Because Babies Grow Up

We were in Nashville over the weekend. And by we, I mean my mom, the girls and me. Brent stayed behind to study his little heart out for his tests this week and next. We were in Nashville because I attended the Blissdom Conference (I mentioned that last week) where I was inspired by amazing speakers and other bloggers.

After the conference ended on Saturday, I grabbed a sleeping Sammi, a hungry Elli and my poor bleary-eyed mom and headed over to the Rainforest Cafe. I was probably the most excited to eat there of the group. You see, we watch Curious George. He’s my favorite of all the cartoons. At the end of the show it shows the ads from the sponsors. Rainforest Cafe is one of Curious George’s sponsors here in Tennessee. I’ve seen those commercials for months now and had no idea where there was a Rainforest Cafe and so hadn’t really pursued it. But when I booked our hotel room at the lovely Gaylord Opryland Hotel, the gal told me about the Rainforest Cafe and how close it was to the hotel. The anticipation set in.

We called ahead and made a reservation (our time was 7:43 precisely, though they were forgiving when we were a few minutes late.) When we arrived, we were blown away by how well decorated the restaurant/store front was. We were transported into the rain forest. While we waited for my mom, who parked the car for us, Sammi saw a large snake wrapped around a huge tree branch and asked, with a note of worry in her voice, if that snake was going to get out of the tree. I explained that it was a toy snake that could move like how her train moved.

That conversation ended up being a theme throughout the restaurant. There were mechanical animals everywhere! Our table was fairly close to the elephants and on the other end of the restaurant there were gorillas. Elli was a bit frightened the first time we saw the elephants move, but I explained they were just toys and not real animals and that seemed to calm her down. Evey time they moved, I’d just say “toys” and it would help her remember. By the end of dinner, they were really comfortable with everything and wanted to explore. We walked around and touched the elephants and gorillas and climbed up on every chair we could to look at the fish tanks. Sami loves seeing “Dory” from Finding Nemo.

The food was delicious, but a bit pricey. It seemed like a lot of people there were celebrating birthdays. I’d probably only be able to justify the cost again if it were a birthday. They do have the killer volcano dessert that I’ll save room for next time. It’s ice cream inside walls of chocolate with a sparkler on top. Fun! Our server was fantastic and even brought the girls balloons. Those balloons even made it home to show off to Daddy.

But my favorite part was when we left the restaurant. At the bar, the bar stools are the bottom half of animals, complete with tails. We had to jump up on a few and take pictures. I adore giraffes and Sammi has always like tigers. We’re still discovering Elli’s favorite animal.

What’s your little ones’ favorite animals?