The Smoky Mountains

So this was kind of a last minute trip, but I'm so glad we did it! It all started a week ago Sunday. We were having dinner at the Burnett's house, trying to come up with a fun idea for Memorial Day weekend. The Smoky Mountains were on our list of places to go before we leave this side of the country, and we had heard good things about Gatlinburg from friends who had been there. So within a few hours we found a great last minute deal on a luxury cabin, called a few friends (the Wrights, Bowcutts, & Despains), and began to plan our fabulous weekend getaway to The Smoky Mountains!

Kristie and I thought we had a great plan to drive down earlier on Friday with the 4 kids before the guys got off work so we could check in, unload, get the kids to bed, and get settled before it got dark. We left at 1:00 pm with directions that said it should take us 6 1/2 hours to get there. Well, I guess we kind of underestimated how long traveling with kids actually takes . . . . and we hit a few rough patches of traffic . . . . and we took an hour to eat dinner at Wendy's . . . . and we had a few bathroom stops . . . . and we may have accidentally taken a wrong turn that added on another 45 minutes of driving. So we weren't surprised to hear that the Bowcutts, who left 2 hours after us, beat us to the check-in office. But oh, how happy we were to see the Bowcutts! Kevin saved me from driving my car into a ditch and provided added security as we drove through the dark and windy roads up the mountain to our secluded cabin. Seriously, if it had just been Kristie and I trying to find the cabin, I'm not sure we would have made it. The kids, already on edge from our adventures while we were lost, nervously kept asking if we were going the right way as we were driving up and down the STEEP forested roads to the cabin. We finally got there all safe and sound. Dan, Trever, Rocky and Joni pulled up 1 1/2 hrs later. They had left 4 1/2 hrs after us.

Anyway, here are some pictures of our cabin. It was called the AAAH-Some Lodge and we all agreed, it truly was AAAH-Some! It had 4 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, a great room, full kitchen, washer and dryer, game room with pool table, hot tub out back, great decks, and it was right on a gorgeous river. It was perfect.

Our cabin was about 15 minutes from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. So Saturday morning we packed up lunches, loaded everyone into 2 cars, and went out to explore. We first hiked to Laurel Falls. It was a fun little hike, perfect for chatting along the way. The falls were beautiful and Annie had so much fun jumping from rock to rock in the stream.




Next we drove to Clingmans Dome, the highest point in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. We parked our cars, looked around, and then noticed all the people walking up an extremely steep path. The half-mile path led to the observation tower on the summit of Clingmans Dome. We pushed the strollers up (again, thank you Kevin for pushing Leah! Dan was holding Annie) and got our calf work out for the day. The tower offers spectacular 360° views of the Smokies. We weren't prepared for the cold temps up there, or the crowds of people, but it was worth it. These pics don't do it justice.

Here's the whole group on the tower (except for 3 year old Cohen. I think he might have been in the stroller.)

We had worked up quite an appetite by the time we got back to the cabin. The Burnetts and us were in charge of Saturday dinner and we had decided to BBQ. The weather couldn't have been more perfect for a BBQ on the back deck. The burgers were delicious, the sound of the river was below us . . . . so fun.

After dinner we went to Pigeon Forge - a town about 1/2 hr away. This place is crazy! There's a huge touristy 5 -mile strip that goes through the town that has more mini-golf and go-cart places than I've ever seen in my life! So it seemed only fitting that we ride some go-carts. We rode the Wild Woody - a wooden, triple decker track. Then we let the kids ride a few kiddie amusement rides. They loved it.

We went back to the cabin, put the kids to bed and had fun talking and telling stories about embarassing moments and how each couple met. Thanks for the fun stories you guys, especially yours, Ally . . . . I thnk we were all in tears! Around midnight we decided to go for a late night dip in the hot tub. But first the guys had to prove their manhood (or something like that, there has to be a reason for the things they do, right?). So as the wives watched from the heated hot tub, they went down to the roaring river to submerse themselves in the frigid cold waters. They ran back up the trail and we crammed 10 people into the 8 person hot tub. The perfect ending to an awesome day.
Sunday was a little more relaxing. We slept in, got ready, ate breakfast, and went to church (an interesting experience in rural Tennessee). The afternoon was spent having a spaghetti dinner, playing games, taking naps, going for walks around the cabin and down to the river, and even a little fishing.

Dan took his camera out for a while and had fun getting some cool shots.

We started the night out with a game the Burnetts taught us. It's a wild and crazy pool game, much like Fandango Pool that Dan's family plays, but with a twist on it - there are 2 teams, and you can play defense on each other. You can block, shove, box out, and occasionally knock people to the ground:) It was really fun.Meanwhile, Annie, Leah, and Cohen were upstairs watching a movie. We had gotten them ready for bed, gave them their blankets, got them all cozy on the couch, gave them a few snacks, and turned on Bolt. I thought everything would be fine. Then all of a sudden, we heard the most awful scream, followed by crying, and Dan, Trever, Kristie, and I sprinted upstairs to find a hurt little Annie. Somehow a drinking glass had broken, and Annie went to pick it up, probably trying to clean it up for the little kids before the parents would see it. Poor thing. She was cut pretty bad. Good thing Trever (a med resident) was there to help us out. He took care of her while Dan and I tried to find the closest medical center to take her to. Unfortunately that was 45 min. away in Sevierville, TN. We left the cabin at 10:00 pm, not really knowing how long of a night we were in for. I won't go into detail about how crowded the ER was, or how frustrated we were that there was only 1 doctor on staff that night, or how everyone there (besides the doctor and nurse, thank goodness) was the biggest redneck we've ever seen. But Annie's finger was taken care of (she needed 4 stitches - our first experience with stitches), and I was so grateful that it wasn't anything worse. We finally got back to the cabin at 5:30 a.m. Thank you to all our friends for helping us out that night, for taking care of Annie, helping us call places, setting up the GPS for us, putting Leah to bed, etc. - you guys are the best. Here's a little timeline of how the night went down:

The four of us (even Leah) slept in until 10:15 the next morning (Monday). We got up, got ready, packed up, and checked out by 11:15. Then all the families split up and went there different ways, some already headed home. The Wrights were driving home with us, and before we headed out we decided to explore the town of Gatlinburg. This was such a fun little touristy town, with lots of things to do. But we only had a few hours, so we just walked around a bit, ate our lunch in The Village, went into some shops, saw some famous cars (including Herbie), and of course took some pictures.

The town of Gatlinburg has got to be the capital of Old Time Portraits - we probably saw 20 shops within a mile walk. We all talked about doing one, but Trever and Kristie were the only ones gutsy enough to really do it!

Well, it was a great Memorial Day weekend. Besides our little midnight escapade to the hospital, everything went smoothly and we all had a blast. It was fun to see the Smoky Mountains and to explore that beautiful part of the country. Besides, sometimes it "feels good to mingle with the laid back country folk, don't it hair?" Thanks to all our friends for making it such a fun weekend! It's always so fun to just hang out and get to know everyone better. Til next time!

Wicked!

Tuesday night we saw Wicked in New York. The Ward's, another resident family in Dan's program who also went to Boston for the conference and joined us in NY, watched the girls for us. We had watched their 3 girls the night before while they saw Phantom. Their hotel room was just a few doors down from ours, so it all worked out really well.

Anyway, we LOVED Wicked! It was our first time seeing it, and we were so excited! I had a lot of friends who were excited for us and talked the show up before we went, and it still exceeded my expectations. It's definitely my new favorite. I loved the music, the story, the characters, and everything was so cleverly written.

What made our first Wicked experience even MORE fun was that we know Nicole Parker, the girl who plays Elphaba. She is Dan's cousin's girlfriend and we first met her a year and a half ago at Thanksgiving in Las Vegas. She was a regular on MadTV at the time and would do all her impersonations for us. She was hilarious and very talented, but we had no idea she could sing! And wow, can she sing! She was AMAZING!!! So fun to watch someone you know, plus she hooked us up with some SWEET seats!

After the show, Dan's cousin, Seth, met up with us and took us backstage to say hi to Nicole. So fun to see her dressing room and to tell her how awesome she was!

We also met a few other cast members including Alli Mauzey, who plays Glinda. I was shocked at how heavy her costumes were! I loved Glinda's character in the show. So funny.

Then Seth took us on a tour of the stage, showing us all the props and how things work. He told us some interesting things about the show, like how there were 3 things they weren't allowed to use in the show for copyright reasons: the name Todo (which is why Glinda calls him Dodo in the show), the red ruby slippers (so they just made them silver and shined a red light on them to make them appear red), and Elphaba's hat couldn't be black (so it's dark blue. But noone can tell.) Funny, huh?

Thanks so much Seth and Nicole! It was awesome.

After the show, Dan and I walked to Times Square and took in the New York City night life. This place is seriously the city that never sleeps! A movie crew was starting to set things up to film a chase scene for an upcoming Nicolas Cage movie. We could have seriously stayed up all night watching them film, but we knew we had to get back to the girls. We were sure Stephanie Ward didn't want to spend all night in our hotel room:) So we grabbed a few slices of pizza and a piece of cheesecake and walked back to our hotel. It was such a fun night out on the town with Dan. What a perfect ending to our trip!

New York

Monday morning we drove into New York after spending the night in Southington, Connecticut with our friends, the Jensen's, from dental school. Dan had been to New York a couple times, but it was my first time, and I was so excited! As luck would have it, it rained most the time we were there, but we still made the most of it and had a fun two days. We stayed at the Park Central Hotel, only a couple of blocks from Central Park. It was beautiful, and just like I had pictured it.

It was so fun to experience the hustle and bustle of New York City! What a crazy and unique place. It definitely wasn't the most stroller friendly city . . . . stairs into almost every store and restaurant and also getting down to the subway. But when I think of it, I don't think I saw too many other strollers, or kids for that matter.

We did find some kid friendly activities to do with the girls. And what's more kid friendly than FAO Schwarz? The girls loved it! And so did we. And no stairs going into this store.

The American Girl Doll Store. I think I was just as excited about this as Annie. Maybe more!

Rockefeller Center

St. Patrick's Cathedral

Natural History Museum

The rainy weather kept us from doing a few things we would have liked to do (like going to the top of the Empire State Building and taking a ferry boat over to the Statue of Liberty) but hey, all the more reason to come back sometime, right? The highlight of our New York trip was seeing Wicked, which will be our next post . . . . stay tuned!

Newport, Rhode Island

Ok, so continuing with our trip . . . . after touring the USS Constitution on Sunday afternoon, we drove an hour and a half down to Newport, Rhode Island. A friend had recommended going down there to see the Newport Mansions, and I'm so glad we took her advice. We loved Newport!! It had a great little downtown shopping district with quaint shops, lots of restaurants, and docks along the pier. The perfect New England town. It was raining the few hours we were there (bummer!), so we only walked around a little bit before finding a place to eat dinner. After dinner, we drove down Bellevue Avenue to see the Newport Mansions. So awesome. This is where many of America's most wealthiest families built lavish mansions in the late 1800's. We were there too late to take any of the tours, but we had fun driving around and admiring these amazing "summer cottages." The one is this picture is called "The Breakers" built by Cornelius Vanderbilt II. A little tidbit of info: It took 2,500 workers 2 years to build The Breakers at an estimated present day cost of $400 million. Someday we'll go back and take the tour.

The cliff walk right in front of the mansions:

Boston

Friday morning we drove another 6 hours to Boston. Dan had an AAO conference in Boston over the weekend which was the reason for this trip in the first place. We arrived in the afternoon, unloaded everything at our hotel, which was actually in Cambridge, and then spent the remainder of the day walking around Harvard campus and Harvard Square. It was fun to see Harvard. I loved all the brick buildings and the meticulously manicured lawns. It started to rain a little while we were walking around campus, so we thought it would be fun to take a few umbrella shots, not knowing we would be taking MANY umbrella shots throughout the remainder of our trip:) Harvard Square was also fun, filled with students, visitors, and tons of personality. We visited some of the shops and ate dinner at Bartley's Burgers, a popular burger joint right by campus.

Dan went to his conference on Saturday morning, so the girls and I went shopping at a mall that was connected to our hotel . . . . handy, indeed! Then that afternoon we walked The Freedom Trail. The Freedom Trail is a 2.5 mile red-brick walking trail through the middle of the city that leads you to 16 nationally significant historic sites that have to do with the American Revolution. It began in The Boston Common and took us to churches, meeting houses, graveyards, a book store, the State House, the site of the Boston Massacre, Paul Revere's house, and more. We didn't have enough time to go into each one and take the tours, etc., which I would have liked to do, but that would have also been kind of hard with the girls. So we just kind of cruised along and saw and took in as much as we could. Boston is such a cool city, so rich in history. Truly a place where the old meets the new.

If you look at the ground by our feet you can see the brick trail that you follow through the city. The girls had fun making sure we stayed on course. That tavern was the very first tavern in America, in case you're wondering why we took a picture in front of it.

The Freedom Trail took us straight into The Boston Market. If we had turned left, we could have gone right around it, but there were so many people and we couldn't really see which way to go, so of course we went the wrong way . . . . and ended up right in the heart of it. It was kind of fun actually. This picture doesn't do it any justice. We walked for at least 10 minutes with nothing but fresh produce to look at - and the cheapest fresh produce I've ever seen! It was wall to wall people down the 2 foot wide walkway. I still don't know how Dan managed to get our double stroller through there! He said he nicked quite a few heels.
Just a cute picture of the girls. The Paul Revere house is to the side of this picture. It's in the heart of the Italian District, possibly my favorite part of the whole city.
We saved one of the last stops of the Freedom Trail, the USS Constitution, for Sunday after Dan got back from a morning at his conference again, because we wanted to do the tour. This ship is the oldest commissioned warship afloat in the world. She was launched in 1797 and her most famous battle took place during the War of 1812, earning her the nickname, "Old Ironsides." She's actually under a bit of construction right now . . . . the navy is getting her ready to sail in 2012, the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812.

We loved seeing Boston, and there was still so much that we didn't get to see! So much to see, so little time. Seems like that is the case everywhere we go.