A Hayride and Picnic- Day 5

Chad was definitely in his element Wednesday night. At 6:00 all 25 of us piled onto a flatbed for a hayride through Cade's Cove. For those of you who don't know what Cade's Cove is, it's a HUGE nature preserve with deer, bears and other wildlife. That night, we saw close to 20 deer, some horses and wild turkeys. All of the children loved being out in the "forest". Gracie was convinced we were going to see a goat. She loves goats! According to Cait, every deer we saw was a mama deer. One highlight from the trip was what Gracie said when we saw 4 deer together. We were all trying to point out the deer and Gracie stood up and said, "Look, it's the sun!" Isn't neat how excited little children get about the small things in life?

After the hayride, we took a group photo and headed to the picnic area for dinner only to find it was already closed. Being the creative group that we are, we found picnic tables outside the park along the road. It was a perfect place to stop. Our dinner consisted of, fried chicken, sandwiches, fruit, apple fritters, chips and everything else that had not been eaten during the week. To top it all off, for dessert we had no bake cookies and butterscotch nutty noodles (chow mien noodles with peanuts and melted butterscotch chips). They were awesome! Chad is an incredible cook and made them for the trip.

The scene after dinner was priceless. Picture 8 children running in an empty field catching fireflies. To top it off, the ring leader of the whole thing was none other than my husband, Chad. He had them "flying" through the field waving their hands as if they were airplanes. That memory alone made the vacation special.

Did we have a fun day? Yes, even if our picnic plans were not quite like we expected. It's times when things don't go as planned that memories are made!!