A Walk in the Clouds

A Walk in the Clouds is a bittersweet love story/movie that I enjoyed. Today I had my own version of that phrase and it has changed my attitude for tonight and tomorrow.
Day 2 of vacation, the am began at 6:30 central time (since we are in eastern time) go figure. I had the big 3 set up so they could play DS's without disturbing anyone but little #4 made her presence known and woke us all up. We ate cereal and played around a bit before heading out at approx 9:15. Kids were about the same up, down and all around. In fact while trying to take a girls pic then boys pic the words if it stays like this today we will not go anywhere tomorrow came out of my mouth. I had stormed away not even taking the pic it was so bad. I did laugh to myself when I heard Daddy say, "Now see boys what you have done."
Despite it all we headed to a place called Ober Gaitlinburg. It is basically a small amusement type park in the mountains. We had to take a tram kind of lift to get there and the ride was more than amazing. Besides the view when passing each of the 5 towers it dips and sways causing the 120 or less capacity crowd to ooooh and ahhhh. Funny stuff! Once at the top we took chair lifts to an alpine slide which is basically sled style boards to ride down. It worked out perfect as 7 and up could ride by themselves. #3 and Daddy rode together, as well as #4 and me to no surprise. #4 thought she should drive pulling up on the break and making me work twice as hard to go fast. We did this over and over till the uphill walk from end of slide to lift took its toll. Next was a toboggan kind of ride. Again rotating people not taking #4 occurred but #1 only did that a time or two claiming tummy ache. I can see that this child will never be a roller coaster kid, whereas #2 couldn't get enough going alone many times. After this Daddy, #1 and #2 headed to take the lift to the very top of the mountain and I stayed behind with little ones. We rode kiddie rides and played on the playground. Being not so tall, and not so heavy has a huge plus cause I crawled through everything with them.
Dark skies above and fading little girl made us choose to head back down the tram and seek food. Course, fast food really is just as expensive as a sit down meal (yes 31.00 OMG)! Then we decided to drive through the Smokies National park drive loop while #4 napped. This lead us to see bears on 2 different occasions. Once in a tree, and another playing cubs. We also saw several deer though not as exciting cause that we see all the time at home. Beyond that we stopped to use restrooms and revelled in 1800's style life with house/buildings to tour. Who knew how very much the kids would get into seeing this historical stuff. Friday our plan is to go back and hike etc more. 2 1/2 hours later and another restroom stop we made our way back to the park. It began to downpour moments after we arrived so we enjoyed some dip n dots, a vacation only tradition. How funny it is that the simplest thing becomes such a special thing. I am pretty sure we could get them at home, but they made a big deal out of such tradition, last year was our first taste in IN.
A bit of shopping since they each were blessed with some cash to spend from an Aunt net, and a carousel ride too. The rain stopped and back outside we promptly galloped (#4 anyway). We worked on a maze where you had to find four letters and stamp your paper, then enjoy a prize when done. The kids repeated it several times. Miniature golf came next. #4 was hilarious. She sometimes let me help her, but every time would hit it once and then carry it to the hole, put it in and say Yeah real loud. Smart way to always win I suppose. We then met a sweet couple who took #2 on the cyclone ride when one of us had to stay with #4 and #3 wanted to go requiring two adults. We did force #1 to ride it but since it was a bit fast and a covered slide he bailed for future turns. Lastly, the middle two and Daddy rode a swing. Whew!
On the return ariel tram ride it was dark. Some beautiful sights at night can be found. But my favorite was the clouds hovering the city lights. #1 noticed we would be going right through it. #4 began screaming, "No cloud, No Cloud!! I don't want cloud!" I am not sure what she thought it was, but it took several minutes to calm her. She mentioned hot, hurt. When has she ever been in a cloud? Luckily, just as we reached it she was happy and quiet again. It was in that moment that I realized just how unique that experience was. Sure there are zillions of people in the world who have flown through them etc. But not every kid gets to say I went through a cloud. Something happened in that moment. Everyone was tired, but peaceful. Everyone was grateful for out experience and not concerned with others. We finally found our family bond. We sang worship songs on the way back, highlighting God's amazing love. #1 said he stopped singing for a little bit because he was choked up on it for a minute (my tender heart for God little man). We devised a system for negativity and if it goes as planned I will share that with you tomorrow.
This was a very full day and ended up keeping us out to just past 9pm. Watermelon for dinner and off to bed they all headed by 9:30. I do hope they actually sleep in:)Praise God for the time, good..bad...or otherwise. No matter how it goes next we had this time together. I call that priceless for sure!