Post-Vacation Blues :(

Well, I'm in that post-vacation slump....that hard-to-get-back-to-the-normal-routine kinda attitude. It's never easy and it's especially hard when you can't really wallow in your sadness, but instead you are thrust back into the real world and the craziness of life in general.....

All that to say that our Maggie Valley (NC) vacation was superbly wonderful and relaxing as all get out! :) I don't want to write a novel about all the fun times we had, cuz honestly it's hard to put it all into words and I am utterly exhausted at the moment (and moderately nauseous again this week...yuck!)...but trust me...our vacation was great! Great to see family, great to just veg out and great to enjoy some nice (less humid) weather! I'd love to post a bunch of pics (and I plan to do that sometime this week), but they are all my Kev's laptop so I'll just leave you with a few bullet points about the NC fun. Kev is going on a business trip to Boston for 4 days this week so when he's gone maybe I can take the time and post the pics....but for now, here's the lowdown...

• Drives up and back were pretty good (I never say this so I had to make a point of bulleting it). Shockingly enough we made very few stops and have very little crying which resulted in the trip only taking us about 7 1/2 hours both there and back....amazing! Hats off to the kids who were pretty agreeable and to Kev who did all the driving as usual! I must comment that car rides are not good on my belly. The area where my liver tumor is caused me a lot of pain and I wasn't able to get comfortable at all....I might be taking this up at my OB appt tomorrow...not that I'm worried about a tumor that's only a few mm's in size...but still....it's on my mind....
• If you read my most recent blog you know my brother's gonna be a daddy! :) This was our first "fun thing" to find out upon our arrival to NC (on the 4th of July, no less :)). I'm still oh-so-impressed with Candy and her secret-keeping powers...how she kept all that morning sickness and baby stuff to herself for so long I will never know. And I know my mom was shocked off her rocker to hear that she was gonna have a new January grandson :) They told my parents by giving them a framed u/s pic of the baby and my mom was so confused as to why they'd give a picture of our baby...she had no idea the baby was a Gritz not a Steg :) Nina is so funny in her pregnancy reactions...gotta love her! :) But, the news of a nephew is grand news and I know my family already had fun in NC shopping for the newest boy in the family! :) Praying Candy is feeling better these days...she had a few rough days there in NC not to mention some crappy night sleeps due to some annoying mountain dogs :(
• The simple things....that's what I love most about our annual NC trip. The kids get to enjoy the fun of nature and companionship of family. I love that. That was the best part of this trip (as it always is). There were days where we just sat and watched the kids play. My parents bought us a very fun new slide/pool and the first full day there we set it up and let them play to their heart's content. It was a highlight for them all, but especially for Shelby. She is our pool lover and she asked every day after that to swim in the pool. Such a simple thing, but so fun for her. Hailey especially enjoyed learning the fine art of badmitten and Dylan took a swing at learning the art of t-ball with the wise instruction of Pops. Both played this almost every day. It's wonderful that our cabin has this awesome front yard and the kids had all this room to do all these things at once. It was perfect! Even my grandma came down one day and sat on the sidelines and just watched all the fun. It was nice to sit and relax like that. And we all know how amusing kids can be so it was like watching a movie somedays :)
• Dylan's fav. trip moment (and this IS his actual response if you ask him!)..."the water and the rocks!" :) By this he means the creek and throwing rocks into it! :) This was the highlight of his every day and I have tons of pics to prove this point. It was truly the sweetest thing. Our boy has always loved rocks AND water...these are two things that he makes a point to blurt out daily even as we are driving, "Look, mama, rocks"..."Look, mama, water!". Very fascinating things...rocks and water. So he was in his element in the mountains amidst the streams. He spent many hours simply sitting in the water throwing rocks or standing at the water's edge throwing them in. No joke...the boy probably threw a few hundred over the course of a week and he never tired of it! It was very cute to watch his excitement over such a simple thing.
  
• Big Creek....this is an annual vacation day-trip for our family and this year was no exception. This is a very fun (big--hence the name) trip we take over the border to TN and back over the border to NC (confusing, yes)....anyway...it's a beautiful setting...a large creek in a park and we spent a whole day there just enjoying the perfect weather, hanging out with family and eating good food. Again, Dylan threw rocks for hours and Shelby caught butterflies for about that long (there are tons of them on the ground here...very neat, aside from the fact that they are slow moving a few got crushed by Dylan's powerful rock-throwing body :((. But, it was a grand day and the men and my cousins and Hailey even took a long trek to a beautiful waterfall/cove area (I have yet to even see those pics, but I hear it was a fun time and Hailey was daring in her diving endeavors :)).
  
• Girl's Day Out--also a big highlight every year for our girls. My Aunt Terri takes her daughter (my cousin, Celyn) and our two girls and they go do fun, girly things all day in the valley :) This year it fun as usual as yet again the girls all went shopping and came home dressed in matching outfits along with a few new, fun toys and girly make-up things. Good ol' Aunt Terri...she loves to spoil the girls. I spent that day shopping with my Aunt Mary and mom...also fun for us to have a "bigger girls" day out :)
  
• Whitewater rafting--it was the girls' first time doing this and they had a ball! It rained that day, but I guess it didn't matter...the girls loved it. Daddy Kev, Uncle Jeff and Pops took them down the Tuskeegee (sp?) River and I guess it was a "wild ride" :) All I know is that Pops disobeyed all the rafting rules, which is so surprising seeing that Pops ALWAYS obeys rules! :) Nina, Candy, Dylan and I shopped that day too (poor Dylan...he was a trooper and Nina even got him a fun Thomas the Train that he LOVES!) :)
  
• Mingo Falls--our annual waterfall trip to Cherokee. Very beautiful as usual and Hailey and daddy enjoyed hiking up under the waterfall. Dylan enjoyed throwing more rocks in the creek. Shelby enjoyed her "rock car"...she pretended that a big rock was a car and she zoomed it all over the creek bed of the waterfall :) It was very cute and very creative :) My issue at the waterfall was peeing...as was Candy's :) We both had baby/bladder issues and a raging waterfall did not help that. Not to mention the thousand steps you have to climb to get to the waterfall! But, we survived and found refuge in nearby toilets before and after. Nina, even with her healing back, was a trooper and made the long climb to the waterfall :) Good times.
• Something new--Nina had the awesome idea of having a picnic (KFC) lunch and going tubing down the river/creek in Cherokee....something we've never done, but always wanted too. The kids loved it. Dylan, of course, just sat and threw rocks in the water, but the girls tubed til their heart's content. The rest of us adults just sat and watched :) It was fun and we hope to make a day of it next year and cook-out there.
  
• Relaxing times--Kev got almost an entire novel finished off there. He was up early somedays just reading on the porch and listening to the peaceful mountain stream by the cabin...good for him. I admire that cuz I am NOT a reader. I'd rather sleep in than read anything and goodness knows I slept in almost every day of our trip! Thank goodness Dylan is a sound and awesome sleeper and there were some days where it was past 9am and he was still snoozin'! That's my kind of kid! The girls enjoyed their loft bed (in another room) and I was thankful not to hear Shelby's "lifting the roof off the house" snoring. Good thing Hailey is a sound sleeper and didn't mind her loud sister in her bed! My relaxing thing was taking a couple naps and just sitting on the porch swing watching the kids. Dylan and I had lots of bonding time too, which was good for both of us. We sat and read books a lot and he became even more of a mommy's boy than he already was...I figure he's entitled to a little spoiling these days seeing as mommy will be a little busier in 2 more mos :)
• Date night--well that sorta didn't happen for Kev and I. We had planned on a big night out...dinner at our fav. restaurant near town (the Jarrett House) and a sunset train ride, but the train ride was canceled for the season and dinner ended up being lunch and included rowdy Dylan. It wasn't romantic by any means, but it was still good food and less kids than normal so I can't complain. Next year we'll try harder to have a night out alone (though it might include a 10 month old girl...so we'll see :)). But, thanks to Nina and Pops for all the kid-watching they did. It was definitely nice to have extra hands to help.
  
• Only complaints--well, I don't like to focus on the negatives (and believe me there were few this trip)...but I will put them in writing....the bugs and the bad beds! Really...those were the only bad things. I never remember ever having bug bites, but this year we all came home with many dozens. I think I even ate a few knats and I know I had a few stuck in my eyes. Don't know why the bad case of bugs this year, but it was annoying sometimes! And bad beds...well, this has been an issue in the past with this cabin, but being big and pg and very uncomfortable this year...well, I noticed it more. I felt like I was sleeping in a hole most nights...we tried switching our mattresses, but all the mattresses we tried were just as bad. Finally I just made Kev sleep on his edge of the bed and I slept on mine. Problem solved except I missed my husband :) And on a side note, does anyone know if altitude has an effect on the bladder? (or at least the pg bladder :))....I have to say that I have never peed so much during the night...I was seriously up every hour (or more)...so that mixed with a bad bed made for some pretty restless nights :( I'm blaming the excess urination on the mountains cuz since we've been back I've back to a normal pg peeing pattern...yay! :)
  
• Many, Many Thanks!!! Well, I have to end this bulleted post by saying kudos upon kudos of thanks to my parents. They made this vacation possible and we owe them our eternal gratitude for all the fun, relaxing times. Truly...their generosity is above and beyond and we can't thank them enough. For the wonderful cabin housing, for the yummy food, for all the cooking they did, for everything. We felt like big ol' mooches last week cuz we just sat on our duffs. We can't thank them enough! We love you, Nina and Pops!
  

So, that's the jest of it. If you're like me you'd much rather rely on pics to tell the story and I promise I'll try to post those soon. But, for now just trust me that our mountain vacation was as awesome as always. Somehow it always goes by too quickly and even with an extra day this year Kev and I still marveled at how fast it all went by :( But, we have next year to look forward to and two new babies in the family to share it with. Good times...and I was reminded on this trip how great family is and how blessed I am to have such a wonderful family. So, here's to the good ol' town of Maggie Valley and to all the down-home fun it offers! Now it's back to the humdrum life of summer and today it was back to reality with swim lessons for us all. A busy day, but fun for the kids...and tonight Kev is actually starting to move stuff out of our basement into storage! Can we say "progress!" We'll see and I'll keep you posted! Have a happy week everyone!

Oh, and on an important side note I wanted to give a belated b-day shout-out to my wonderful Bloomy friend, Vonna :) She celebrated her 38th while we were gone on vacation. But, I didn't want another week to go by w/o wishing her the best and sending her a blog-hug. She is a dear, dear person...a friend that came along at the best time for me and I love her to death. She not only wise beyond her young years, but she's funny and kind and so very talented :) She's just superb in my eyes a rare gem in this world. So, here's to you, Vonna...you're a blessing in my life and I'm so glad our path's crossed years ago and that we have become such great friends! Happy Belated!