I've been Tagged!!! Gotta Love Summer!

I've been tagged by Hope at "My Hope Is In The Lord," to share five things I love about summer...

I love that I get to go to youth camp with my hubby and umpteen teenagers that we love to pieces. Nothing more beautiful than a youth filled room lifting up the name of Jesus. I love summer church camp!!!

I love family vacations. Days filled with family fun adventures.

I love the smiles on my kids faces when they get to spend the evening at the pool.

I love being able to wear a good pair of flip flops everywhere, because you just can in the summer time. Love Old Navy flip flops!!!

I love the fact that every June I'm reminded of how blessed I am, because God gave me this guy, who loves me.

I could go on, but I think I would rather read what others have to say, so I'm tagging Amber, Sharon, Kat , Mimi, and Michelle.

Happy Summer Everyone!!!

The Last Day of Vacation... I promise!!!

OK, I know everyone is probably about sick of seeing our vacation pictures, but I'm almost done. Here it is, the last day of pictures taken. Promise!

After the whole Dollywood day we were exhausted that night. After all I told you we went when they opened and left when they closed. We originally didn't have any plans for the next day, it was going to be a big travel day, crossing the state of Tennessee on our way back to Arkansas. Originally, we were thinking about stopping back by Nashville, but realized we would like to drive farther, because my hubby had to be back in time for youth group Wednesday night. So we decided to stay half way between Nashville and Memphis. Now any other smart family would just go, find a motel and then spend a quiet restful evening at dinner and by the pool, right? Meet my family, four indecisive people, plus to hubbies/dads who really have no say because they are party poopers at times and five kids. Hmmmm... get the picture? After much indecisiveness (suggestions of Graceland and a dude ranch were flung out there), we finally decided to do something else "fun" that morning before heading towards the motel. What to do...

Our first choice which even the dads approved of was Rock City in Chattanooga, Tennessee/Georgia (still confused on what state it was in.) Caves, rocks, mountains, what's not to like? One problem. It decides to rain on our parade, so to speak. Here we have traveled a little out of our way to go to Chattanooga only for it to rain. Plan B. I happened to see a sign for an aquarium. Now if you know the kids in my family, then you would know that an aquarium is right up their alley. They love animals. Turns out that it is a BIG and VERY NICE AQUARIUM too. We got in late to the motel that night, but we had another wonderful family fun time. The whole family enjoyed the sharks, jellyfish and penguins. Just goes to show you that sometimes plan B can turn out to be better than plan A.

Here are just a few of the many pictures taken...

Here's Kayla petting a snake...

And here I am... Yes! I admit it people! I'm a wimp!

Thanks for joining me on my vacation adventure. We sure did have a blast! Now I'm not going to know what to blog about... hmmm... but life goes on, so I'm sure something will come up!

Dollywood... (Day Five)

Here it was, the day the kids were all looking forward to. Well I guess us BIG kids were looking forward to the theme park day ourselves, or maybe we were just hoping to get a "Dolly" sighting. The weather was great! It was suppose to rain in the neighborhood that day, so the cloudiness cooled off what would normally be a killer hot day in the south. Yet, we only had a few sprinkles all day, so the "drowned rat" pictures of me throughout this post are purely from the rides I was "forced" to ride. :)

By the way, I will go ahead and apologize now, for I seriously think this is the longest post I've ever posted. I just happen to be the picture queen of my family. What can I say, I LOVE pictures!!! Anyway, when it came time to pick which pictures to include, I had a very hard time. So there you have it. I guess my saving grace in the length of this crazy post is that it is mainly pictures. If you like pictures, than hang on for a long ride... (I promise there are a few crazy ones of me mixed in for your viewing pleasure.)

While everyone was getting tickets, we took a few random family pics...

First on the list of rides was the wooden roller coaster, which I was "forced" to ride with the second round of our family riders. I think my insides are still jiggling around like jello. Here is a glimpse of my daughter...I was sitting nest to her.

This ride was a family favorite among the boys and my parents. You will have to forgive me if I don't remember the names of all the rides...I have lived since then, plus my souvenir map got wet from being in my pocket and had to be thrown away.

This was my first taste of being WET. I knew it was a battle of some kind, but really didn't know what I was in for until the boat next to us started spraying us with their guns. Of course I was just thankful I was sitting next to my brother-in-law or I would have been even wetter (if that is possible). Of course, when I looked back at my pictures I found one of this little guy and I'm just wondering if he is the reason I was wet? And what is up with my son? Boy, he was ready for battle!!!

There were two or three more roller coasters in which my sister and brother-in-law were the brave adults that took the kids. Sorry, but this woman doesn't do loopidy loops. I just don't see the need to defy gravity at my age. Although my son has discovered he likes the "loops" now.

Kayla wanted a funnel cake. You can't go to a place like this and NOT get one. She was a sweetie and shared with her brother and cousins...

Here are some more random family pictures taken while we waited on some of the others to ride rides...

My hubby bought me some pottery as my souvenir. Too sweet, huh? Everyone else got t-shirts and caps, but I got dishes. My hubby loves and knows me well. Aren't they pretty? They can go in the oven, microwave and dishwasher, so it doesn't get much better than that, I'm thinking. If you haven't guessed, I love dishes! Sorry! Not the greatest of pictures, but you get the idea. Trust me...they are pretty!

We went and saw a show. The show was made up of people either related to Dolly or some of them had played in her band. Thanks people for now I've had "Jolene" running through my head ever since!!! My sister went and bought a big bag of popcorn for everyone to share during the show, thinking my brother-in-law would be back in time with the kids to see it (they had gone to ride a ride, while we saved seats). Only they came at the very end. Did I mention that my sister bought a BIG bag of kettle corn? Everywhere we walked someone was commenting on what a big bag... IT made for some cute pictures, though. Let it be said, this family likes their kettle corn.

We saw this lady while we ate at her little restaurant. She was a crazy "chicken lady" who sounded a whole lot like Dolly herself...a relative maybe? Dolly in disguise? Hmmmm...

We had to make it over to the teacups (or actually I think they were lemonade cups), because little britches, my five year old nephew said that is all he wanted to ride. Unfortunately, he was so little it didn't make for very good picture taking. His daddy lifted him up for me, for one good pic before the ride started. The older boys had a blast... of course Jordan told me later that it had left him very dizzy.

A park is not a park without some kind of log ride. My dad bought the park picture of it for me. The different looks on every one's face is priceless.


Pictures of other rides...

We ended the day with two rides. The cars and the rapids (again, not sure of the exact name). My brother-in law and I were volunteered to be the token adults who had to walk around wet while going to dinner. Hmmm.... still wondering about that. Needless to say, I got WET!!! I think every rapid, waterfall or water cannon had my name on it. I was just thankful they had a dryer (that is the crazy picture of me in the sunglasses) or I would have been DRIPPING all the way to dinner.

Overall, it was a FANTASTIC day. We all had a GREAT time! My mom even said it was one of her favorite theme parks ever... I think I would have to agree. We got there when it opened and stayed until closing and we NEVER do that. We probably stayed about two hours too many, because we were worn out afterwards, but we had some great memories made in those last two hours too.

I will close this post with dinner. The whole trip, my dad had been teasing about going to Golden Corral. HE knows that my sister and I wanted to go to places we couldn't go to at home. However, since he had been a trooper and had gone where we wanted to all week, we decided to take him that night to the Golden Corral. Turns out to be one of the best Golden Corrals I've ever been too. It was fast since it was a buffet and we were worn out (and wet). Can't beat a good steak, baked potato and fried okra in this girl's book. And I ended up having the best salad too! In fact my hubby said it was his favorite meal of the whole trip. Great choice, Dad!!!

Well, thanks for hanging in there on our adventure through Dollywood. It really was fun. I have one more day of pictures left from my vacation. I would go ahead and tell you what we did, but I think I will let it be a surprise. You see, it was a surprise for us too... curious?