This past Thanksgiving was mine and Ken’s tenth wedding anniversary, and we spent the day at Stone Mountain. Don’t worry. We really celebrated it last month with our trip to Las Vegas…without kids. I always say that’s it’s not a vacation if we bring the kids. It’s just doing the same stuff I do at home in a different location. If you’re a parent, you totally get that. And if you’re a mother, you are probably nodding your head right now.

So all of that to say, Ken and I spent our ten year anniversary/Thanksgiving at Stone Mountain, GA, this year. The park is actually open on Thanksgiving Day and decorated with a billion Christmas lights. They have a whole Christmas theme going on this time of year (go figure). It really was a fun way to celebrate. We just wanted to do something different this year to commemorate the actual day that we said “I do,” and if you’ve got to bring kids along, you might as well take them to a kid-friendly place. My only complaint was that we had cold chicken fingers and fries for our Thanksgiving dinner served to us by a girl who was obviously ticked that she had to work on Thanksgiving. I felt a little gipped that we didn’t get to participate in the whole turkey and dressing thing, but in the spirit of trying to do something different this year, I rolled with it. But hear me know, next year I’m having some turkey.

Here are a few pictures Ken took of our trip:

(DISCLAIMER: Yes this is a picture of my soon to be two-year-old son with a paci in public. Trust me. This is not the norm. However, desperate times call for desperate measures. He was two hours past his nap time, and we were nowhere near ready to go back to the hotel. My hopes were that he might fall asleep on the train ride and then take a little nap in the stroller. That’s how we got this rare paci picture. For those of you interested, no, my plan didn’t work.)

I am so far behind on my posting that there are still topics from our Stone Mountain getaway that I haven’t written about, including our enchanted evening spent at the Medieval Times dinner show.   This was not on our original agenda of things to do, but when it began pouring down rain we had to improvise.

Medieval Times was Ken’s brilliant idea, and I mean that in the most unsarcastic way possible.  It was a little pricey, but he was able to find a coupon code on the internet which made it more affordable.  When it comes to finding coupon codes, Ken’s skills can’t be beat.  It’s like years of “hunting & gathering” instincts have laid dormant…until a coupon code needs to be found.  Then watch out!

He really hit it out of the park with this one.  It was a dream come true for Edie.  Eating supper with a real live princess, watching knights joust on real horses, and getting to eat with your fingers!  She didn’t really understand the plot, but instead watched my reactions for her cue to cheer and boo.   I really got into this part because she just ate it up.   We clapped and waved for the Red Knight (as per our instructions) and really let the Blue Knight know we were NOT a fan.

Ken happened to sit next to a fellow camera geek.  So he spent a lot of the evening comparing pictures with his new friend and talking about focal lengths and bouncing light.  Here are some of his pics from our enchanted evening:

If you want more info on the Medieval Times dinner show, I have posted the link below.  If you have young kids, I really recommend it!

http://www.medievaltimes.com/

Lately I have had the vacation bug eating away at me.  I want to go SOMEWHERE!  Anywhere!  I don’t care, just take me away! This probably has something to do with the baby tying us down for the past six months or maybe because a year has passed since our trip to Italy.  Whatever the reason, I find myself spending a lot of time on Trip Advisor these days, trying to find ideal vacation spots for our little family.

So Friday night during supper, I announce, “I’m ready to go somewhere.”  This was my way of getting the ball rolling on our next vacation…to start discussing possible places and time frames.

“Ok, let’s go…how long will it take us to get packed?”

“You mean, tonight?! As in right now?”

“Sure, why not?” he says nonchalantly as he starts taking the dinner plates to the kitchen… like we have just decided to watch a movie or something.

Not wanting to rationalize my way out of a mini-vacation, I hop to it.  I pack while he researches places on the internet.  I book the hotel while he loads the car.  Two hours later we are pulling out of the driveway.  Our destination: Stone Mountain, Georgia.  Not that I consider this to be a vacation exactly, but it’s somewhere other than my house, so I’m in.

We ended up having a great weekend.  Stone Mountain is a perfect little weekend getaway if you are in the Birmingham area.  I had no idea it has so much for children.  We opted for the “Adventure Pass” which was well worth the price…train rides, sky tram, 4-D movie theater, an obstacle course, and crazy three-story barn filled with jungle gyms and balls flying through the air.  As you can imagine, Edie thought she was in heaven.  Truth is, I kind of did too.  

It felt so good just to get away even for a short time.  I’m not saying that my vacation bug has been squished, but we did at least wound it a little…maybe pulled its wings off or something.   I mean, I did sit in front of my computer all day today at work and not once did I type ”www.travelocity.com,” so that’s a good sign.   Hopefully, it will tide me over a couple of more months until we can really go somewhere.