Gatlinburg 2013

We have been on several trips since getting married, but they have always been with other family members (reunions, ward camp out, etc.).  However, there were no family reunions planned for this year, and I really needed a vacation, so we decided to go to Gatlinburg for a few nights.  We stayed at the Edgewater Hotel right off the strip, so it was convenient.  Old, but convenient.  

I won't go into the complaints.  All I will say is that if you ever go to this hotel, be sure to request a room that has never been a smoking room.  The hotel is now a non-smoking hotel, but our room was once a smoking room and the scent of stale cigarette was still way too strong.  Very disappointing.  And be sure to watch your small kids closely as the railings on the balcony are far more than 4" apart.  And bring a power strip if you have more than one cell phone/device, etc that you want to plug in.  If you want to plug in more than one thing you will have to unplug a lamp or alarm clock or phone or refrigerator.  On a positive note, the waffles at breakfast were delicious and the staff were very friendly. 

So a few days after we booked our hotel I realized that Emily would be moving her kids from Arkansas to New York and they'd be leaving the same day were were going to be arriving in Gatlinburg.  Tisha was going to be with her, so I thought it would be great fun if they stayed in Gatlinburg on Monday night and we could hang out and visit.  They stayed at the Brookside Hotel and Monday evening we went and swam at their hotel for awhile.  Then we went to their room to celebrate Emily's birthday a day early.  We had Nate's chocolate chip cookies (YUM!) and an Oreo cheesecake I made since Dan said Emily would like that.  We had a nice visit and by the time we got back to our room around 9:00 Rylee was ready to pass out.  I had been concerned about her sleeping in our room, since she sleeps so well by herself, but she was so tired she passed out in less than 5 minutes after I put her in the pack n play, so that worked out great.  Corben slept on the other bed in the "box" that Dad made or Rylee last year.  That also worked out great.  They both slept wonderfully Monday night.  

Their hotel had a pool with slides, but wasn't heated and was very cold! 

Can you tell I'm cold?

This was Rylee's first time being in water deeper than she was and she did pretty good.

Still cold

The hot tub was nice and warm. : )

Yeaaahhh...not very flattering, but it was fun! : )

Runny make up.  Oh, well.  Rylee is cute!

Tisha was the one taking all the pictures and I guess someone finally took a picture of her after she got wet.

Corben was most excited about all of it.  Tisha did eventually get him out and tote him around for me.  Thanks, Tish!

That night in our hotel room:

Tuesday morning after breakfast we headed over to Emily's hotel to swim a little more before they had to check out.  Then they parked at our hotel and we all waked to No Way Jose's for lunch. 

Hanging out at the hotel before walking to lunch...

So we have a tradition that anytime three sisters get together we take a picture holding up a cell phone that represents the fourth sister on the phone and there with us.  I wish I had all of these pictures in the same folder somewhere.  We have at least one picture of each of us missing.  We missed you, Sara! : )

*side note...you can tell just by looking at this picture that the rails are more than 4" apart*

At No Way Jose's we told them it was Emily's birthday and asked if they had anything for people who celebrate a birthday.  They did a rousing song, but that was it.  No free dessert or anything.  This picture was taken before Emily found out that dessert was not included. lol  After lunch they headed on to the next leg of their trip.

Other pictures from our meal...

Tisha kept commenting about how fun the candid shots were...she's right. lol

Corben was nice enough to sleep through most of the meal.

On the walk back to the hotel...

After Emily's crew left we went back to the hotel room where Jonathan said that we should let Rylee have a nap.  It took her over an hour to fall asleep and I wish we had just kept her up because I had a sneaky suspicion that if she took a nap she would not go to sleep easily that night.  She had a good nap and after her nap we ate supper in the hotel room and then went swimming in the hotel pool.  It was heated and indoor which was great since we didn't have to worry about putting sunblock on the kids.  And it wasn't crowded at at all. We were there for probably a couple hours and had fun.  Then we took the kids back to the room, gave them baths, and proceeded to lay in the dark for 1 1/2 hours waiting for Rylee to fall asleep.  And we fell asleep instead and woke up at midnight and then were up for a couple hours.  Oh, well.

At the pool...

Corben's first time in a pool.  Since he loves baths and this water was pretty warm, I wasn't surprised that he enjoyed it.

Corben eventually fell asleep and since this isn't very safe we had to turn him over which woke him up.

But he soon fell asleep again.  

Wednesday we had breakfast, hung out in the hotel until lunch time and then went to the Wild Bear Falls Waterpark.   This is an indoor water park at the Westgate Resort.  I have not seen it advertised anywhere, but it is open to the public.  We accidentally found out about it when we were looking at hotels and the Westgate Resort came up and said it included 2 free tickets to the waterpark.  We didn't stay there, but since it is open to the public, so we decided to go.  We had been thinking about going to Ripley's Aquarium, but it was really expensive, and we just didn't know how much Rylee would like it.  The waterpark was cheaper than the aquarium and we figured more fun.  I LOVED that it was indoor so we didn't have to worry about putting sunblock on the kids.  (Are you noticing a theme here?  Unfortunately I didn't get a lick of sun and am white as a ghost in August.  This is very depressing to me, but we won't go there right now).  Rylee enjoyed it, but kids a little older would like it a lot more.  There was a lazy river and I had thought I could just float around with Rylee and Corben while Jonathan did a couple tube rides, but there were too many surprise water dumps to be relaxing.  Poor Corben got dumped on twice in a row one round.  He was not a happy camper, but got over it pretty quick once we went to the warmer kiddie area.  I loved the tube slide and the line was non-existent.  So Jonathan and I each got to go down 5 times which is pretty good considering we had two kids under 2, I thought.  Anyway, we stayed until they closed at 5:00 and had a fun day.  After supper we bathed the kids and put them to bed.  We wore Rylee out pretty good and since she didn't get an afternoon nap she was out in less than 5 minutes again.  Hallelujah.  And Corben went down fine, too.

I didn't get many pictures from the water park, but here's what I did get.

Despite how it looks Rylee is not sleeping

Corben, however, had a good nap.

When we got back from the water park...Rylee being silly

Oh, after the pool I forgot that we walked around town for almost 2 hours.  Corben's legs don't open up quite enough for him to be comfortable in the pognae, so it's easier to carry Rylee in it and push Corben in the stroller.  You can just tell that Rylee is fading fast.

Zonked out that night...

Rylee loved riding on the luggage cart!

So it was a short trip, but we had  good time.  : )  

On the way back we went over the Blue Ridge Parkway for a little bit so that Jonathan could see the pretty view.  It worked out well, too, because it was time for Corben and Rylee to eat when we stopped at a look out.

So totally random add on...this is the only picture I could locate of our traditional sister pictures.  I think it was also the first picture we took of this kind...this was when Emily, Sara, and I went to Italy/Spain together.  That seems so long ago.