Gatlinburg

Wednesday morning we packed up the RV and hit the road at 7am(ok, it turned out to be 7:11am - which by the way is pretty good for the number of people on board!) for Gatlinbug, TN.  My mom and dad, my sister Jenn, her husband Derek, 3 year old daughter Taylor, my other sister Lindsay, her husband Chris, their 5 year old son Cole, Kordell, me and Landon (yes, 11 people) on a 22 ft RV for 9 hours which turned into 13 hours thanks to the stopped traffic on the way.  Before we even left my parents, we had our first injury of the trip.  Landon had his first "rolling" accident and landed on Uncle Chris's sandal and had a mark on his head the whole vacation. 

Poor little guy.

I have quickly learned that I am not an RV fan.  Maybe if I sat in the front seat and didn't have to move at all, but that was not the case.  I guess I should be happy the thing had a bathroom in it so I didn't have to dehydrate myself along the way so we didn't have to stop every 10 minutes, but that bathroom is dangerous.  Every time I came out, I was holding a different part of my arm or leg that I had just banged up from falling over.  Not only was I trying to focus on not falling over but being the professional RV'ers that we are, we didn't turn on some vent thing in the bathroom, so each time I went in there I had to try and hold my breath the whole time so I didn't smell the horrendous stench.  By the time we got to Gatlinburg, the whole RV smelled like a porta potty after Woodstock (ok, not that bad, but bad) .  It doesn't make it easy trying not to move around with a baby either.  Making bottles, feeding him, changing him, etc. all while trying to not to fall down is quiet difficult.  We packed a folding chair to sit in on the RV too to spread out and since I was completely car sick, I decided to give that seat a shot.  Worked really well until my dad made a turn and I fell out of the chair.  I really cherish solid ground.  The good news is the bruises all over my body are a beautiful shade of yellow now.

I got assigned to sit at the "kitchen table" with Taylor, Cole and Landon.  The day we were traveling to TN was also Lindsay's birthday, so Cole decided every 4 minutes we would sing her happy birthday.. I chimed in the first 16 times.  I picked up a new song from Taylor on the way "D-E-S...D-E-S" not sure what this means, but she sang it the whole way.  In fact, I believe she even sang it on the way home too.  Surprisingly, the kids were all really well behaved on the way there.. the way back?  "Are we home yet?" seemed to be a common theme.  Taylor wanted to know if we were in Arizona yet, NO, thank goodness!  We did let Landon out of his seat for a little bit (sorry officer) but the air in there did not work very well for us folks in the back and Landon's seat was facing the opposite direction so he had no air at all.  Poor little guy was in his diaper for most of the time and still dripping sweat.

All 11 of us stayed in a huge cabin in the woods in Gatlinburg that my grandparents rented for us; so there were 13 total.  The cabin had such an awesome view!  One morning we woke up and there were bear paw prints out on the porch.  Yikes!  Thank goodness we were sleeping!  Each family had their own bedroom with their own bathrooms connected; the Schrock's got the Elvis Room.  I am not sure which one I liked better, the "Elvis Fan Parking Only" sign in the bathroom or the old records used as a boarder around the room.  The roads to get up to the cabin were so steep that we actually bottomed out on the way in.  As Taylor calls him, "Grandpa Bert" was not a very happy camper.  There was no walking from our cabin to anywhere, not even to the mail box (if there was one).  Since the RV was non-movable once we got there, we rented a Jeep Patriot and then had my grandparents car to get from here to there while in the 'Burg.  The one and only thing my grandma wanted to do was take her great-grandchildren to the Ripley's Aquarium.  So the first day we were there, 10 of us packed in two cars and made our way downtown.  (For some reason, I was always the one who had to ride in the way back of the Patriot, laying down.  Not fair!)  Even though Landon had no idea what anything was, he sure did love all of the colors!

We didn't do a whole lot of touristy things while we were there.  One day we spent walking around downtown Gatlinburg.  Apparently there is some sort of black market for ponchos there.  It started pouring while we were walking around so we stopped in a shop for a poncho and he told us they were 4 bucks but the store down the way was only 1.99 (why would you tell a customer that?!) anyways.. as we were leaving to go buy the cheaper ones, he calls us over.  As he looks around to make sure no one is looking, he said, don't tell anyone but I'll sell you them for 1.99 and proceeded to pull out a stash of them from under a rack.  What in the world?  It's a poncho sir, they are legal!  Regardless, we had fun walking in and out of the shops with our sticky, hot ponchos.  Speaking of hot.  Ask my sister about the dip she sampled at one of the stores.  She failed to read the "Warning, extremely hot, do not feed to children. HOT" sign. No she didn't feed it to her son, but she sure did take a hunk of it for herself.  Oops.  Speaking of my sister, we went ahead and told all of the restaurants it was her birthday, that's always fun.

We did some wine tasting in the 'Burg too.  These people are puuuushers!  Sure they can only serve you wine in a 1 oz cup but they don't care if you want 684 1 oz cups.  In fact,  they get rather upset when you say you are done.  I like them!  We made friends with one of the guys, we went back the next day with our husbands and introduced them and he had no idea who we were.  We don't remember you either McKinley.  Now speaking of fun, let me tell you about a game we liked to play.  "We are all sisters... who is the oldest, middle and youngest?"  99% of the time they could tell I was the youngest, one guy claimed I was the oldest, strange!  There was usually a toss up between the oldest and middle spot.  I won't be mean and say what these guys were saying about why we look the age we do.  They were mean; which is how I came across my dream job.  A  restaurant called Dick's.  You get paid to purposely be mean to people!  My kind of gig! 

Just kidding (kinda).

You can't go to Tennessee without go-karting!  (Especially when your husband thinks he is a professional)  Even my grandma went racing.  I actually passed Jenn and Taylor, she may say she was driving slow cause Taylor was in there, but I don't care, I still passed her!!

We headed home on Sunday and left at 5:30 in the morning.  Glad we did because we didn't get home until 6pm and when you have to work the next day that makes for a long day!  The way home actually went rather quick.  I read an entire book on the way home which I highly recommend (Heaven is for Real).  I typically don't like those type of books but it was there and I was bored.  It sure is a crazy little book!  I wasn't as sick on the way home as the way going, just stressed, tired and ready to unpack.  I hate living out of bags!  Not that the beds in the cabin were uncomfortable, but there is something about my bed.  Actually something about my house, my bed, my laundry, my car, my dishes, my towels, my hair dryer, my tv, my couch, you get the point.  I never would have thought Landon knew the difference from house to house but the second I laid him on the ground and his hand hit his little toy "HI, I'm Alphabet Pal!" he started shaking and smiling from excitement.  It made me cry a little.. (ok so I am emotional).  I left the room and came back and he had managed to straddle that toy and was licking its face. 

Ahh.. Home sweet home!

 

Most of my vacations have a song that always "takes me back" but I honestly didn't listen to any music while I was there so instead of posting Happy Birthday, I'll just pick a country song.. Why no my husbands girlfriend because well.. she's pretty.