Recapping Day 1

Thinking way back to the beginning of our Tennessee trip...

The drive down was uneventful. Babies were quiet enough to allow Steph to listen to her first Neal Morse album completely uninterrupted, which is a rare feat. I think she's on board with me now, as far as can be expected. Sometime in the future I hope to expand this blog to include music reviews and opinions...so we'll save details for another time.

Tennessee seems to have closed all their rest stops along I-75 for some reason - made for several annoyances along the way. Usual traffic coming into Pigeon Forge, but arrived at the KOA with no trouble, got checked in, unhooked, etc. Much to NOBODY'S surprise, dad backed off of his hard stance that we would grill out the first night there...instead we made our pilgrimage to Corky's for some great BBQ.

The whole vacation we alternated the girls sleeping with us in the cabin with them sleeping in the RV. Which meant that on the nights we had them, we had to entertain them until the babies went to sleep, in a single room cabin with barely room to stand. It wasn't horrible, but it made for a long couple of hours when it was 'our' night. Mari at least now will pretty consistently go to sleep when the lights go out. And luckily we only had to take Faith to the potty once during the night the whole trip.

First morning, breakfast in the RV, and then we had a little complication. Steph had an unavoidable phone commitment in the middle of the morning, so she stayed with mom and the babies while dad and I took the big girls to go tubing. We weren't sure how it was going to work out...this was the only tubing operation that said 2-yr olds could ride. We assumed that the big girls would float in the same tube with us...but they more or less insisted that they ride in their own tubes. They got special tubes with a bottom on them, and then tethered them to dad and me. I got Tooks, dad got Faith. And off we went.

It went pretty well...stressful at first, since Tooks is so wild...and I stressed her out for sure, because I had to use angry voice to make sure she understood not to climb out. But after a while, we got the hang of it. Got hung up on the rocks several times, and yes, I was glad Tooks was in her own tube...it allowed me to get up out of my tube, dislodge myself, and jump back in...which I could never have done if I had to hold Tooks the whole time. We ended up way seperated from Faith and Z, they didn't get stuck nearly as much. But at one point, a whole bunch of ducks came out and swam right alongside us...which Tooks loved.

I think they were more excited about riding on the 'school bus' back to the car after the river than the river ride itself. All in all, I think everyone had a good time. On the way back, we stopped to buy some produce at a roadside stand (always do this wherever you are - it's good stuff and supports the local growers) which is also where I snapped the "Fried Oreo" picture. Didn't try one, though...maybe next time. Obviiusly I didn't bring the big time digital cameras and camcorders along...but the pics from the disposable waterproof camera will be ready on Monday, so I'll post some then.

Didn't do much else the rest of the day...Steph and I ran over to the Visitor's Center to get maps for the following day's journey through the National Park (not that it helped much...more on that later). Well, gotta run, babies are waking up. BTW - put them in their Bumbos for the first time. Hannah's great in it...Robby still has a little head control problem.

More about the next day soon.

Matt