Gatlinburg

I know I haven't posted in forever, but there hasn't been all that much exciting going on. Life's been happening and we've been carrying on as usual.

This past week we had more excitement since we had our first "vacation" since Elliot was born.  I use the term vacation loosely since vacationing with a three year old and baby isn't exactly the recipe for relaxation.  Plus it was a family reunion (my mom's side of the family) so it was kind of a forced vacation.

Anyway, we set out on Sunday for the 350 mile drive.  Andrew was content to watch a movie and read a book:

Elliot slept:

We got there with minimal fuss and settled in.  All four of us were sleeping in the same room, but luckily it was a pretty large room:

Andrew slept on an air mattress in the corner and Elliot was in the pack n play in the big closet behind me.  This was a six bedroom house and we had 18 people staying in it (The four of us, my sister and two nieces (6 and 4), my other sister, my aunt, My cousin, Jason, his wife, Emily and their kids, Collin (8) and Marin (6) and my other cousin, Lauren, her husband, Ben, and their kids Connor (15), Jackson (12) and Clare Darby (10).  We had a pretty full house, but it never felt too over crowded thanks to lots of outside space.  We had an awesome view, too:

We did some fun activities, like a hike to a waterfall on Monday:

 

On Tuesday we went to play some mini golf:

 Andrew did really well and didn't melt down through all 18 holes.  He needed a little help with his swing, but he had fun.

Wednesday we went on another hike, this time to Clingman's Dome.  It was raining when we got there so we stopped and bought some ponchos at the gift shop. The rain cleared up by the time we got to the top:

All the kids loved going to the (cold) pool and hanging out in the hot tub (their own personal pool):

Thursday we went to Ober Gatlinburg and everyone had a great time on the tram, the slides and the other rides:

We saw an awesome double rainbow from the back deck:

We played some games:

Elliot hit a milestone:

We played some more mini golf:

Spent more time at the pool:

And got some pictures of all the kids:

Saturday we packed up and headed home.  While it was nice to see everyone and Andrew had a fabulous time playing with his cousins and my cousins kids, the lack of sleep from Elliot almost put me over the edge.  Our next reunion is being planned for 2016 in Pittsburgh. Hopefully by then Elliot will be much more agreeable.