Five Years, Full of Love

 Five years ago, on July 21, 2006 we were married on a beautiful July evening in a vineyard. 

For five years I have been married to my best friend. Five unbelievable, beautiful, exhilarating years.

We knew we wanted to do something special for our five year anniversary, so after thinking about it we both decided on Gatlinburg, TN. We both love it there, it's far enough away to feel like a little vacation, but close enough to not take away an entire day of traveling. 

So, the plan was to leave Thursday evening, and spend three nights down there in a cabin. 

Mom & Dad watched our boys for us, we were SO thankful. The boys had so much fun with them, Case couldn't wait for them to get there that Thursday afternoon. He woke up from his nap, and when they weren't there yet he just cried and cried! I knew that he would be just fine with them for the entire weekend - and Rhetter's loves everyone so we knew he'd be fine too. :)

So the time rolled around for us to head out for our Anniversary Getaway. 

We were SO excited! 

 The first night we hung out at the cabin, unpacked clothes, and settled in. We relaxed in the hot tub, and enjoyed the view. I also surprised Matt with my Secret Anniversary video I made for us. I collected all of the pictures I could find of "Just Us" adding babies along the way, to a 20 minute DVD of pictures and a few short clips of Casers and Rhetter's when they were itty bitty. I think he liked it, pretty sure he teared up. ;)

I was a bawling mess even though I made the thing. HA! :)

The next morning, we got up early (thanks to me, I couldn't sleep in for the life of me! I kept thinking I heard Case saying "Mommy!" when I was half asleep ha!) I was just kind of walking around, then Matt got in his "wake up let's go" mode! We ended up getting ready for the day...and headed to pick up our JEEP WRANGLER for the weekend! WOO HOO! We were going to just rent it for one day, 24 hours but Matt said "What the heck" so went ahead and rented it for two. 

SO MUCH FUN.

So that Friday morning, we headed out to Cade's Cove, we both love it out there. It is so refreshingly natural, and beautiful.

 

  

Breathtaking. 

After Cade's Cove we went adventuring a little further with the Jeep.

  Then we headed into town for lunch and the outlet malls. 

We walked around forever, and the only thing we bought was ice cream!

A monsoon came out of nowhere, so we sat on a bench and ate our fast melting treats. I called Dad to check up on the boys. He said Gunner was a big crazy dog, but so perfect for the boys, and that the boys were doing so well. He also made sure to tell me we had two very sweet boys.

(Made my day!)

Then we hopped in our wet Jeep and went back to the cabin! 

 We literally crashed in front of the TV, it was so nice being just completely lazy without a care in the world. Finally, we got motivated enough to get ready and go on down to downtown Gatlinburg. 

I made him take a ton of pictures. :) 

We found a Mellow Mushroom, we have one in Lexington but we have been there maybe once or twice. It's so far away from the house, we never think about going there. So, it was a treat to have it right there on the strip. I was excited about the pizza, but Matt was even more excited about his favorite beer Fat Tire...on draft! Sooo yummy. We had a Pitcher (or maybe 2) and the Caesar Pizza....Holy Cow it's yummy. 

It was so SO SO much fun having Matty all to myself, just holding hands walking from store to store together. Simply enjoying each other. 

That evening, I checked my e-mail on my phone, and Mom had updated me about the boy's days there. I LOVED LOVED LOVED that she did this for me! Matt and I just read them and smiled and laughed, she talked about how the boys played so well together, and she loved making Rhett smile. That when Case ate her carrots he said "Yum yum" and that it made her day. Told us about Case and Grand-Dad watching the Red's play, and that Rhett was such a happy baby. About Case praying at night, and making her sit down next to him. So priceless. :)

The next morning was our big trip over in Cherokee, we had planned on spending a day driving around with the Jeep from the beginning, and we were so excited. We woke up early and headed out. It was an hour or so drive just to get to where we were going to drive, and it was fa-reezing in the Jeep going 45+ mph! I was SO thankful I had a baseball hat and had brought my rain jacket just in case! Kept the wind off of me a little bit! We stopped for a picnic lunch right before we entered the trail...then we headed out for our 28 mile route down the mountain.

It was absolutely beautiful. So refreshing, and perfect. 

 

After such a wonderful day out adventuring, we were e.x.h.a.u.s.t.e.d. when we got back to the cabin. We both agreed that we couldn't sit around for a long time, or we would both just crash and probably not wake up! 

So, we hung around for just a little while, and got ready and headed downtown for another night on the strip. Somehow we ended up at Mellow Mushroom again....no complaints from either of us! This time we had the White Gourmet pizza, and of course Fat Tire on Draft again. The White Gourmet was SO GOOD. 

We walked around, went shopping for Rhett (we got a toy for Case in Cherokee) and were deciding on going on the sky lift or go back to the house, play cards, drink a few beers and hit the hot tub again. Then it started to sprinkle, so we decided to head on back. We were still a few blocks from where we parked the Jeep when it started pouring. I mean, a torrential downpour. We were just cracking up, it was even funnier jumping into the jeep with puddles in the floor board mats! It was like Forrest Gump rain, it was coming in sideways. 

 We loved it though, just took it all in as a memory. :)

& for Memory's sake, here are some pictures of our cute little cabin. 

On the way home we stopped at the Christmas Store (one of my favorites!) and bought a few ornaments. We spotted a Mellow Mushroom across the street and ate there AGAIN.
I think they should have given us a couple of T-Shirts for free. 
 We couldn't WAIT to get back to our boys, I was so giddy when we pulled into the neighborhood...we couldn't wait to smoother them with hugs and kisses!

What a beautiful five years it has been. The most wonderful, challenging, exhilarating, breathtaking five years of my entire life.
Wouldn't change them for anything in this entire world. 

So very thankful for everything God has blessed me with, but especially thankful for such an amazing man to spend my life with, and our unbelievable babies. 

With little ones, it is so easy to slip into a routine and forget to find time for each other sometimes.

The weekend we spent in the Smokies was everything we had hoped for, an amazing, memory filled trip we will never forget.

Love you Matty. Thank you for everything. :)