Gatlinburg Wrap-Up

 I'm never going to get through our vacation if I don't step it up and start posting! Rain was in the forecast for half of our trip, and while we did spend some of that time at the water park, we wanted to get out and see something new.  We found a rainforest habitat that was indoors, so we loaded up and headed out.  We had the place mostly to ourselves.  A school group came in a little after our arrival, but they had a program to sit through which allowed us to tour at our leisure.

This guy would not put his tongue back in his mouth.  We enjoyed laughing at him. 

We brought a pack 'n play for Brooke, but I knew she wouldn't sleep in it if she saw all of us beds in the same room.  So we decided that Kayla would share a bed with me since she moves the least and Brooke could sleep in the middle.  The first night she of course screamed about being in the pack 'n play, so I brought her to my bed. She thought it was play time at first, but after putting her back in the pack 'n play two times she got the picture and went right to sleep.  She did really well.  After the rainforest adventure Marc took the older girls to the water park and I stayed in with Brooke for her nap.  It took quite a while to get her to sleep since it wasn't dark and everyone else was gone, but she finally went to sleep for a couple of hours.  I laid next to her and read a book.  That was probably one of my favorite parts of the trip.

The weather cleared up the next day, but it was cold.  I didn't pack warm enough so we found an Old Navy on the way and bought a few fleece jackets.  We enjoyed a pancake breakfast and headed to downtown Gatlinburg.  Of course we started our adventure at a candy shop.  Can't pass up those caramel apples! After walking around a bit we headed to a mirror maze.  I was expecting it to be a little more fancy, but it was still tough.  Every once in a while I'd see what I thought was one of the girls only to have them pop out from somewhere else.  Thankfully it wasn't crowded and we didn't lose any children!

We rode the tram up to Ober Gatlinburg.  In all my years of going to Gatlinburg I have never been to Ober Gatliburg.  The line for the tram was longer than we expected, but the girls had a great time.  We enjoyed a pizza lunch while watching the ice skaters, and wandered outside for a bit before we got too cold.

 The colors were absolutely fantastic.

Brooke fell asleep in the car.  When she is tired she puts her hands on her face.  If she has a blanket she will cover her face when she falls asleep.  Makes me smile.

On our way back home we made a stop at the Deer Farm and Exotic Animal Petting Zoo.  Kayla complains about the name being so long, but every time she talks about it she says the entire name.  

The girls enjoyed feeding the animals but they wanted nothing to do with walking in the pens.

I can't really blame them.  I mean look at those hungry animals!

 Marc was brave enough to enter the deer pen.

This guy was intimidating and pretty nasty.  Marc fed him a few years ago, but he decided that once in his life was enough.

 This guanaco was so gentle.  The kids enjoyed feeding it and we even let Brooke give it a try.

She thought it was funny and giggled when she saw her empty hand.

I think the highlight the of the day was holding the baby goat.  Marc went into the crazy goat pen and picked out a baby for them to hold.  He brought it into the area between the two entrances to the pen.  

We had a wonderful time on our vacation.  I love that they are older now and adventures aren't quite as much work as they used to be.  I'm looking forward to more traveling in the future.

Water park!!

The girls had an absolute blast at the water park. There was a play area for the older ones, a wave pool, and an area for younger children.  Our girls enjoyed it all. Well, except for the bucket that dumped water every 15 minutes or so.

 When Marc first tried to get her to go down the slide she said, "I don't want to go down the drain!" So funny, but after one ride down she was hooked.

Gatlinburg

Last week we headed up to Gatlinburg for a few nights.  We weren't able to take a family vacation this summer so the girls were so excited for this trip.  We left in the morning and made it up there for a late lunch.  We decided to go ahead and stop at the Apple Barn for lunch.  We can't go take a trip up there without stopping at the Apple Barn.  Thankfully the wait wasn't too long and it's always fun to walk around while you wait.

We stayed at The Wilderness at the Smokies which is a large resort with an indoor water park.  The girls had the best time.

The girls enjoyed the wave pool.  The waves were huge and pretty intense, but the water wasn't too deep so Marc and I were able to hold onto the rafts pretty well.  It was quite a workout trying to keep 2 floats together and hitting the waves at the right spot!

Just chillin'.

There was a section gated off for kids 48" and under.  That would include all 3 of the girls and despite the fact that the water was only one foot deep and the activities were geared to young children they all enjoyed it.  I enjoyed it more too because the water was warmer. :) These swings bounced and spun around as well.

Macy's first comment when Marc told her to go down the slide - "I don't want to go down the drain!" Once Marc went down with her she was hooked.

Kayla is a little more timid, and while she finally got to where she would go down the slide she still didn't want to go down too often.  It didn't help that there we a few kids who wouldn't wait until the slide had cleared out and slid down on top of them.

I have no idea what she was thinking about, but she wasn't doing what it looks like she might be doing.

 

 

Just Hanging Around

We've been busy these last couple of months.  The blog has taken a back seat, and other than special fall events and our vacation, I haven't been taking many pictures.  There are a few I'd like to remember so I thought I'd just stick them together in a post.  Next I will start on our vacation to Gatlinburg, and we took a LOT of pictures on that trip.

The girls have enjoyed playing in our new downsized back yard.  It's basically our driveway, an access street, and a hill.  It's been fun for the girls, though, and since there are only 2 houses past ours we don't get much traffic coming through.  One afternoon they decided to take a little rest.

I have been trying to think of some fun things for Macy to do when Kayla is at school.  On Mondays she has dance, but on Wednesdays we try to play games, do art projects, or my personal favorite, snuggle on the couch while watching a movie. We made colored rice the day before but didn't have a chance to play with it until after her Timothy classes on Tuesday. She loved it, but I highly recommend playing with it outside.

The Anderson kids came over one night so their parents could have a night out. The car is always a big hit, but this is the first time that Brooke and Jack were in it alone and one of them actually pushed the pedal a little.

Brooke got her first cold of the season.  I had gone upstairs to do some laundry and came down to find Brooke asleep on the ottoman.  She still loves to sleep with her "blay-blay" that a friend made for her when she was a baby. 

Macy is my big snuggler, but once the other girls saw us on the couch they had to join as well.  And please ignore the sagging diaper.  It was almost bedtime and we were waiting to change her until we went upstairs.

I have a lot of pictures to post from our recent vacation, and we just got word that we close on our construction loan next Thursday.  The ball is starting to roll on our new home and we are so excited.  Marc was out at the lot this morning whacking down bushes and small trees so he could mark the property line and the corners of the house.  YAY!