Birthday Getaway

Arlin had a big milestone birthday (the half-century mark!) this past week, so he and I went to the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee for a couple days to celebrate. Arlin's sister and parents stayed at our house and took care of Katie for us. We were all kind of nervous about it because Katie had never stayed by herself with them for that long, but she did great! Twila took her to school each day, and her interpreter and aide said she did great at school too.

We enjoyed our trip. The weather was beautiful both days, and although a lot of the leaves had already fallen, the trees were still gorgeous! We rode the tram up into the mountains, went shopping, and had some great Southern cooking (my favorite!). They were having a chili cook-off in downtown Gatlinburg on Wednesday night, so we had fun sampling all the different chilis--and then getting some Ben & Jerry's ice cream to cool our mouths off!

Katie was glad to see us when she got off the bus on Thursday. And we were just a tad bit happy to see her too! :-)

Thanks again, Aunt Twila and Grandma and Grandpa Kauffman, for taking such good care of our girl while we were gone and for giving us the opportunity to get away for a couple days!