Saying Goodbye

I hope this is the saddest post I'll ever have to do. This past Sunday afternoon, we said goodbye to our beloved 5 1/2-yo Golden Retriever, Sammy. We loved him so much, but due to his aggressive tendencies towards people unknown to him, as well as other animals, we had to let him go. He was a great family pet...very protective and loving towards our kids and us. We were so blessed to have been able to take him on vacation with us...the first time we've ever done that. We love you, Sammy, and we'll miss forever.

I'm sure you can tell by the red, swollen eyes, that our kids were saying goodbye to Sam.

They had a hard time smiling for the camera, but tried their best.

SB: Day 4...Last night at the cabin

We had some family fun in the master bedroom our last night there. It was actually past the kids' bedtime, but everyone was in such a good mood, we decided to make it last a little longer. It started with some tickling and ended with tickling with some back rubbing in between. Ella even got in on the action. While Cole was rubbing my back, she decided to throw herself over me...again and again. It didn't feel real good, but she was having fun, so we let her do a few times before making her stop.

SB: Day 4...St. Patty's Day Parade with 1000 Santas

Beware of many, many, many pictures of multiple santas. Some, even, from different nations. I hope I don't bore you, but I do hope you enjoy seeing all we saw. This is the beginning of the parade.

Horse drawn wagon.

Notice even some of the pictures have elves and Mrs. Claus'.

Santa with reindeer (caribou).

Notice Santa headed straight for my kids? He gave them each some bubblegum.

Musical Santas and Mrs. Claus'.

We actually met this Santa two days before the parade at a Mexican restaurant. He came over to our table after he paid his check and spoke with our kids for a few minutes. It was really cool. There were 3 other santas in that restaurant that we talked with while waiting to be seated. The kids were in shock at all the santas. Even Ella, who screamed at having to sit in his lap at Christmas, seemed to enjoy all the Santas. She even flirted with a few of them.

Race car Santa.

Segway Santa and Mrs. Claus.

Trolley full of Santas.

Father Christmas coming to greet my kids.

The tallest Santa ever!

Another Santa coming to greet my kids. This was so COOL!

Mrs. Claus handing out candy or trinkets to my kids.

These last few pictures are some of my favorites. This is the most elaborate sleigh I've ever seen. Scroll down carefully and notice that in the first picture it's just a sleigh on wheels.

Now, notice the jet engine coming up from behind.

Now, notice the sleigh lift on hydraulics.

While it was lifted off the ground, it made a 360-degree turn. Once it went full circle, the hydraulics came back down, the jet engine revved up, and the sleigh took off. It was the coolest thing ever.

SB: Day 4...Just Hanging Out

We spent a good while down by the river front and decided to head back up to the sidewalk and watch all of the Santa's walking by as they began to take their place in the parade. We had two great park benches all to ourselves and the kids never did get tired of just sitting around.

To clarify things a bit, there was a Santa convention in town and they held a St. Patty's Parade. There were over 1000 santas in the parade. Quite a sight. I will be sharing those pictures in the next post. Be prepared for lots and lots of pictures.

While we walked the main street earlier in the day, we took the kids to a shop similar to Build-A-Bear. I can't remember the name of it though. We let each one of them pic out their favorite animal to adopt. Kelsey chose a tiger and named him Stripes. Cole picked out a St. Patrick's Day (fitting) bear and named him Clover. Ella picked out an orange and white checkered bear and we gave her the name Sunshine. The kids were able to pick out sounds to place into their animals. Kelsey chose a roar. I can't remember what Cole chose, and Ella's has a tune that plays "You Are My Sunshine," thus the name Sunshine. So this next picture is of all three kids holding their new creations.

And here's our littlest monkey of the bunch climbing the light pole.

SB: Day 4...Little Pigeon River

After the go-karts, we headed over to Gatlinburg to walk the busy main street. We at lunch at a little Italian restaurant and then had some time to kill before the 4:30pm St. Patrick's Day/Santa parade. We took the kids down to the Little Pigeon River and let them play for awhile. It turned out to be such a beautiful warm day. But, the water was icy cold.

Ella would have jumped in the water no matter how cold it was if Jason wasn't hanging onto her. She loves the water.

What a good lookin' family if I do say so myself.

SB: Day 4

On Tuesday, the last full day of our trip, the sun decided to come out...and boy was it beautiful. We had been wanting to go horseback riding before we even left the house for vacation, and Kelsey couldn't stop asking us when we were going to do it, so we thought this was the perfect day. We got to the ranch and found out that because of all the rain, the trails were too steep and slick for non-experienced riders. Having three kids with us, we opted out of riding. We didn't think it was worth losing one of them on the trail. Maybe next time. Needless to say we were all a little bummed. The last time Jason and I went riding was in 1998, the year before Cole was born. Bummer...

We had to find something to take the kids' mind off of their letdown, so we let them choose either go-karts or mini golf. You can see what they chose. This was Kelsey's first time to ever get to drive one. There were two courses. One for teens/adults, and one for kids. This was perfect for them. There were only three kids total on the course which was great. Cole even slowed down a couple of times to let Kelsey pass him. What a great brother!!!

Here's Ella and Daddy chillin' on the sidelines of the go-kart course.

And here's me and Ella watching the kids race.