Gatlin-blog

*Just so you know, Mark came up with the title for this entry...blame him:)

Due to impending bad weather, our family pictures had to be postponed.  We won't be able to do them until the first of November!  I'm so disappointed!  As worked up as I was over them, I'm sad we weren't able to get them done today.  I had the outfits all ready and I was pretty pumped.  Now they will loom in my mind until November :(  Oh, well.  

Like I mentioned earlier, I took over 300 pictures yesterday, so it was pretty hard to narrow them down to just a few.  I did a terrible job trying to pick.  Sorry I've included so many!  

When we arrived we had a little picnic and let the kiddos play for awhile.  Here are a few of the pictures we took while we were at our first location...

Us 

 I love my family!  

 The Nudd's 

Great friends

 Rosie Girl 

 Bryn, being Bryn:)  She's SO cute!!!

Just some of the girls 

She loved exploring!    

After our picnic, Brandon wanted to take us to an area called Clingman's Cove.  It's supposed to be beautiful.  The only problem being everyone and their brother was headed there, too.  We set in traffic for the longest time and finally gave up and decided to head into Gatlinburg.  

The view while we were stuck in traffic.  It was gorgeous.

We saw a lot of this!  

Once in Gatlinburg, we headed to the aquarium.  We all loved it.  It really was a great one! 

The Shark Exhibit 

This guy was in heaven.  He loves ocean animals! 

I would never want to run into this guy while swimming.  

Kiki was very curious about everything 

The kiddos 

Mesmerized by the Jellyfish

Mark comparing wingspans with a ray. 

Just being silly 

Besties 

Aren't they cute? 

She loves her daddy

 We were pretty exhausted at this point, but we rarely get pictures together and decided to use the opportunity! 

I'm so not ready for these guys to drive.  At least we have a few more years! 

We had such a fun time! 

After our time in downtown Gatlinburg, we were all pretty exhausted.  It was well past the kids' bedtimes, but we couldn't be that close to an outlet mall and not stop, so we ended the night in Pigeon Forge shopping until we dropped...almost literally.

This is how we all felt on the trip home.

Pumpkin Craving

Mark got in late Thursday night and we are all pretty excited.  Luckily, our friends took really good care of us ladies this week while he was gone.  Jackie watched the kiddos for me on Tuesday so I could go to guitar lesson and had dinner for me when I picked them up!  Brandon watched the girls so we could go to book club on Wednesday and Maria invited me to sleep over.  Then last night, she had us over for dinner.  We missed Mark like crazy, but it wasn't super overwhelming since we kept pretty busy while he was gone. 

On Friday evening, we were invited over to some new friends' house for dinner.  I'm usually a wreck hanging out with people I don't know very well (the joys of introversion), but the family was super sweet and it went very well.  My favorite part about the evening was that they served homemade waffles with every topping imaginable.  It's their Friday night family tradition.  I'm seriously thinking of adopting that one for our family.  They were delicious! 

Yesterday, we headed to Gatlinburg for the day with the Nudds.  It was so much fun.  I hadn't been there since I was little, so it was all pretty new to me.  It is peak season there right now, so it was nuts!  We waited in traffic for what seemed like hours, but the times we spent out of the car were great.  The views were incredible.  In the afternoon, we went to the aquarium and that evening we ran into a few stores at the outlet mall.  We were all EXHAUSTED by the time we got home, but it was so worth it.  I'm looking forward to our next Gatlinburg trip!  I took over 350 pictures while we were there, so I will try and post some of those later.    

I'm kind of freaking out because we are getting family pictures done today.  Putting our outfits together has been up there with inventing the wheel.  It's been tough to say the least.  I wanted us to coordinate but not be too matchy-matchy.  There's a good chance I've failed us.  I think I've put a lot of importance on this photo session, because we haven't had a family photo since McKinley was born.  Of course, I woke up yesterday with a huge zit on my forehead and Kiki fell in her crib on Friday and has a big gash above her eye.  Thank goodness for photoshop!  

Thought I would show you the lunch I made for the girls on Friday.  I went with a fall theme.  I saw my old pumpkin cookie cutters in the drawer and got inspired.  It's really fun to think outside the box and try and be creative with the food I have in the fridge/pantry.    

Cheddar cheese pumpkins, peanut butter and jelly roll-ups, carrot slices with ranch dressing, steamed green beans, veggie chicken nuggets, veggie straws, cheese flowers

While we are on the subject of pumpkin, I've decided that I only want to eat pumpkin foods for the next few days.  They all just seem so yummy right now.  Pumpkin bread, pumpkin soup, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin ice cream...bring on the pumpkin!  I think I'm going to make pumpkin crunch cake tonight.  Yum!