"Chagganoota"

Well, we did it again!  We embraced the desire to be spontaneous and adventurous.  On Friday afternoon, after the kids woke up from their naps, we loaded up the minivan and headed to Chattanooga for an overnight.  We had such a good time!  Jonathan mentioned the idea to me last weekend, but we didn't officially decide to go until Friday morning.  I spent most of Friday cleaning and packing, and after naps we got on the road.  Chattanooga is only 1.5 hours away, but there is a bridge under construction which added a long bit of sitting in traffic, so it took us longer to get there.  We were hoping to check-in at the hotel and then find somewhere to eat in downtown Chatty, but with all of the traffic, we decided to make supper simple, so we stopped at a Chick-fil-a.  After that, we found our hotel, unloaded our stuff, and headed out!

The kids were thrilled and so excited to be in "Chagganoota."  I just love it when they mispronounce things...so cute!  We walked to the pedestrian bridge where there is an awesome ice cream place called The Ice Cream Show.  Then, we took our yummy treats to the bridge to look at the beautiful view!  The kids loved the bridge.  Liam liked the big nails that line the floor because he thought they were "money."  He kept trying to pick them up (they are about the size of half-dollars).  Nora and Liam just ran and ran, so we ended up having to play Red Light-Green Light to keep them from running to far away from us.  After about thirty minutes of running, we decided to head back to the hotel to get prepped for bed.

Keep in mind, this is the first time since Liam was a baby that we've been in a hotel room all together.  We weren't sure how Liam would do not sleeping in his crib, but he had a blast sleeping with his daddy.  I think Jonathan had one of the best night's sleep that he has had in a while because Liam actually slept instead of waking up all hours of the night screaming hysterically.  (That's another post).  Stella slept in the pack-n-play, and Nora (also known as Wiggle Worm) shared a bed with me.  I am so glad we did this because the kids exceeded my expectations and slept great.

One fun thing was that we were staying very close to the Baseball Stadium and there was a game going on that night.  Just as we all got tucked into bed, the game ended and there was a fireworks show.  We could hear the fireworks going off, so we got the kids up and opened up the curtains and were able to watch the entire fireworks show from our hotel room!  It was great!  Liam definitely liked to watch that.  What a special treat!

The next morning, we got up, got dressed, ate breakfast, and packed up our stuff.  Then, we headed to Rock City which is actually in Georgia, not Tennessee.  I didn't know that!  The kids really enjoyed it, and so did Jonathan and I!  It was beautiful, although my only complaint is that our tour guide was a bit speedy for me.  I would have liked to take it a little more slowly, but when the guide is an almost four year old, you just have to keep up!

After Rock City, we found a local place to eat lunch and then we rode the Lookout Mountain Incline Railway.  It was just okay....definitely not worth the money, in our opinion.  If you are ever in the area, you can drive up to the top of Lookout Mountain which is probably what we would have done had we known.  But, it was fun and a neat experience for the kids.  By the time we got back, it was mid-afternoon and the kids were getting pretty tired, so we decided to head back home.  After a quick pit-stop at Dairy Queen so the kids could enjoy their first Blizzards, we took a scenic route so we could avoid the construction traffic we encountered on the way down to Chatty.


I hope that we take advantage of having Chattanooga so close!  There is so much to do!  It's definitely one of my new favorite places.