Catch-up Post

I'm quite a bit behind on this post. Several weeks ago, my friend, Beth, who is Anna's BFF's mom, told me about an indoor water park in Gatlinburg that they were going to for Spring Break. She invited us to go, and Jared and I decided to take the plunge and spend the money for another vacation with the kids (other than our annual Disney trip). We decided to surprise the kids so we loaded them up for the seven hour drive and said we were going shopping at the outlets. Instead, we pulled up to the Wilderness at the Smokies in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. The kids didn't quite understand what was going on until they walked into the lobby of the hotel and saw the Bachmore family (they have four kids very close in age with ours). We explained to all the kids that we had three interlocking rooms and that there was an indoor water park at the hotel. They FREAKED! Needless to say, it was a fabulous time with screaming, squealing, wrestling, and splashing with some fighting and crying mixed in.

At the end of the two days at the water park, we said our goodbyes to the Bachmores, piled back in the car and took a scenic drive through the Smoky Mountains. The kids were playing with their DSs while Jared and I nagged them to look at all the beautiful scenery they were missing. The boys threw us an occasional "uh uh" without looking up from their games, so we finally gave up and just enjoyed it ourselves. We did force everyone to get out of the car once for a picture.

What we didn't tell the kids when we said goodbye to the Bachmores was that we were actually meeting up with them again. Very long story short, we met them at a three bedroom cabin complete with hot tub, air hockey table, pool table, old school arcade and theater room. The cabin was three stories, and the kids just could not keep their mouths closed while they walked around and looked at it all. It would be a GREAT place to have a family reunion or just get a bunch of friends together for a fun weekend with fun for adults and kids (who's in???).

Here are a few pictures...

Anna jumping on the top bunk of the bunk beds.

This was one of several bad parenting decisions over the weekend.

"The Luge"

We rode up to the top of part of the mountain on a ski lift (freaked me out - Austin was fine!) and then rode the luge down the mountain. We LOVED it! Jared got to do it with Aidan, too.