Trip to Tennessee

We got on the road right after church on Sunday to head to Tennessee for a short, but refreshing trip to see family. Alison did awesome. I can't sing her praises enough. I was dreading hearing her cry to get out of her seat, but she didn't whine once. Both 12 hour drives she napped and then played for hours. I just put a box full of her toys next to her and she entertained herself. It was absolutely amazing. We were also prepared to watch LOTS of videos and stocked up on some new shows, but I think she watched a total of 2 hours of TV the entire trip.
Monday morning we had an awesome breakfast and sat and talked most of the morning. We had lunch at Panera (Jordan made the mistake of mentioning there was one nearby) and then went by Sophie's new studio.

Then we headed to Rick and Rachel's for the rest of the day. Alison immediately started dressing up in whatever she found around the house.The aunts handed down some Elmo dolls to Alison and somewhere she found a "bible sword" that lights up. She was pretty dangerous to be around with a sword while trying to lug around a doll that was bigger than her.

All of the girls were there and Alison had a hard time deciphering which one was which. So she would walk up to one of them and say, "I want that one" and when they picked her up she would ask them to take her somewhere in the house. The girls were so sweet to play endlessly with her. Taking Aunt Cie upstairs
Alison finally passed out in Mimi's arms. It was nice that she fell asleep and we could have some more time to talk. I'm so glad we got some time with them, but I could have definitely used more.

Ben, Jordan and Rick spent most of the afternoon in the basement going through old things. I think the goal was to find things Ben had left there that he needed to take home. Instead, we came home with a car load of things Rick handed down to Ben. But, Ben found a stack of old pictures he had never seen before. I don't know why the picture uploaded sideways, but I thought this was the cutest picture of Ben. I can totally see Alison all over his face.
Tuesday we headed to Opry Mills Mall, one of my favorite places on earth. It really is the best outlet mall I've ever been to and it's so fun to walk around. We passed an apple store and I could see them making apple donuts. I decided that they need to put a warning at the front of their store for all pregnant women entering...that store was dangerous. I ran up to the counter and order several apple donuts. While the kind gentleman was warming my donuts, I spied apple cider slushy. It was delicious! In Michigan we'd go to the cider mill every year and get apple donuts. Ben was thankful I found my fix for them this year and he possibly got out of having to make them for me at home.
We were walking through the mall when we heard a gasp from Alison. Apparently the Disney store is now jaw dropping to her. We let her go in and she kept shrieking, "LOOK AT THAT!" I have never seen her so excited. Ben let her pick out a couple of things and her choices were interesting. She wouldn't let go of a Buzz Lightyear cup and a princess Jasmine doll. The smiles and entertainment that came from those 2 things was priceless.
Poppy came over for dinner at Jordan and Sophie's that night and Alison was ready to soak up some reading time with him. Notice the hat? Somehow Alison confiscated that from Aunt Chey.
We came home to cold, rainy weather and Alison was excited to play in the puddles. I guess we need to get her some rain boots and an umbrella.