25) Springfield and Branson Missouri

We returned to where our family began. Branson is where Gary and I first met 🥰 we lived in Branson, then Gary was transferred to Arkansas. Kade was born, and we moved outside of Springfield to the small town of Clever for a little bit when Gary was transferred once again to another restaurant. we were so excited to be back and to connect with our friends from years ago!

We stayed at the Bass Pro Shops resort for a night in Springfield and walked around the store and museum a little bit. This is a statue of the “dream buck.” The statue is only 4 times the size of the real life buck killed!
After bps we revisited our old house on the James River.
We were reunited with “aunt” Michele in Branson! She holds a very special place in our hearts as This is the woman responsible for our family 😁
She was a manager at Lone Star with Gary. She hired me as a server because she thought I was perfect for him. I guess she was right:)
The Branson strip is insane! This where every business tries to outdo the others with the craziest building😂 this isn’t even all of it. There is entertainment everywhere you look
Aunt Michele hooked us up with Silver Dollar City tickets! The girls rode every roller coaster!
The time traveler is one of our favorites! we rode it for the first time last summer and it was the most memorable out of all of them.
Aunt Michele bought us tickets to experience the show, “Jesus” at the sight and sounds theater! It was AMAZING! After the show we all met up with another friend from Branson, Brian. He had traversed 3 states with Gary when I was pregnant with Kade in order to find every piece of the John Lennon Cater’s nursery collection and put it all together to surprise me for Christmas that year…. What great friends and memories!!
When we came out from watching Jesus there was a rainbow spread over the sky💕 I don’t think that was coincidence 👀
We had so much fun! Captain Liam took us out on his parent’s boat and brought us to some cliff jumping spots and took the girls tubing! They had a blast on Table Rock Lake. We sure hope to see more of this sweet family who took us in and hosted our stay in Branson:)
We explored 2 cliff jumping spots! They were at least 30 feet
They experienced some pretty good wipeouts 🤣
We spent the whole day out on the water. We finished tubing and cliff jumping and headed over to our friends’ houseboat! Reconnecting with Paul and Kelly was such a blessing – crazy how we haven’t seen them in almost 20 years and we all just pick up like we saw them just last week🥰
It was so great to catch up with Paul and Kelly! We loved hanging out in the water. The girls did a little paddle boarding out on the lake:)
This is a house! It’s an 80 million dollar crystal palace. The enormous, 25,000 square foot glass house was designed by architect Dennis Spencer and built for Robert Plaster, founder and former chief executive officer of Empire Gas. At the time it was most expensive home ever built in Missouri. The property includes an 8,000 square foot garage with space for 14 vehicles, as well as, 4 offices, 12 guest suites, 2 master bedroom suites and a helicopter landing pad.
There are some abandoned million dollar houses also on the lake
We walk down on the landing and watched the water show
We had brunch with Aunt Michele and Jackson. It was so great to visit with him again! We went to the keeter center at college of the ozarks and everything was DELICIOUS! 😋
There’s a hatchery on the other side of the dam on the Tanneycomo. People were catching the fish as soon as they came out of hatchery down the small waterfall. We had to say goodbye to Michele and Jackson:(
We all went by Stephanie’s bakery to give a customer a cake. It looked so yummy
So we might have an addiction….Andy’s is the BEST frozen custard. We might have gone a couple times 🤫
The house we stayed in was incredible! Not as large as the crystal palace but we were amazed by it! It was on Table Rock Lake and had gorgeous views of the water:)
They had 3 secret doors in the house😆
We are coming home! We loved our time back in Branson and we can’t wait to come back to visit all our friends again.