Today we all slept in... actually Tony found Quinn playing his Game Boy at 6:30 and made him go back to sleep (that morning boy!)... Madison didn't get up until some time after 9. The kids wanted to drive some go-carts... not just be the riders in ones that were too big for them. So, we went to Nascar Speedpark that is less than a mile away from us. The weather was perfect-o, however, the lines were quite long... I finally convinced Tony to let me go stand in another line while they stood in one line and then they could come over and get in line with me. He felt bad about doing that... hey, I'm all about productivity. I stood in line for 1 hour for a race that lasted only 5 minutes. So after about 3 hours and 4 rides, we decided to throw in our towels for awhile. The one good thing was that if you had a child that was too short to drive but tall enough to ride, the parent could drive for free.... bonus for Tony & I. We debated and debated about whether to buy these $30 wrist bands because we knew that Madison could be the driver on quite a few more rides than Quinn. When we finally got up to the cash register to pay the lady kindly told us that tip... so obviously we didn't buy our own bands. From talking to another mom that day... she wasn't given the same tip. She bought a wrist band for $30 and completed her day after driving only 4 races. Pretty expensive races huh? Actually, if you bought just tickets, instead of a wrist band, the number of tickets required per race varied a bit but the ones we were on would have cost $9 per race... ridiculous at close to $3 per ticket.
We came back to the condo and made lunch and relaxed. Tony had to do some computer work for Rollpak (never too far away for work!) so Madison and I taught Quinn how to play Skip-Bo. We had a good time at it... although Madison takes games faaaar to seriously. She's out to win!!... she made the "decree" that no one could help each other starting in the 2nd game etc... poor Quinn, just learning this new game. I privately tried to give him a "handicap" and dealt him only 25 cards instead of 30 but to no avail... I still won! : )
It was such a gorgeous day, in the low 80's, so we decided to drive through some scenic parts of the mountains (I think they all would be considered "scenic"). Madison really wasn't into all of the driving around just to look at stuff (I so remember being like that) but we found this place called Cades Cove which is an 11 mile one-way road that loops into the mountains and back out. When we started into it the cars in front of us were driving really, really slow so we knew this might take awhile. We had the kids pile into the front seats with us so they could see better and Quinn steered us through the Cove... stopping to look at all the nature. It was soooo beautiful!!! We must have seen 100 or so deer, we saw a coyote, old buildings that they had preserved... old churches, one from the early 1800's. Very cool. We got out and hiked a little bit but wanted to see the whole Cove before dark so couldn't go too far. Quinn took video of nearly all 100 of those deer so if anyone wants to watch it, I'm sure he will be happy to point stuff out. He was all over it. We decided that it would be highly possible to spend a whole week just in the mountains themselves. We were right next to North Carolina while driving through that area. On the way back on the twisty, hairpin turns, we had to laugh because we brought about 40 or so filled Easter eggs to hide with Jade this coming weekend and the basket spilled so we had to listen to those eggs rattle all over the place with all of those turns. Ha!
We drove back into town around 9pm and saw that the Nascar place was still open. We really felt like we hadn't gotten our money's worth yet so it was back to the go-carts! The evening weather was beautiful... not even a sweatshirt needed and the place had really, really cleared out. They rode soooo many more rides... basically got off of one race and could get right back on. It closed at 10:30 and they were disappointed to have to leave "so early". We definitely felt like their $30 wrist bands were paid for by then. So, we came back to the condo and ate my crock pot lasagna for supper around 11pm! Thankfully I had stuck it in the refrig prior to our 4pm departure for the mountains. It was a tiring but fun day.
I can't wait to post some pictures with my stories when I get home again.
Hope all is well with "ya all".... love, Leah
We came back to the condo and made lunch and relaxed. Tony had to do some computer work for Rollpak (never too far away for work!) so Madison and I taught Quinn how to play Skip-Bo. We had a good time at it... although Madison takes games faaaar to seriously. She's out to win!!... she made the "decree" that no one could help each other starting in the 2nd game etc... poor Quinn, just learning this new game. I privately tried to give him a "handicap" and dealt him only 25 cards instead of 30 but to no avail... I still won! : )
It was such a gorgeous day, in the low 80's, so we decided to drive through some scenic parts of the mountains (I think they all would be considered "scenic"). Madison really wasn't into all of the driving around just to look at stuff (I so remember being like that) but we found this place called Cades Cove which is an 11 mile one-way road that loops into the mountains and back out. When we started into it the cars in front of us were driving really, really slow so we knew this might take awhile. We had the kids pile into the front seats with us so they could see better and Quinn steered us through the Cove... stopping to look at all the nature. It was soooo beautiful!!! We must have seen 100 or so deer, we saw a coyote, old buildings that they had preserved... old churches, one from the early 1800's. Very cool. We got out and hiked a little bit but wanted to see the whole Cove before dark so couldn't go too far. Quinn took video of nearly all 100 of those deer so if anyone wants to watch it, I'm sure he will be happy to point stuff out. He was all over it. We decided that it would be highly possible to spend a whole week just in the mountains themselves. We were right next to North Carolina while driving through that area. On the way back on the twisty, hairpin turns, we had to laugh because we brought about 40 or so filled Easter eggs to hide with Jade this coming weekend and the basket spilled so we had to listen to those eggs rattle all over the place with all of those turns. Ha!
We drove back into town around 9pm and saw that the Nascar place was still open. We really felt like we hadn't gotten our money's worth yet so it was back to the go-carts! The evening weather was beautiful... not even a sweatshirt needed and the place had really, really cleared out. They rode soooo many more rides... basically got off of one race and could get right back on. It closed at 10:30 and they were disappointed to have to leave "so early". We definitely felt like their $30 wrist bands were paid for by then. So, we came back to the condo and ate my crock pot lasagna for supper around 11pm! Thankfully I had stuck it in the refrig prior to our 4pm departure for the mountains. It was a tiring but fun day.
I can't wait to post some pictures with my stories when I get home again.
Hope all is well with "ya all".... love, Leah
1 comment:
80 degrees there -- 34 degrees and light snow here. Hmmmm. Something about that just isn't right.
See you soon!
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