Perfect Peace

We decided to take a last minute vacation to the mountains this weekend.  We found a cabin with a hot tub (Harper's only criteria), a fireplace (my criteria), and beautiful views (Alex's criteria).  It was near Pigeon Forge, about four and a half hours from Charlotte.  We arrived at night when it was dark and we couldn't appreciate the views.  We immediately started a fire and went out into the hot tub.  We spent the majority of our time in the hot tub or sitting in front of a fireplace.  The kids had a great time!  It was Ethan's first time in a hot tub.  We went down to The Island in Pigeon Forge for some cute rides for Harper and Ethan.  Ethan and I rode the big ferris wheel while Alex and Harper went through the mirror maze and rode a frog ride.  It was an amazingly relaxing getaway! 

      

Exploring the house!

    

    

     

Our nighttime view!

    

     

    

Harper's nook of the loft was very cozy.

    

    

    

    

My fireplace had a timer so I could turn it on while I fell asleep.

    

    

    

    

       

Coffee views

     

    

We played several rounds of pool with the most amazing views.

    

    

    

We had cinnamon buns on the porch.  It was seventy degrees outside on Saturday!  We experienced part of the severe storms that went across the south this weekend.  We had gusts of wind up to eighty miles per hour.  The house was shaking at times and very noisy!

    

    

    

Our cabin was called Perfect Peace.

    

    

    

Harper's favorite part of the trip was the hot tub.

    

    

    

    

    

   

The Island at Pigeon Forge  

   

Ethan and I rode the ferris wheel! 

    

      

    

    

    

    

Harper on her frog!

    

    

    

    

    

    

    

The Christmas decorations in Pigeon Forge are left out until February.  It was nice!

    

    

    

     

    

    

   

On our way home Sunday, we stopped by Max Patch for a hike.  Both kids had melt downs and we had to turn around, unfortunately.  Hopefully we will be back to hike this beautiful hike!

    

    

    

    

Greensboro Children's Museum

When we were tired of eggs and rain, Harper, Ethan and I headed to Greensboro for the Greensboro Children's Museum.  I have heard so much about this place over the years, but had never been!  It is pretty similar to the Huntersville Discovery Place, but a little bigger.  It was definitely hard to keep up with two kids with different interests. 

   

Welcome to the hospital!

    

Harper, the pediatrician 

    

    

    

    

The play space outside was really neat!  Harper was a little too nervous to climb high.

    

    

    

Where he belongs...

    

    

    

    

Science Friday

Harper and I decided to do a Science Friday last week.  Our eggsperiment took a couple days, but it was really cool!

   

We started with a Skittles rainbow experiment.  Harper learned about concentration gradients and stratification...

   

Then we played with her microscope and looked at different objects up close.  We looked at feathers from the cushions, sea shells from my decorations, drift wood and Harper's dress.

   

   

     

Our most exciting part of Science Friday was our eggsperiment.  We placed three eggs into vinegar and one into water (our control).  We left the eggs overnight.  The vinegar dissolved the calcium carbonate of the egg and created carbon dioxide.  All that remained was the soft membrane that lined the inside of the shell covering the egg white and yolk.

    

Waiting was the hardest part of this experiment!  

   

After twenty-four hours, Harper noticed that our vinegar egg was bigger and "bouncy".  Once the hard shell was gone, water moved from the vinegar to the inside of the egg by osmosis to balance the concentration of water across the membrane.  Our egg did grow in size!  It felt like a soft rubber ball.

    

    

Next, we put the ink from a pink highlighter into one jar, blue food coloring into another jar, and Pepsi into the third jar.  We were supposed to use corn syrup (a solution with a lower concentration water) to make the egg shrink again as it draws out the water from the egg, but all I had was Pepsi.  It did not work as planned.

    

     

Our final product!  The vinegar eggs were all larger than the water egg.  The highlighter egg was translucent and appeared to glow in the dark with a light source behind it!

    

Harper tried bouncing the eggs from higher and higher starting points.

    

    

They do break eventually!

     

     

Scheer New Year

Nanna and Grandad came after Christmas for a New Year's visit!  The kids were thrilled to see them. We had a second Christmas, which was a big hit.  Harper and Ethan loved spending time with their grandparents and Alex and I loved having babysitters for New Years' Eve.  We had a special New Year's Day brunch, complete with Amelie's and homemade bagels!  We can't wait to see them in a month!

    

Second Christmas!

    

    

Little man is obsessed with his took kit.

    

Harper got walkie talkies!

    

    

   

New Year's Day brunch! 

    

    

   

    

    

Alex and Dave took the kids to Discovery Place.