Three Votes to One: July 2016

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Ragbrai 2016

The girls and I (along with Kayren and her kids) headed down to Mt Ayr yesterday to take in on the festivities for Ragbrai. They biked through Mt Ayr this morning. It was a lot of fun to witness 13,000 of our closest friends in town. All the riders were so friendly and complimented Mt Ayr for being so welcoming. The girls will remember this for a long time!

bikers coming into town

kids giving bikers "high fives"

the square

this is where the bikers enter the town square. The green strips you see in the background are water misters. It was a fun day to witness Ragbrai.

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Smokey Mountains 2016

We attending our 2nd Watson family trip. This year we ventured to Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge, TN. We left Iowa on Tuesday 12th at 5:30 AM. Stayed the night in Georgetown KY. Wednesday we got up and drove to Knoxville to walk around UofT's campus. Gorgeous campus! We were lucky enough to get to walk in and see the football (Neyland) stadium . It holds 102,455. Pretty big stadium (of course bigger deal to Wes). We then arrived in Gatlinburg later afternoon. My parents had rented a 5 bedroom house in the Smokey Mountains. It fit the 14 of us perfectly!

Some highlights of the trip were:

White Water Rafting

Playing in the white water streams

Dolly Parton's Lumberjack show

Hiking in the Smokey Mountains

Shopping in Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge

Seeing a black bear

Playing with cousins

Girls and I ate dessert at Melting Pot

Spent 26+ hours in the car

Drove 1,762 miles round trip

Counted 39 out of 50 state license plates

We left TN on Sunday 17th at 5:15 AM. Hannah slept the 1st 7.5 hrs of the trip! Man she was tired! Both girls did awesome on the way home and even the way down. We all stayed up late every night and were busy during the day! Vacation took a toll on Hannah!