Tennessee Trip with the Kids

A couple weeks ago, Jeremy suggested to me that I take the kids on a road trip to Ohio to see my Mama Pat because she couldn't come down and visit like we had hoped.  On the way we had planned to stop in Tennessee for a few days to visit Jeremy's parents and his sister and her family.  We ended up staying longer than we anticipated and had a terrific time!

 

First of all, I got my mother-in-law (and myself) hooked on Geocaching.  Geocaching is basically a world wide "treasure hunt".  People all over the world hide 'geocaches' in various locations.  Some geocaches are just big enough for a small piece of paper for people to sign and log that they found the cache.  Others are larger and full or trinkets that you can take and leave new ones as a reward.  We had a fun time!

This was my first geocache ever. It had a surprise in it, that I think hooked me for life ;)

It's probably wrong to post this, but I wanted to show how clever these caches can be.  This was a small tube connected to a bolt in a pillar.  The GPS coordinate along with the hints help us figure out the bolt had something to do with the cache.  This was our second cache and the creativity hooked us even more:)

 We had a lot of fun hanging out with the cousins.  Their ages were fun, Nicole (6), Seth (5), Hannah (4), Suzie (3), Nathan (2), and James (1).

This cabin is dated around 1790!

The sign says this is a portion of the first wagon trail to the Cumberland Settlements in East TN.  Blazed in 1787.

There was a geocache down that old wagon road.  We had to walk through this creepy cemetery.  I had to keep my thoughts to myself as I walked through this old lot.

I loved that Nicole was picking flowers and sticking them in her pocket!

How I felt after the hike!  hahaha...just kidding.

These kids were always together.  They would just sit around and play pretend, make up games or talk. They loved spending time with one another.  I hope they always have close relationships.

We found another geocache!  This one had some great goodies.

Cousins

Grammy's got "King James" in there as my kids like to say.

James is SUCH a cutie!

Our cold toes.  It was in the 50s!!! Brrrr.

I have more pictures that will be posted later.