Our first vacation

This was the first year Landon has been off for Spring Break and me too! This is actually the first year we haven't led a GO Trip or Landon has normally had to work through Spring Break. So I was really excited and wanted us to plan to do something. So we decided to go to Chattanooga. What can you really do with a 2 year old and 5 month old that isn't stressful when traveling?! Our goal was two things: Chattanooga Aquarium and swimming. That's it. simple. We gave our self the whole day to travel, which it only takes 4 hours to get there without stopping and a whole day traveling back. No goals, no set time, just stopping when we wanted, eating snacks, and enjoying being with each other. We left Friday and stopped in Nashville, stopped to see a friend and ate lunch. Landon took me to Goodwill and I piddled around for an hour. Eli played, Madi ate, a trip to Sonic and back in the car. We actually made it to Chattanooga in the late afternoon and went swimming in the indoor hotel swimming pool. Which Eli LOVED! He has no fear of the water--And I mean no fear. His eyes were so red when he got out from jumping in face first over and over without shutting his eyes. Poor kid. He talked about it all weekend and we even went back and swam the next day. We spent Saturday at the aquarium which was so good and definitely worth going. My favorite part was seeing the sea otters and watching a man dive in and feed the fish. It was pretty great! Then we drove around Chattanooga while the kids slept in the car, ate dinner and went to bed. Sunday was pretty much the same coming back. We stopped in Franklin to see more friends Devin and Cara Maddox and their sweet little boy Duke and then headed home. 

Over all the trip was great! I was a little hesitant spending the money for a trip the kids wouldn't remember and wasn't sure we needed to spend any extra money  I had been saving but it was really worth it. Just the time away from Jackson and being together was really great. Even though Eli will not remember. I will. I will remember the sweet things he said. How excited he was to swim. His fear of the sting rays, chasing butterflies, eating lots of suckers and his love for Landon and wanting to be with him all the time! It was all so special to me. I love our family.