Kaitlynn doing some rock navigation
A beautiful sight
Ryan stretching his abilities
My favorite part of a Gatlinburg trip...the mountains.
Ryan trying not to slip on the wet rock
Evan was a little pro at navigating the rocks
Havin' fun with Papa
Mom enjoys reading one of her "outlet" book finds
Ryan and Papa at The Track
Evan and Olivia enjoy breakfast at Shoney's
Greg discusses something with the rest of the crew...looks pretty important!
One of my favorite nature shots
Mom and I resting after walking Gatlinburg at night
Olivia...very, very tired!
Ryan and Evan with someone a little taller than their dad!
Greg and Evan at The Track
Uncle Eric and Ryan enjoy the pool
Kaitlynn found a little friend at the pool
Two happy gals
Takin' a break in Gatlinburg
Kaitlynn telling her mama about her lack of golf skill. Mama said, "Kaitlynn, you're good at shopping and eating out!" She was happy with that!
Ryan doing the unthinkable after visiting the Comedy Barn...he'd kill me for posting this!
Wild girl trying to putt putt. She wouldn't take any advice.
Unlike her brothers, she wasn't gifted with the greatest golf stance!
The part of the Black Bear Jamboree that we enjoyed!
These pics of Olivia's birthday are in reverse order...
All done and ready for bed!
Cake everywhere...even the diaper!
Yum Yum Yum!
What a cute little 1!It seems like forever since I've posted, so I'll give a short update:
1. Ryan's lymph swelling finally went down with the antibiotic. Thank the Lord! I am a "glass half empty" kind of person, I guess (at least that is what my dear husband says!), and always tend to fear the worst instead of hoping for the best. During the last couple of days he took the medicine, his sinuses kind of cut loose, so to speak, and seemed to take care of it.
2. Another Yount baby has appeared! Congratulations to Devin and Jennifer (Yount) Driggers on the birth of Whitney Faye last Friday. She joins her brothers Logan (2) and Landon (1). I am awaiting pictures!
3. Vacation Bible School was a good success at our church. The directors attend our church, and always do a fantastic job. Their theme was "The Armor of God" and my kids (2 weeks later) are still putting on their armor, as well as singing songs such as "Onward Christian Soldiers" in very embarrassing places such as restaurants and stores.
4. We just finished vacation! Tuesday evening we made our way to Pigeon Forge, TN to spend a few days relaxing. My parents came down separately, and we spent Wednesday kind of doing our own things. Greg and I took the kids to The Track for a couple hours of rides, etc. I purchased a discount pack online before the trip because those things can be incredibly expensive! Even with the discounts I was grimacing the whole time! We wanted to do something different this time. Ripley's Aquarium and The Dixie Stampede are awesome, but we have visited each of them a couple of times in the last couple of years. Having heard rave reviews about the Black Bear Jamboree, we decided to give it a try. We were told it was even more child-oriented than the Dixie Stampede, and having seen a video of the show previously, we figured the kids would really like it. Our table ended up being on stage level...not a good thing we would find out! There happened to be an "all new show" for 2007, and we were so disappointed! The pre-show was great, and they still used the bear puppets, although very minimally, but everything else was loud, driving music with lots of immodesty and dance. We're not talking square dancing. I felt like I was in a night club. Within the first few minutes one of my boys had his head down with a very disturbed expression on his face. I felt terrible, like I had violated his innocence! I asked the kids if they wanted to leave, and they all did. I wasn't even worried about the money...I just wanted out of there and when the lights went out, we left. I found out that another large family had gone there a couple of weeks before, and the mother was in tears because she had subjected her family to that kind of trash. So, this is my advice...spend your money elsewhere! I did talk to the management in a very kind way before I left. If they receive enough negative response, maybe they will have an "all new show" for 2008! Other fun things we did were The Comedy Barn (with my mom's brother John Yount and several of his kids and grandkids who also happened to be vacationing), lots of shopping at unique places, a few hours in a mountain stream (that was the most fun) with mommy as the all-time "bear-watcher," and spending Friday evening and Saturday morning at Eric and Meg's place. We celebrated Olivia's 1st birthday which is at the end of the month. She is walking all over the place now, and getting plenty of bumps and bruises! It was a good time, but I am glad to be home...safely. It was over 100 degrees almost every day, and the humidity was terrible. I acquired some kind of allergy or sinus cold while down there, and am taking everything I can without much relief.
4. After arriving home from vacation, I received my grades for the last class. God really helped me with all of my projects, papers, etc, and everything was a success! Vacation week was my 1st break from class since mid-April, so I was ready! Tomorrow I start Counselor Professional Identity, Function, and Ethics. There are 3 very large texts, but it looks like it will be a good class. I will finish that one in early October, and take off until January. That will give me time to have a baby! My last 2 classes will be scheduled for spring, and then I will be done. Yahoo!
5. Ryan finally lost a top tooth this week! He is almost 8 and has only lost the bottom 2 (almost a year ago). The 2nd top one is hanging, and should be gone in the next few hours!
6. Teacher's inservice days begin tomorrow and school starts Wednesday. I don't even want to think about all the work the next 48 hours will hold! It's kind of like housecleaning, if your house is like ours. All the clutter has to be dealt with before you can actually clean. I'll probably spend the 1st half of tomorrow just dealing with clutter. Once that is taken care of, I'll feel ready to begin a new year! A nice benefit is that 2 weeks will bring Labor Day weekend, and then 2 weeks later brings us another long weekend with our Staff Convention on a Monday and spouses joining us in Holmes County for a staff retreat Monday evening and Tuesday. That will be a fun break. So long for now!
1. Ryan's lymph swelling finally went down with the antibiotic. Thank the Lord! I am a "glass half empty" kind of person, I guess (at least that is what my dear husband says!), and always tend to fear the worst instead of hoping for the best. During the last couple of days he took the medicine, his sinuses kind of cut loose, so to speak, and seemed to take care of it.
2. Another Yount baby has appeared! Congratulations to Devin and Jennifer (Yount) Driggers on the birth of Whitney Faye last Friday. She joins her brothers Logan (2) and Landon (1). I am awaiting pictures!
3. Vacation Bible School was a good success at our church. The directors attend our church, and always do a fantastic job. Their theme was "The Armor of God" and my kids (2 weeks later) are still putting on their armor, as well as singing songs such as "Onward Christian Soldiers" in very embarrassing places such as restaurants and stores.
4. We just finished vacation! Tuesday evening we made our way to Pigeon Forge, TN to spend a few days relaxing. My parents came down separately, and we spent Wednesday kind of doing our own things. Greg and I took the kids to The Track for a couple hours of rides, etc. I purchased a discount pack online before the trip because those things can be incredibly expensive! Even with the discounts I was grimacing the whole time! We wanted to do something different this time. Ripley's Aquarium and The Dixie Stampede are awesome, but we have visited each of them a couple of times in the last couple of years. Having heard rave reviews about the Black Bear Jamboree, we decided to give it a try. We were told it was even more child-oriented than the Dixie Stampede, and having seen a video of the show previously, we figured the kids would really like it. Our table ended up being on stage level...not a good thing we would find out! There happened to be an "all new show" for 2007, and we were so disappointed! The pre-show was great, and they still used the bear puppets, although very minimally, but everything else was loud, driving music with lots of immodesty and dance. We're not talking square dancing. I felt like I was in a night club. Within the first few minutes one of my boys had his head down with a very disturbed expression on his face. I felt terrible, like I had violated his innocence! I asked the kids if they wanted to leave, and they all did. I wasn't even worried about the money...I just wanted out of there and when the lights went out, we left. I found out that another large family had gone there a couple of weeks before, and the mother was in tears because she had subjected her family to that kind of trash. So, this is my advice...spend your money elsewhere! I did talk to the management in a very kind way before I left. If they receive enough negative response, maybe they will have an "all new show" for 2008! Other fun things we did were The Comedy Barn (with my mom's brother John Yount and several of his kids and grandkids who also happened to be vacationing), lots of shopping at unique places, a few hours in a mountain stream (that was the most fun) with mommy as the all-time "bear-watcher," and spending Friday evening and Saturday morning at Eric and Meg's place. We celebrated Olivia's 1st birthday which is at the end of the month. She is walking all over the place now, and getting plenty of bumps and bruises! It was a good time, but I am glad to be home...safely. It was over 100 degrees almost every day, and the humidity was terrible. I acquired some kind of allergy or sinus cold while down there, and am taking everything I can without much relief.
4. After arriving home from vacation, I received my grades for the last class. God really helped me with all of my projects, papers, etc, and everything was a success! Vacation week was my 1st break from class since mid-April, so I was ready! Tomorrow I start Counselor Professional Identity, Function, and Ethics. There are 3 very large texts, but it looks like it will be a good class. I will finish that one in early October, and take off until January. That will give me time to have a baby! My last 2 classes will be scheduled for spring, and then I will be done. Yahoo!
5. Ryan finally lost a top tooth this week! He is almost 8 and has only lost the bottom 2 (almost a year ago). The 2nd top one is hanging, and should be gone in the next few hours!
6. Teacher's inservice days begin tomorrow and school starts Wednesday. I don't even want to think about all the work the next 48 hours will hold! It's kind of like housecleaning, if your house is like ours. All the clutter has to be dealt with before you can actually clean. I'll probably spend the 1st half of tomorrow just dealing with clutter. Once that is taken care of, I'll feel ready to begin a new year! A nice benefit is that 2 weeks will bring Labor Day weekend, and then 2 weeks later brings us another long weekend with our Staff Convention on a Monday and spouses joining us in Holmes County for a staff retreat Monday evening and Tuesday. That will be a fun break. So long for now!
6 comments:
What a time ya'll are havin! Hopefully things will slow down for you within the next couple of months...yeah right, huh?!?! Hope you have an awesome school year. So sorry about your Black Bear experience. Ours was nothing like that at Christmas time a few years ago. =( Sounds like you had fun in the mountains and the guys were actually prepared with their trunks this time!!! Good memories!
Love you!
Hey Steph, Glad you guys had a good vacation. I have never been to Black Bear, don't think I want to. Hope the school year goes well.
It sounds like it's going to be a busy year around there too! Glad to hear the munchkin is better--I was just wondering about that the other night.
I'm glad that Ryan is doing better. We really miss you all.
Thanks for posting the pics. Looks like you guys had a really fun time!
I would have loved to have seen Kaitlynn trying to golf....so cute! I might have actually found someone that I can beat at putt-putt!!! :)
I'm so glad you posted that about the Jamboree.....we are headed down there in October and it's nice to know things like that in advance!!!! You are one brave lady......going to school and expecting your fourth child!!! I think I'll add you to my prayer list!!!! I can barely keep up with three!!!!
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