san antonio

Months ago, we reserved this first week in April for a family vacation.  We didn't have any set plans, but left the week open to whatever we decided to do. We were considering going to Pittsburgh to see Jeffrey and his family before he finished his PhD program, but it wasn't a good week for them, so we began researching our options.  We settled on a trip down to the JW Marriott in San Antonio since we could drive there and apply some hotel credits that Kevin had from work travels.  In a nutshell, it was amazing.  Such great family memories and experiences!

When we arrived in San Antonio, we ate at a Brazilian Steakhouse that Kevin was REALLY excited about.  He wanted the food experiences to also be memorable, and they were!  

Coby is my meat-eater, so he enjoyed it a bit more than Brooke.  He also loved using those tiny tongs to grab each slice of meat.

Brooke wanted to stop and smell the flowers before we loaded back into the car to drive the last little bit to the resort.  Pictures like this make me realize how grown-up my girl is getting.  I don't know if it's the outfit, or the beautiful long hair, but either way, I'm not sure how I feel about it.

When we arrived, we checked out our room and balcony, walked the grounds, and jumped in the pool.

This picture is exactly why I take so many pictures.  I love these two littles SO much and I love their relationship.  Of course they fight, but overall, they are playing so well together and hearing them laugh together fills my heart.

The kids especially loved the sandy area off one of the pools.

We essentially had the pool to ourselves, probably because we were in the off season.  They were also setting up for a huge golf tournament, so the majority of the resort guests were there for the tournament.

We also checked out the water slides before heading back to our room.  Both kids were excited about the small slides in the toddler area, but Brooke was scared of riding the bigger slides even thought I reminded her that she rode them 2 years ago and wasn't scared.  Colby rode one of them with Kevin, but we figured we wouldn't push Brooke until the next day.

Well, the next day was in the 60's, so we didn't hit the pool until much later in the day. We ate the most amazing breakfast at Cibolo Moon (one of the hotel's restaurants), sat by the outdoor fire pit, played pool. ping pong, and walked the grounds to see the golf course.

When it was as warm as it was gonna be for the day, we decided to brave the water slides.  It was pretty darn cold, but we wanted to make the most of the day. Colby and Kevin rode a few more slides, we spent a good amount of time trying to convince Brooke to try them, and spent the rest of the time in the hot tub.  The picture Kevin took of me talking to Brooke is pretty classic.  She promised me that she was going to try the slide, so we made it all the way to the top and then she absolutely refused.  We then walked all the way back and I was so frustrated that she wouldn't trust me.  I didn't want her to feel pressured, but I also knew that she would totally love it so I wanted her to have the confidence to try something that might seem a bit scary. We even tried bribing her with $5 since she really wanted some baby Twisty Petz, haha, but even that didn't work.

Once the rain started, our pool time was officially over.  We snuggled up and watched a movie in our beds, then got dressed and ready for a Hibachi dinner.

Dinner was delicious and the kids loved watching the food being prepared in such an entertaining way :) I was pleasantly surprised that both kids were open to trying the chicken, steak, AND shrimp.  The fried rice was one of my favorite parts.

When we arrived back at our room, Kevin wanted a picture of the two of us.  Having Brooke take the picture was nothing short of hilarious.  She had to stand on a chair to get a good angle, and every picture was blurry.  We finally managed to get one where we weren't cracking up and that was mostly clear, haha.

Then we opted for a selfie which was probably the best option from the get-go! I love this guy a whole lot :)

Thankfully, temperatures rose overnight and instead of a 60 degree day, we had an 85 degree today!!  I couldn't have been more grateful for the heat.  It definitely makes things more fun when you are at a water resort.

We have a similar picture from our last trip here, so I needed a replica :)

And my girl FINALLY rode the water slides!!  It took so much convincing and patience on mine and Kevin's parts, but we were right because Brooke loved them and wanted to go about 15 more times. Sometimes it is hard to know when to push your kids, but in this instance, I am glad that we did.  I could see the confidence it gave her, and of course she didn't forget about the $5 bribe to get those Twisty Petz.

The entire day was spent outdoors, whether it was on the slides, in the water, in the sand, or poolside eating dinner. It literally couldn't have been any better!

The kids loved having strawberry daiquiris poolside, and Colby spent a lot of time zooming his boat across the water. 

We buried Brooke and Colby, built a family castle, then smashed said castle. 

When I tried to take a picture of the boys in their coordinating swim trunks, Kevin told Colby to flex his muscles.  Colby immediately looked up at Kevin and I will forever adore this picture and the way that he looks at his daddy. 

The flexing continued, haha.

One final picture at the end of an amazing day!  This was exactly what our family needed and I'm grateful that Kevin could make it happen for us.

He also humored me and let us stop at the Natural Bridge Caverns before we headed out of San Antonio.  He preferred to stop on our way down, something about "being a horse to the stable" at the end of our trip, but it made more sense to spend the extra time at our resort the first day and do this on our way out since we had to check out of the hotel anyway. I am super happy that we did because it was really cool! Our tour guide was sort of awkward, but funny at the same time.  He emphasized over and over that it was a felony to touch any of the formations, so I was a little worried about monitoring Colby.  I wasn't a bit worried about my rule-follower Brooke, so at least that made things easier.  

I had read on the website that the cave temperature stayed about 70 degrees, with 99 percent humidity. Kevin took this picture towards the beginning before my face was a glistening mess. Check out those cavern walls, though!

I have only been in a few caves in my life, but I don't think I have even seen such huge stalactites or stalagmites. I learned a bunch of other cool terms which I can't remember now, but it was really quite interesting. I loved hearing the stories behind the names of each "room" in the caverns, and the stories of the university students who discovered everything in 1960. 

 Nature is amazing!  It's incredible to think that this was all formed by single drops of water over time.

 Since my kids don't forget anything, and I had mentioned something about mining for gems and minerals, we found the Mining Co. Store which sold the bags of "mining rough".  Outside the store were a series of troughs called a sluice. We were instructed to pour the bag of mining rough into a screen tray and lower the tray into the trough of water.  While you sift and shake the tray, flowing water reveals amethyst, rose quartz, emeralds, and variety of other stones.  The kids absolutely loved this activity!  Kevin emptied about half of the bag in each of the kids' trays, and as they discovered a gem, we would set them aside.  Kevin started sneaking the stones back into Colby's tray, so it was the activity that never ended, haha.  The fun just continued :) I love seeing Kevin in his role as a daddy.  I love how hands-on he is with the kids, and that he has fun with them.  And I'm glad that he listened to me that the $14 bag of "rough"was totally worth it, haha.  Each kid ended up with a small bag of gemstones, so I'd call that a win.

My inner rock-collecting nerd was also pretty excited about this activity :) Look at those gems...

I would highly recommend this to anyone visiting San Antonio!  Totally a unique opportunity and very family friendly for kids 3 and up, in my opinion.

And that was a wrap on our family trip!  The road trip back home went smoothly, but we were all pretty beat by the time we made it home.  We ordered pizza, had a movie night, and geared up for soccer the next morning!