About a month ago, Richard realized he had some unclaimed vacation weeks that he had to use before August 1st so he got a week assigned at random. I tried to get the week off too, but it was too late to ask off. So I still had to work Tuesday afternoon, but I had Friday off for the Holiday weekend. Since I had the majority of the week off, we decided to just see if anything came up last minute using my parents time share. Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't... but we decided to leave it as a gamble.
Two days before Rich's vacation, my mom called me to let me know a mountain house had come up in Dillard, Georgia. We had never heard of Dillard before, but we were up for an adventure!! So we booked, and started packing!!
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| Katy Ellis getting some road trip grub at Cracker Barrel....little did we know how much "country cookin' " we would have on this trip! |
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| "King me!" |
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| Rolling with our crazy crew! |
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| Sky Valley Resort had a beautiful little chapel on the grounds that played different hymns every hour and at 9pm played taps. |
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| Our first night, we decided to hike down to see the waterfall on the resort property- Mud Creek Falls. |
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| Beautiful. |
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| Blakely and her daddy finding "treasure." |
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| Rich and his girls!! |
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| One of the BEST things about this trip was the weather!! In Lexington the week before we left, the temperature had been over 100 degrees everyday. Miserable. In the mountains, the temperature was 60's to low 70's during the day and 50's at night. Bliss, pure bliss. It was like spring again! |
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| First night, playing outside and not sweating! Amazing!! We may be mountain people now! I don't know if I'll ever go to the beach again!! |
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| Blakely and I loved sneaking up on the wildlife and seeing how close we could get. We got within 4 feet of the baby bunny! She was so excited. We also chased gophers, but never got closer than 20 feet. |
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| KE and her daddy!! |
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| Blakely was so excited to be playing outside again! She kept rolling on the grass yelling "everybody roll!!!!" |
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| In the afternoons while the girls napped, Richard and I would set out on the deck and rest and relax in the 70 degree weather!! ***sigh*** |
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| Blakely loved hanging out with her daddy all week. When Rich and I talked about memories that we think we will have of this trip in 5 years, Richard said that he would remember how cuddly the girls were this week. Blakely always wanted to be as close to her Daddy as possible, and Katy Ellis learned how to give hugs and kisses!! xoxox |
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| This little princess had such a fun week being with mommy and daddy!! |
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| Katy Ellis loves to be tickled and to tickle you! She would keep coming back for more! She giggled like a mad woman!! One of my favorite memories from the week was an impromptu dance party at the end of watching Cinderella. Something so magical about this era of parenting where they think everything we do is the coolest. I love them so much!!! |
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| I thought we would be spending the week in the pool, but with the weather being so cool it was hard to want to go swimming. Thankfully the pool was heated to 80 degrees, so we did manage to go up there a couple of nights for an after dinner dip. Blakely even got to keep working on her swimming. |
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| Even better than the pool was the HOT TUB! It was only 98 degrees, so both girls were able to get in too! Blakely loved the "little pool." So much fun to go to the hot tub after a day of hiking. |
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| Tuesday, I had to work from 2-5pm. I left the mountain house at 8am, drove 4 hours home, emergently grabbed some warmer clothes for Rich and the girls, had CFA lunch with Mom, Alyssa and the boys, worked and then drove back to Sky Valley that night. By 9pm, I was tucked back in at the Mountain house with a cup of coffee and a roaring fire. Whew!! Whirl wind of a day, but so worth it to get to be on vacation with my little family! It had been 98 degrees in West Columbia when I left work, and when I got out of the car in Sky Valley it was in the 50s! Loved enjoying these chilly nights in front of the fire. Such a magical vacation. |
