Here At Last...Rocky Top, TN

I can't believe it, but it's been a month since we left to go for a little vacation to visit my parents in Knoxville, TN. It was a short trip, but we made the very most of it. As always, I was looking for the next great story to tell on my blog and our trip proved to be full of them. The first full day we were there, a huge storm blew in. It ripped one of my parents new plum trees right out of the ground. The thing about plum trees is that they cluster together kinda like birch trees. So for one tree you may have four or five trunks growing up from the same root system. But plum trees don't have extensive root systems. In fact they just kinda hang out at the surface of the ground and grow outward. So it really doesn't take much force to uproot them. (This is an incredible spiritual analogy...but I won't go into that today.)
After the weather calmed a bit, we all went out to check it out.

My parents and Scott worked at cutting it apart and clearing it away from the flower beds while I took pictures from my blog--of course!

As I was taking my blog pictures, I couldn't help but notice that my dad and Scott were identically dressed.

The only difference was my father's shoes. He has a tendancy to do all sorts of messy things with his dress shoes on. As a child I remember many Sundays coming home from church and while us kids changed clothes and my mom started lunch, my dad went straight to his workshop still in his suit. We all still to this day tease him about his choice of footwear for working around the house. It's one of those quirks that I absolutley love about my dad. I hope that he never stops wearing his dress shoes to cut down trees!!!


So that was our first day in TN. The next day was the Forth of July. We had plans to BBQ but it rained on and off most of the day, so we went to the brand new Apple store that had just opened instead, where my sister finally gave in to Scott's constant reccommendations. She was the last Martin to fall to his Apple tempting ways. (Once again there seems to be a spiritual lesson somewhere in that...hmmm.) In the evening we went downtown for the firworks show. We parked in the parking ramp right accorss the street from the World's Fair park. It was really cool. The Knoxville Symphany played and there was food. Our little family had a blast!


Once the fireworks started, the symphony played to the rhythm of the explosions. It was so cool!



So afterwards, we headed back to our car in the ramp...with about 10,000 other people--not even kinding. We hadn't even thought about how many other people had parked in the ramp just for the fireworks. We were parked on the 7th floor of the 8 floor ramp. There were 6 floors FILLED with cars that were all leaving at the same time. We sat in our cars for over an hour waiting for the ramp to empty. We had fun anyway. It was so late by this time that I think we all got a little giddy.

Scott and my dad got bored waiting in the car, so they walked down a ways to watch the traffic. When things finally began to move for our floor they came back to the car. It was stiffling hot in the ramp. Ugh! Like an oven!!


But finally it was our turn...


That was day two of our little vacation. Day three took us to Ober Gatlinberg. To get there you have to ride this tram which they pack full of people. It's a little unsettling, but kinda exhillerating.




My dad had been given two wristbands good for all the rides, go carts, chair lift, and a bunch of other stuff through his work. (Wausau Insurance insures the Ober Gatlinberg park, and it's one of my dad's accounts.) Anyway, my parents gave them to Scott and me. We had so much fun. We rode all the rides--well almost all the rides and just had a blast together while they watched with Natalie. We all went up the chair lift, which has a breath-taking view on a clear day. It's not bad even when it's cloudy.



At the very top there's a hillbilly band that plays and a really great view--again on a clear day. Natalie wasn't a big fan of taking pictures, but we snapped a few anyway.



As we walked around Ober Gatlinberg, my dad kept trying to get us to go on this huge waterslide ride. Ok! I was not wearing a bathing suit--Scott hates water rides--and there were a million steps to climb. We had just moved into our house and I was glad to be on vacation from my steps. Looking at those steps did remind me of my steps at home. It's roughly the same amount of steps, don't you think
The steps to the waterslide...

And my steps here at home...

So similar, don't you think?

Well, anyway, that was day three and by day four we were headed home. I told you it was a fast trip. We had such a great time. I was waiting to post this until my mom sent me her pictures, but she's taking too long and my pictures-to-post are piling up. So, if she has some really great ones--I'll add them later.

Until then--Happy Blogging to you!