Our first road trip!

This July we took our very first extended road trip vacation. After months of planning and worrying it would turn into a 'Griswald Family Vacation', we took off and headed east. We visited Hot Springs, AR; Memphis, TN; Nashville, TN; Pigeon Forge/Gatlinburg, TN; and finished up in Ashville, NC. And of course made the trip back home. A little shy of 2,500 total miles driven and Kal slept a total of 5 hours on the road! 3 from Ashville to Nashville on the return leg and then about 1.5 hours as we pulled into OKC to Lawton. Oh, and she slept briefly from Knoxville to Pigeon Forge. Unbelievable!

I decided to put my 'mom' hat on for most of the trip while Shawn took a majority of the pictures. Well, except a few when Kal could grab my mini cam and clip a few pix on her own. (She's been with mom one too many times on photo shoots I'm finding out).

We were gone for about 8 days that were packed with adventure and fun. Certainly not a trip I'd love to take any time soon again (a little too much time in a car for my taste). But it was certainly a great time to build a lot of family memories that I will cherish forever. And the best part - no one got sick!! Whoo hoo!!! This is a rarity for us. Our last go at a vacation resulted in Kallie throwing up for 3 days (mostly on me) leaving early from the skiing trip with the rest of my family and going straight in to the doctor! NOT my idea of fun!!!! That trip sort of stuck with us so we packed every single drug we had at home to head off any possible sore throat, cough, upset stomach, vomiting and well, everything else!

I was able to give Shawn and Kallie a tour around Nashville, a place I've spent time in over the years, took a tour of Graceland, where Kallie scored a pink Caddie magnet (of course), saw the Biltmore Estate which was unbelievable, did some wine tastings with Kal getting in on the fun with tastings of their grape juices. Took in Dollywood, a Ripley aquarium and too many more things to list. It was one of the best vaca's I've ever taken!! Had two of my most favorite people with me and now it's back to work!