Pigeon Forge

Half of these pictures were taken on my iPod, so the quality varies! 

Mom and I left Thursday morning for the Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge area. We were supposed to meet my granny and my aunt around lunch time, in Gatlinburg. Well, we got there about 30 minutes earlier than they did, a fact of which we were very proud. They were just sure we were going to be late. We weren't.

We ate at O'Charley's for lunch, then walked around downtown Gatlinburg in the afternoon. I bought a couple silk wrap skirts, and a couple gifts for a certain someone. Said gifts will be given in July (said someone's birthday) and I don't know how I'm supposed to wait until then. Aggravating. Anyway, I think that's all I bought. We walked through so many interesting stores, and still didn't see but about half of them, I guess! Here's me and granny...

At lunch, the waiter brought me a brownie and granny asked him if he was going to sing to me. How embarrassing! He said he would, but that he sounded like a "mule in a hail storm!" He sang, and everyone else joined in, and it didn't sound bad at all. But then, I've never heard a mule in a hail storm...maybe it's a good thing.

We had leftovers from our lunch, and the waiter asked if we wanted boxes. Being that we couldn't take anything with us, we said no. Well, he said something about feeding the leftovers to the cats. If you know my mom, you know she LOVES cats. So, she said that she would like to go feed the cats. The waiter said, "just go outside and yell 'Harvey'" It seriously sounded like candid camera!!! It wasn't though, and she went out and fed the stray cats.

Tara helped...

 
When we checked into the hotel, we took a luggage rack to hold our luggage. This is what happens when we all get together.

(She's probably going to kill me)


Oh, I forgot! When we checked into the hotel after lunch, my granny had had birthday cakes and roses delivered to our room, individual for my aunt, Mom, and me. She also had some gifts, and my aunt gave Mom and I our gifts then, too. Mine is a coffee mug...but I'll have to get a picture of it to post. It's no ordinary mug...it's something else. I love it!

Let's see...Thursday night, we went to Johnny Carinos for supper...I picked. We had meaningful heart to heart conversation.

 Mom and I split a calzone...

 And the nice waiter brought me cheesecake. He didn't sing.

 After supper (which was late) we went to Walmart and looked at girly things (along the Spanx line, since we'd just eaten Italian and all felt fat.) Then we went back to the hotel and watched TV and stayed up til 2 am or something like that. We were all in one room, my aunt and granny in one bed, and mom and I in the other. Well, you know what they started doing at one o'clock in the stinkin morning? They all started singing Henry the Eighth I Am. I felt rather left out...I didn't know the words. Before it was over, there were a few different songs sung...I'm surprised no one called management on us!

Friday morning, we all got up and got ready. That in and of itself was a challenge...4 women in a hotel room doesn't make for getting ready fast! We ate a light breakfast (we sorta still felt icky after all the Italian the night before!) and then went to Dollywood. Actually, we went by the Dixie Stampede place first to get our tickets for the show that night. While granny took care of the tickets, we went to see the horses.

Then we went to Dollywood.

We rode the trolly thing into Dollywood, from out parking lot.

We toured Dolly Parton's old tour bus...

Hand tooled leather on the couches...

Then we rode the rides. We started out with this big swingy thing...basically, it swung you up, dropped you, and did that over and over, getting higher and higher every time. I laughed the whole time.

We rode this one...it was underground, but wasn't very thrilling, I didn't think. Just a couple little drops, but not very fast or anything.

Then we rode the new Wild Eagle roller coaster. I didn't have my camera with me (left it in a locker so I could ride) and it was fun. Just one big drop that took your stomach really bad! Here is a video and more info.

Then we rode the TN Tornado....still didn't get very good pictures!

We ate lunch (after all the rides!!!) Here we were trying to decide exactly how you'd drink a 44oz drink!

Can someone please tell me what this sign means? We were confused.

We liked this sign...

My aunt made me stand in this funny thing...

Then my aunt, who didn't want to ride the coasters, wanted to ride the ferris wheel. Sure!

Mom. It was at this point she started freaking out ever so slightly.

Her ever so slight freaking out soon turned into more.

As you can see on the video, it had started to rain. We had to leave Dollywood to be at the Dixie Stampede show on time, so we had to run through the rain to get to the trolly to get to the car. Well, this was no sprinkle.

By the time we got to the car, we were all completely soaked through. As in, we had to go back to the hotel room and change clothes (all clothes) and dry our hair and everything. I've never been so soaked from rain!

We went to the Dixie Stampede that night but they don't let you take pictures inside. :(

That night (I think) we got a Starbucks coffee. For some strange reason, the girl writing our names on our cup thought my granny (Rita) said her name was "William." It loses SO much punch trying to retell it, but we laughed for a looong time about that!

We also went to a pharmacy because I had taken prescription allergy medication earlier in the day and after we got out of the Dixie Stampede, I had a funny feeling in my throat like I couldn't breathe. We guessed it was from being closed up in there with the animals. Anyway, I needed to take something to make sure my throat didn't completely close up and we weren't sure what to do since I'd taken 12-hour medication 8 hours before. The pharmacy guy was a hoot and we had a lot of fun with him.



Saturday morning, we went back to Gatlinburg and walked around a few more stores...this outdoor store was one.

 We went to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co for lunch, and had a Russian waiter. He was great and he and Mom cut up the whole time. She's like that. Again, I can't even begin to retell everything, because it's just not as funny if you weren't there. Take my word for it, we laughed and cried because we were laughing the whole time we ate.

But the best part came after we ate, when it was time for Mom to have dessert since her birthday was the next day. The video says it all. And more. This may be the funniest thing I've ever witnessed.

After lunch it was time for all of us to head home. We said our goodbyes and got in a hail storm not too far down the road.

I was driving on the way home, and Mom and I both were extremely sleepy. At one point, Mom was going through the radio, just sitting there with her finger on the seek button, mostly. Once, she stopped on a station that was all static...I mean, there wasn't anything coming through at all! She stayed on that station for about 30 seconds, and when I looked over at her to see what was going on, she was asleep! She woke up right then and I laughed. She said "how long was that station on?" I told her and we both laughed for about a minute, and then got sleepy again.

We stopped a little while down the road for a coffee and when we payed, the guy asked how we were doing. I said "sleepy!" He told us to be careful on the way, and Mom said "we've already been through hail!"

We knew were in the south when he replied "literally!"

Um, yeah...that's what we meant!!! Haha!

We got home about 8pm or so and went ahead and did Mom's birthday party, since I was going to be gone Sunday. She didn't want to wait til Monday.

We had a great time in TN. We ate too much, spent too much money, and laughed enough to last...oh...a couple weeks. :)