Long over due blog update

I cannot believe I have not gotten to posting all the fun stuff about our trip! We are definitely all in summer time mode. We stay up late at night watching tv, we sit outside in the evenings while the kids play, we do as little housework, yardwork, cooking etc, as possible! So I just have not been really motivated to even update the blog!

But, back to updating on all that has gone on. We had a wonderful trip. It was long overdue! I will let the pics do most the talking now.

Well, here we are heading into the mountains. The pics taken from a moving car are not that great, but you get the idea!

So here are our two navigational tool! We used the gps on the phone for the most part and it was almost spot on every time! We did have a few wrong directions from it. I think overall the gps made the trip easier though and I did not have to try so hard to understand the map!

This is the beautiful, tree covered roadway that led to the mountain road to the cabin!

Here is a pic of the cabin we stayed in.

This is the view from our back porch. The lighting was not really good but it was beautifully dense with trees. It made for a nice private area in the back.

Our first adventure was to go for an 11 mile bike ride through Cades Cove! It was incedible in many ways. It was incredibly beautiful, incredibly challenging, and incredibly rewarding to finish it! We drove through Cade's Cove when we were on our honeymoon but biking is definitely the way to see it!

Here are some pics of the things we saw through Cade's Cove as we rode...

We completed the ride in 2 hours and 45 minutes. I did not think that was too bad for to non-bike riders! We really did have a great time doing it.

After our long bike ride we went to the cabin to clean up and nap for a while. We went to downtown Gatlinburg that evening and had a wonderful dinner at The Melting Pot. After dinner we walked all through downtown and did some shopping. We also road the sky lift to the top of the mountain. Here are the pictures of that...

The next morning we went to walk up to Clingmans Dome, highest point (6,643) in the Smokies. We attempted to walk up to it on our honeymoon but I chickened out! So I was quite determined to do it this time!

Accomplishing this was one of the most exciting experiences of my life. It is absolutely breathtaking at the top!

After Clingmans Dome we went back to the cabin and cleaned up and began packing. This was our final day on our trip. We went that evening to a dinner show, The Hatfield and McCoys. It was so very funny! The food was really good too. It was fried chicken and all the good southern fixins! Outside of the theater they had all kinds of crazy things set up, including chicken coops! Here are some pictures of the crazy things...

They had this outhouse set up and Jim decided to sit in it!

Then Jim decided to act like he was actually USING the outhouse!

So we had a wonderful trip! We are already planning a trip back next year with the boys.

Birthday Fun and A BIG Anniversary!!!

Well JC had a wonderful birthday party! And yesterday Jim and I celebrated 10 years of marriage!! That seems so hard to believe but it really has been 10 years.

So now to share lots of Birthday Pics!! I will say a little bit about the pics as I post them...

This is JC enjoying a cupcake on his first birthday last year! I wasn't really planning to put an old pic on here but when I pulled up the folder I accidentally clicked the 2010 folder rather than 2011! So I though well lets just see the difference in a year!

Here he is on his birthday last week having a cupcake! What a difference a year makes! No more high chair for this big boy!!

Our present to him was this Little Tike basket ball goal. He loves playing ball, especially baseball and basketball. He was very excited. He was not so patient while he waited for us to open the box up and assemble it though!

He also did not want to shoot it himself! He threw a fit when we did not pick him up to put it in the goal. But he has gotten better about that now.

At his birthday party the next day we had more cupcakes! He did not want to blow the candle out. He got mad and ran off when we tried to sing to him, so we had to let him take a bite of another cupcake and then he stood and let us sing to him and blow the candle out! Oh the terrible 2's are strong with this one!!

Now some pics of the party goers...

Mom and Daniel

Mom and Ben

Mom and Lou a.k.a Nana and Poppy

Nathan

Drew

Stephanie and Erin (got ya Steph!)

Daniel and his friend Ryan

Kenzie and Erin

Erin

This pic is terribly fuzzy but it had to be included because Scott Hanks is actually smiling in it!!!

Elizabeth and Matthew. They matched that day, I just realized that! Which is appropriate because he is always her shadow!!

Uncle Dave and (soon to be Aunt) Susan!!

And the birthday boy himself!

Now to some of the present action! I made the mistake of letting him open up the gift from mom first! I knew that it was a baseball tee with bat and 2 balls. Well once he opened it he was not interested in anything else! So, I basically opened all the gifts from then on. But here he is with his new baseball tee and bat

He can really hit the thing too! He lines it up and everything. He does NOT like for his daddy to try to show him how to position his feet! He's got this thing down on his own with no help! I DO NOT know where he got that head strong nature!! HA!

He did atleast help me get a few things out of the bag from Aunt Elizabeth. She gave him a golf set and a bubble machine and side walk chalk.

Memaw gave him a sleeping bag so that he can be a big boy like his bubba and "camp out" in the living room on the weekends. They have done this about 4 times now and LOVE it and he does good. They sleep on the air mattress together. It is really cute!

Uncle Scott and Aunt Steph gave him a new trike! He was very excited about this too! His feet do not quite hit the peddles yet, but he scoots it just fine without the peddles. He should be riding with peddles before the end of the summer.

I have realized now as I am going through all the pics that I got none of them with their memaw! Not really sure how I managed that! She is coming to our house this weekend for a visit and I will just have to make sure we get one of the 3 of them together!

On Saturday morning we went to the zoo and we had memaw with us. We had a great time, as usual. Again the animals were pretty active because it was still early in the day. We stayed for about 3 1/2 hours and had a nice picnic lunch together. We were all worn out after that!!

JC chillin in the stroller as we began our morning at the zoo.

Beautiful tigers

Penguins swimming

We went into the farm this time to see if we could pet some animals. The did get to pet a sheep and a goat. This duck was sitting in the middle of this flower bed. You cannot tell from the picture but there is a bench around this bed and a girl was sitting there petting him just before I took the pic. The boys did not try to pet him. I was just sure they would scare him off!

Prairie Dogs

Drew and JC posing in the tree outside the panda exhibit!

It was a fun morning and a great weekend! We had lots going on with different gathers for the holiday and all but it was great!

Well, until next time that's all for now!