Our big Summer vacation was a trip down to Tennessee to spend a week with Grandpa Harrie. It was the first time in Tennessee for Declan and Owen. Everybody had a great time. Amazingly, nothing got broken in Grandpa’s house!
We made sure to get a picture with Grandpa before the week was over. Amazing that everybody smiled!
Owen and Declan spent a lot of time doing dances like this. They were having fun!
We didn’t go on the trip with any plans as to what we would do while we were there. That’s pretty typical for us. Trying to stick to a schedule just seems like work. Where’s the vacation in that?
Grandpa’s house is a short walk away from a place called the Custard Cabin. It’s pretty good stuff. Since the weather was extremely hot while we were there we thought it would be great to walk up there in the evening when it started to cool off.
There's a big valley followed by a big hill in the road out of the neighborhood.
Walk up the big hill, turn left, and just a short way up the main road is that big cone calling you toward it.
They have a table just the right size for Declan and Owen out on the porch.
Kieran sat with us at the porch counter.
One day we stopped at a road side stand selling peaches. The peaches were very good, but the reason I mention it is that the woman running the stand asked us “Have you been to the tree house?” Huh? What tree house? She told us there was a local minister that was building a huge tree house because God told him to. She said it’s open for people to climb though for no charge. When we got back to Grandpa’s house we looked it up on the Internet. It looked really impressive so we decided to check it out the next day. It’s called The Minister’s Tree House. Here are some pictures.
There's a chapel inside where they hold church services some Sundays.
This is the main stairway that spirals all the way up to the top. That's 10 levels up. Other stairs are located on various levels.
Most of the structure has walkways around the various levels like this one.
Declan and I were not all the way to the top, but we were looking down at Owen and his Mom.
If you look real close you can see Linda, Kieran, Declan, and Owen looking out from the top floor window.
Add a little zoom and you can see them all looking down at me.
I tried to capture the whole thing, but it's hard to see it through the trees from this side.
When you go around to the front (or is it the back) you can stand back and really get blown away by the size of this tree house.
If you get the chance to visit Crossville, it’s worth a stop at the tree house. You’ll be impressed.
They recently opened a brand new public library in Crossville. We like libraries so, of course, we had to check it out. It’s a really nice place.
The new Crossville Public Library
You can sit out on that balcony and read in a rocking chair. At least if it’s cooler than it was when we were there. The children’s department has a round area where they’ve setup former carousel animals and carts and things that the kids thought was great.
Declan on the carousel pig
Owen on the carousel horse
Cumberland Mountain State Park isn’t too far from Grandpa’s house so we decided to go hiking one day.
This is the lake created by the bridge/dam in the park.
This is the bridge/dam that creates the lake.
Setting out on our hike.
The boys stopping at the stream on the trail.
There's a cable bridge at the far end of the trail that we hiked. The twins were a little freaked out by this.
There were several of these large overhanging rock formations along the trail. The Tennessee rocks are just amazing.
We have cousins that live closer to Nashville and we decided that we needed to get over to visit them on this trip. We spent the day with them and their new baby. It’s the third girl for them.
Linda got her baby fix with Makenzie
Kieran wanted to hold Makenzie as much as possible
Had to get a shot of the proud parents with the new little one
We had a lot of fun on our trip. The drive there and back got a little long at times, but everybody survived. Grandpa was happy to have us and it sure was nice getting to see him for an extended time. Hopefully t won’t be so long before the next trip!
