Ice Storm 2015

Monday, February 16, we settled in at home and watched it pour rain, then slowly see everything turn to ice. We were out of school/work that day anyway due to it being President's Day and because of the ice storm that hit at home, our schools were closed the rest of the week! We had a few days of snow as well where it would lay a pretty dusting down on top of the ice. Towards the end of the week, we were getting cabin fever pretty bad so we braved the icy roads and made our way to Dustin and Christina's house to hang out and let the kids run wild! It was much needed!!

Since we were home all week, we went outside everyday to walk (carefully) on our iced covered driveway and yard and "played" with what little dusting of snow we got that day. Because we were home all week, I'm pretty sure I cleaned my house multiple times, threw a bunch of stuff away, and made a trip to Goodwill. When Friday came around, we happily took the kids to Jerry and Nancy's house that morning so they could spend the night with them. They needed a change of scenery and we needed a day of doing absolutely nothing and not reporting to a thousand "momma" and "daddys" for a day.

You feel me?!

:)

We took all the back roads home and were still so amazed at what ice can do to back country roads. Everything was beautiful. We ran a few errands and then went home to eat lunch. The rest of the day was spent watching HGTV, napping, and cleaning out a few cabinets in the kitchen and laundry room. We ate chili for supper and watched a movie that night. 

Romantic huh?

My favorite kind of kid free night!

Here are a few pictures of our week at home during the ice storm.

The first few are from Monday. The day of rain which froze everything over.

Because of all this beautiful ice, our power went out around 3 AM Tuesday morning. We have a ceiling fan and a plug in fan in our room that we turn on every night and we both knew something had happend when the silence from our fans not working woke us up. When the kids woke up later that morning and I got out from under the covers, I realized how cold the house felt. I caught myself walking into rooms flipping on the light and then saying "duh" as the light didn't come on. Such a habit!

The kids kept asking to go outside to "play" in the ice/snow and we weren't really wanting to just becasue we didn't have a warm house to come back into once we were frozen from being outside. But we decided we needed to get them out of the house so Adam started his truck and once we were frozen, we could hop in a warm up. Landon and I got in first. We still had the DVD players in from our Pigeon Forge trip so while we were getting warm, Landon was in the back watching a movie. After some time, we decided to go on a ride to look at everything. By the time we got back, it was lunch time and soon after nap time. With our power still being off, we decided to pack up and head over to my parents for the rest of the day. As we were about to walk out of the door, the power came back on! We went on anyway since they were watching the kids for us later that afternoon since we had our appt to get our taxes done. While the kids were still sleeping, Adam and I went to town and made a pit stop at Sonic then on to do our taxes. When we finally got back, my mom had dinner ready for us which was sooo nice!! It was delicious. We didn't leave until much later that night then we put the kids to bed when we got home. 

To pass time that Tuesday morning since nothing worked in our house, this is what we did

We took turns shooting the nerf gun at plastic cups

ha

More ice pictures

Nothing but ice

Every single branch.limb had ice wrapped around it.

So so beautiful 

See that lovely branch in the background? Ice was too heavy for it!

Wednesday Adam braved the roads and took Adalyn with him to the farm. Landon and I hung out all day. Love being able to give him my undivided attention!

If you know Landon, you know he is not too keen on having his picture taken. I normally snap about 20, just hoping I got 1 with him actually looking AND smiling at the camera at the same time. On this afternoon, he specially asked that I take his picture with each of his super heroes. 

I happily obliged!

(ignore his peanut butter mouth :))

These last three pictures were taken Friday evening when the kids were with grandparents. This was the most snow we had received all week. It was so pretty!

Because of all the ice, our schools were also closed on Monday, February 23. So if you count President's Day, we were off for 6 days! 

Love working for the school system!!

Thank you Lord for a beautiful week of ice and snow!

Pigeon Forge 2015

President's Day weekend was a few weekends ago so that meant the Clark's were in Pigeon Forge with the rest of my family! It's our yearly trip in February to be with family and also to celebrate my dad and brothers birthdays. Adam and I left as soon as we got home from work on Friday, February 13. The kids were so excited to be going on a trip! Since Valentine's was the next day, we went ahead and gave them their little gifts right before we left. They each received a movie and a shirt. I figured two new DVD's to add to our collection would be great! Especially since we had a long drive ahead of us I knew they would enjoy watching something they hadn't seen in a while. Finding Nemo and Lilo and Stitch has been a hit! They had snacks, their blankets, and a movie playing and we were on the road. Traveling with them (or I should say Landon...) is sooo much easier now. Landon was difficult to go on a trip with when he was younger so I am so very glad he grew out of that stage! 

We stopped before Knoxville and ate at Burger King and then before we knew it, we had arrived! We were excited to see everyone. We stayed at the cabin where we had previously stayed for a few years prior to last year. 6 bedrooms so that meant Landon had a room all to himself! Adalyn stayed upstairs with Casey and Autumn where there is a full size bed plus two bunk beds. She was in heaven.

Saturday morning we woke up and ate a big country breakfast like we always do then got ready for our day. The guys went to a shooting range and to all the boring, knife/camping stores. Adalyn, Autumn and I got ready and picked up Adam and headed to Tanger Outlet for a day of shopping! We decided to bring the stroller for Adalyn so she hopped in and enjoyed the ride. It was freezing! But we got a lot of shopping done! We started building Adalyn's wardrobe for Spring/Summer and you just can't beat all the deals you find there in the children's stores. We enjoyed our time and after a few hours, we made our way back to the cabin. Adam and I wanted to take the kids that night to the Island at Pigeon Forge to ride the huge Ferris wheel so Adam went ahead and grilled our steaks and we (and Autumn) ate earlier than everyone else was planning to. Shopping made us hungry and they had a wind advisory out so we were scared they might close it so we wanted to go as soon as we could. It was freezing and so windy but we had so much fun that night! The kids absolutely loved the Ferris wheel and all the bright lights. We waited in line for about 15 minutes before it was our turn. The view from the top was beautiful, especially at night! After our ride, we walked around and visited some stores and on the coldest night, we had a craving for ice cream. :) Once back at the cabin we celebrated birthdays with cake and presents for my dad and brother. 

Happy Birthday you two!

Sunday morning we had another big breakfast and then made our way to the Alpine Coaster. It was located about a mile from our cabin which made it so convenient! Adam and I, along with a few friends, did this in October and we knew everyone would enjoy it! The weather Sunday was sunny, but so bitterly cold and windy. Landon was tall enough to ride so Adalyn rode with me and Landon was with Adam. Adam later told me Landon would say, " I'm so excited! I'm so excited!" over and over again as they were going up the mountain. It is such a fast and fun alpine coaster I think we will probably do it every year! 

After that, everyone went back to the cabin and we left the kids with them while Adam and I went out to do even more shopping. I so enjoy getting alone time with just Adam so we shopped the rest of the afternoon and hit a lot of stores that we hadn't the day before. 

While our weekend was going along, a big topic was the weather that was coming towards our home towns. Ice was the big concern and so we made the decision to leave late Sunday night instead of first thing Monday morning like was normally planned. If we hadn't, we would have been driving through bad weather conditions and we just weren't interested in doing that! We were in no hurry to leave so we finished our shopping, hung out at the cabin, packed and then went to Mellow Mushroom for supper. We left there after 8:00 I believe and made the trip back home. Because we left so late, there was no traffic and I think that was the quickest trip home from Pigeon Forge we have ever made. The kids started out watching a movie but then soon wiped out. 

It was nice to wake up Monday morning in our beds. The Ice Storm was the big talk on all news channels so we sat back and waited on it to hit us! It pretty much rained all morning but even though it was raining, we could see icicles start to form and then throughout the day, the icicles were getting longer and longer and before we knew it, everything was covered in ice! That will be for another post but I am glad we all made the decision to leave Sunday night instead of Monday. Christopher, Brandy and Hunter left Monday morning since they were headed back home to Florida, they would be missing all the bad weather. 

It was such a fun and relaxing weekend! the kids were wonderful. Just another sign they are growing up on us!!

Now, for a ton of pictures!

Landon loved Hunter's digger

 Those super heroes come every where with us!

While walking, we came across a store that was devoted to nothing but Super Heroes and Disney characters. Any little boy or girls dream!

 Landon just might take after his granddaddy and love guns

Ice cream break!

We had such a wonderful weekend!

Read about our trip to Gatlinburg when Adalyn was 11 months old here
Pigeon Forge 2012
Pigeon Forge 2013
Pigeon Forge 2014