Spring Break Trip to Gatlinburg

 Day 1 and 2

I have A LOT of pictures (mostly of Cades Cove and the national park) so I am going to break this post down into days. 

We knew that we wanted to take a family trip for Spring Break and we decided on the Mountains. Of course the week before we were to leave, sickness strikes our house and we had everything on hold to see what would happen. We also found out a few days before leaving that Gatlinburg was expecting at least 4 inches of snow. YIKES! So I packed accordingly and we went on with our plans. A vacation in the snow might be fun but would definitely be adventurous!

Poor Rascal was sick on his birthday (3 days before we planned to leave) and didn't start feeling better until Sunday March 24th.  I stayed home with him from church that day and when we saw that he was rapidly getting better we decided to load up the van and head half way to the mountains and spend the night then go the rest of the way on Monday. This way he wouldn't have to spend a good 7 hours in the car at one time. 

And we were off for Nashville:

 

  This girl was VERY excited to watch movies in the van. A first for her:

We took sweet Lucy with us and she was a little confused when we got to the hotel in Nashville.

 She would not stop sniffing and that night she growled in her crate at every little sound.

Monday we woke up and Rascal was feeling SO MUCH better and had the appetite to prove it! It was starting to spit snow so we decided to get on the road early and hurry up and get to Gatlinburg. 

It got a little nerve racking when we hit Crossville and the snow was coming down good.

We ended up driving and getting ahead of it.  Our plan was to stop at the Bass Pro in Kodak TN and do some shopping. Plus Bass Pros are pet friendly so Lucy could shop with us.

We walked into the entrance of Bass Pro and I was holding Baby A. I looked at her and she wasn't quite looking right, all of a sudden she gags as if she is going to throw up. I RUSH her to the restrooms and she never got sick but her fever was HIGH. So we turned right around and left Bass Pro. We called and were able to get an early check in to our cabin. 

The plan was to hang out at the cabin that night and let Baby A rest and watch it snow.

She LOVED watching us play pool.

Scooter and Rascal wasted NO time and headed to the hot tub. They didn't care that it was steadily snowing (the hot tub was under a gazebo). 

 Baby A tried to lay down but it was all too exciting for her. 

Poor Lucy, she isn't always a fan of Baby A's rough play.

Baby A was so bummed that she couldn't get into the hot tub with the boys. With her fever nearing 104 we knew better than to put her in hot hot water. So we told her she could swim in the indoor hot tub (aka: jetted bath tub). This way I could make the water cooler and kill two birds with one stone. 1)Let her have fun and 2)work to get that temp down. 

She LOVES her new swimsuit from Uncle Michael and Aunt Peggy.

And of course what's a bath without BUBBLES! 

 You can't tell she is sick can you?

 I went outside to check on the boys and saw that hey talked Tim into getting in with them. They thought it was fun to see who could stay up out of the water the longest. Rascal would win every time!

 We got Baby A's temp down and she was up running around so we took that opportunity to head to a local grocery store and get some staples just in case we were snowed in the next day. 

We made hamburgers at the cabin for dinner and then started a fire in the fireplace. 

This sweet girl was feeling bad again by bedtime. I hated that she was sick but I loved rocking her to sleep. She let me do this 2 of the 3 nights we were there.

We all got tucked into bed and we were eager to see what the snow would do that night and what sight we would see in the morning.