks- each having a height requirement.  The only course that Owen was tall enough to drive was the Rookie Track. He loved driving the go-cart and had a smile on his face the whole time.  After a few laps he started waving or making faces at us each time that he passed by.

 Olivia was tall enough to drive the Road Course Track.  She also liked driving the cart but seemed to be more serious about her driving.  She started off slow but sped up as she went.  There was also a four story wooden go-cart track that had 1 full spiral, 2 mini spirals, and a blind peak.   It looked like something off of Super Mario Kart.  There was no way that we weren't going to drive on it.  The kids were both too short to drive on that course so Brian and I drove while the kids rode as passengers.  It's been a minute since I've driven a go-cart.  It was pretty fun.

There were many miniature golf places.  We played a round at Dinosaur Canyon.   

 Our hotel had a indoor-outdoor pool.  There was one afternoon where we spent three hours at the pool. Olivia really liked going down the waterslide.  I think she ended up going down that thing fifty times.  Owen went down a few times but he mostly just worked on his swimming (which is getting better).

 Branson is known for its shows, and there were plenty of them to choose from.  We saw The Haygoods and hey, they were good.  These six siblings sang songs from a variety of genres and played various instruments.  The kids gave me a hard time about "making" them go see a show, but they ended up enjoying it as much as Brian and I did.  It was a pretty interactive show and the group sang several songs that the kids knew.

 We ate at several really good restaurants while on vacation but two of the most memorable were in or around Branson.  The first is an Italian place called "Pasghetti's". I'm not going to lie- we picked this place because there was a giant meatball outside that you could walk through.  I thought the food was "meh", but the kids just really liked it.  Because of their insistence, we ended up eating here twice.

 We also ate at Lambert's Cafe.  This place is famous for being the "home of the throwed roll".  Basically, they don't put rolls on your table.  They have a guy who walks around with rolls and if you want one you signal and he throws it to you from across the room.  The food here was good.