Charleston ***WARNING -- EXCESSIVELY LONG POST ***

So we decided to take my mom out to Charleston before we ditched her for 5 days with our kids, and we discovered our hands-down favorite southern city. Charleston has so many things to see and do and with a mere 24 hours to spend we crammed a ton in. We already know we need to go back and take more time to really explore, but this was a great appetizer.

We started our adventure walking around the historical district downtown. I think they have something like 83 pre-Revolutionary War buildings there, but that's not something we were about to attempt with 3 kids, so we just wandered and saw what we could from the street. It was still pretty impressive...


...it was also hot as Hades and we were thrilled to stumble upon this park with a wading fountain. Once Keaton saw the water he peeled his shirt off so fast you'd have thought it was on fire. He and Rylan (Branik was a little intimidated) had so much fun playing in this fountain and I'm pretty sure all 3 adults were ticked to be too old to soak ourselves in public. How fun does this this look?

Keaton got really brave after about 5 minutes and decided to stick his head into the blasting water. I thought he might freak out when he felt how hard it was coming out...

...I was SO wrong. Notice the mohawk hair from the blast of the water -- obviously he loved it.

Anyway, after the fountain we wandered out onto a pier and took in the scenery...



Branik just wanted to get down and run -- he was in no mood for photos...


...see?

If Keaton's reset button is water (spraying in his face), Branik's is any cookie you can think of. It doesn't matter if it's homemade, out of a box, or from Subway (it was close and had air conditioning, OK?), if it is in cookie form he will devour it and it will fill his life with unadulterated joy!

The hat. It's a long story. Okay, not really -- 6 year old girl says she is hot and needs a hat "to keep her face cool". Said 6 year old has a pretty small head, and none of the normal style hats fit. This one did. She loved it. End of story.

Keaton was SURE he wanted a chocolate cookie with macadamia nuts -- we were sure he didn't -- guess who was right?

Anyway, after we left historic Subway we headed back to the car and checked into our hotel so we could let the kiddos sleep it off. They were exhausted from the drive and the heat, and although we were equally ragged, I'm pretty sure I'm remembering accurately that we wasted the night watching some news magazine about a woman who killed her husband (or DID she???)

The next day we decided to drive up the road a few miles and check out Magnolia Plantation. This place freaking rocks, and the pictures I took don't do it justice (but I'm still posting them).

Kids under age 6 aren't allowed into the house, so we couldn't do that part, but we still loved it. We took a tram ride around the grounds and learned about the history of the plantation and a lot about the wildlife that lives there. I'm not going into all of that -- if you want to know about it, Google it.


If you look at the center of this next photo, you can see 2 alligators in the water. We saw several more just walking around, but these were the only ones we could get on camera at all. Crazy stuff.


After the tram ride we went over to the little petting zoo there to let the kids see the animals...



You know how spoiled those Southern goats are -- what are you gonna do? No seriously though, what's up with this?

They had a couple of white-tailed deer which I have never seen in a petting zoo, and it was bizarre to watch Branik run up to them and use both hands to "pet" them (or pound them, if we're being truthful) while they just sat there.


Those animals were so chilled out around my boys that I decided they must be on Valium or something. But then a keeper walked in with food and they bolted straight for him, so I guess they are really that used to children. It was cool.

After I bathed everyone in Purell, we headed over to the actual gardens that have been maintained by the same family since the 1600's. It was stunningly beautiful. And yes, my crummy little point-and-shoot really took these photos.


We were too late in the year to catch the full bloom of azaleas, magnolias, and gardenias, but it was still totally worth it and about as southern as you can get. We can't wait to go back, and we're glad my Mom could come out and experience Charleston with us!