So This Is Knoxvile

Tennessee Top 10 (in no particular order)

1. Dollywood (kids #1 favorite): 10 am-8 pm found us riding, screaming, roller coastering, nauseating, line queuing, drenching and drying, bird show watching, walking and walking all over the theme park. We heard a lot of her music but no glimpses of Dolly herself; that would've surprised Alex as he commented that she is dead.

Wrinkled prune feet after a day of wearing wet socks and shoes

2. Custom Foods tour: Kids and I met Scott's coworkers whom we'd heard so much about. Tony, in charge of Operations, guided us on a factory tour where giant vats of macaroni boiled, huge kettles of cheese cooked, I cried in the onion chopping room (think Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), assembly lines where soup was poured, vacuum sealed, capped and labeled. The kids froze in  warehouse-size freezers and almost refused to walk through another to reach the robot, where we rode inside it's cab and saw how it organizes, sorts, inventories and retrieves product in a ten story freezer. It was cool (ha-pun intended!) to see what Scott's been doing and impressive the amount of details, controls and steps necessary to supply only America's finest restaurants!

Definitely not this year's Christmas card

3. The Great Smokey Mountains: Cades Cove is a scenic nine mile loop in a beautiful valley surrounded by mountains, which really do look smokey! A few times we got out of the car to explore homesteads once inhabited by settlers. Despite only seeing two deer, a certain little girl was petrified of bears and had a meltdown anytime we wandered near the woods.

This picture interrupted the complains about the heat, bugs, scratchy grass and pleas to go back to the hotel room.. true adventurers, this clan.

Stopping along a cold stream to splash and throw rocks proved to be a favorite activity and made me wish for opportunities for the kids to spend more time 'in nature'. This area and the town of Gatlinburg ('The Gateway to the Smokeys', dripping with tourists and cheesy shops) reminded so much of the of Northern Colorado canyons and  Estes Park.

Alex slipped while chasing his flip flop downstream, but saved it!

Proud of his rock pile

4. The other UT: Lincoln is our family's University of Texas Longhorns, burnt orange fan. We quickly learned the University of Tennessee, has a huge fan following and everybody wears orange or displays a Vols flag.

5. Downtown Knoxville: Our hotel was walking distance to a popular outdoor walking mall, the University and Worlds Fair Park. I loved having so many things to do and people (and their dogs) watching right the outside our door but the kids grew tired of all that walking.

We rode the elevator to the 4th floor with impressive 360 degree views of the area

6. Canoeing: We beat the heat by paddling around the Tennessee River. Saw herons and a vulture but no bears.

7. Night at the Hunters:  We made this trip was because Customs Food's owner hosts an annual summer dinner at his home. Situated on 14 lush acres, 20 adults enjoyed a gorgeous catered meal poolside on his deck. It was a lovely evening and Scott's coworkers and spouses we're so kind and genuine.

8. Night with Chelsea: As we enjoyed a kid-free evening, the kids enjoyed an adult-free evening in our hotel room with Chelsea, the front desk clerk! With all of his recent travels here, Scott's on a first-name basis with some hotel staff, so he was able to wrangle a sweet college student into a night of babysitting. Lincoln was excited to order room service for the first time and they walked for dessert at Rita's Italian Ice, a new favorite, which they had almost every day.

9. Brave: One hot afternoon we stayed cool by seeing the Disney film. Cute story, but Danica spent half of it on my lap with her head buried in my shirt because she was scared of, you guessed it.. the bear.

10. Weather: Upon our arrival, it was a fabulous 75 degrees. As the days went on so did the thermometer and locals were abuzz about how unusual this heat was. It hit 105, setting a record for Knoxville's all-time high. Surprisingly and thankfully it did not feel humid.