Memorial Day trip

This yr for our long 3day weekend over Memorial Day, we decided to take a trip to Chattanooga, TN. It's only a little over an hr away so why not?!?! I mentioned to my friend Meredith that we were going and it turns out her husband was wanting to run a marathon there at the same time so it worked out that we were able to meet up so our families could spend time together. Our hotel rooms were right next door to each other which made it convienant for the kids to go back and forth and to make plans. We had to take advantage of the hotel pool of course. We also got to go to Ruby Falls (http://rubyfalls.com/) and spend a few hrs there.. beautiful place! The Mortimers were also nice enough to take our kids out for a few hrs to Chuck-e-Cheese so Jon and I got a bit of quiet time. The only dissapointing thing we did was take the Incline Train (http://ridetheincline.com/) up lookout mtn. It was very expensive-- the kids enjoyed it but we could have easily saved the money and drove up the mtns ourselves. But at least we can say we did it:) And the view was breathtaking.. not $42 breathtaking but still.. beautiful! Next time we go, we'll have to check out Rock City.

Fresh faced and ready to go into the caves

Checking out the rocks before we start the tour


Reese, Rielly, Noah and Katy ready to go!



Awwwwww!!


Wow.... creation is such a beautiful thing!

Happy to be several hundred feet below the ground!

Beautiful!!!

Leave it to me to take a picture of a donkey butt!

There is so much beauty that we don't even realize!

This waterfall is millions of yrs old... I was playing with my flash on this one

The Mortimer family at Ruby Falls (look how tan Meredith.. good grief!)

Our family at the falls.. (me- not so tan)

View from the castle tower at Ruby Falls
Yeah- it had been a long day!!

But the kids slept good!!!

Well.. it kept the boys entertained!

She said this was an ice cream cone....
Pool time!!! This pool was weird.. it went from 5ft right to 12ft! No in between!

She was so floatied up that there was no way she would sink.. but she STILL wouldn't leave the side of the pool!

The kids enjoying some cardboard... I mean PIZZA at Chuck-e-cheese

I sure have a thing with taking these types of pics don't I?

Before we could take the train, the kids wanted to be part of the little group playing at the station. They're not shy at all. Rielly just walked up and asked if she could play an instrument!

Before going up the mtn! The kids did great.. me not so much. I hate heights and this went STRAIGHT up and STRAIGHT down! I had to check with several people to make sure the train never came off the rails.

This is the view from the top of the mtn we just went up. That line is the track we actually had to take to get down.