We stopped in West Virginia for the night. The swimming had to wait until the next morning as we were too busy whopping it up at the local pub to be bothered with swimming.
We didn't have to be in Lexington until evening, so we could take our time on the last few hours of our drive. We stopped in Charleston, WV to do a little shopping. Bob found the magazine he's been searching his whole life for....
And we found an awesome pizza place, (Pies and Pints), thereby kicking off Bob's "Farewell Gallbladder Tour".
The night before, while we were partying at a pub in WV we got a little sneak peak of what would be waiting for us at the Fields cocktail party but we still didn't know quite what to expect....🤔
(I wasn't sure what we were walking into!)
Devon's girlfriend Bonnie had the awesome idea to recreate the epic Patti-Pam-Tina glam photo that created such a stir on the throw pillow last year.
They set up a photo booth complete with wigs and pearls.
The girls and I got to test it out first. I think Audrey did an excellent job of channeling Pam's faraway look.
Maddy's wig looked so natural! And the pearls...😂
We had to get photos with the aunts that inspired the fun, Aunt Pam...
...and Aunt Patti.
(Somehow a photo with Tina proved elusive.)
Bob, Patti and I also had a go at it. Bob won the award for "Best Tina Expression by a Non-blood Relative".
Aunt Patti let us crash at her place AND got us a babysitter, kept us up drinking and talking until 2am and wouldn't let us leave without a breakfast casserole and chocolate chip pancakes....in other words, she's the best hostess ever!
However we were a little anxious to get to New Haven so we could meet Levi! We took about a million photos. He's a very sweet baby... and very tolerant of his baby hogging Aunt and nieces!
Christmas was really extra-special this year...
...a new cousin AND Santa came too! Maddy's asked for a BayMax and a Sphero robot.
Audrey asked for a Scratch pillow and an "animal surprise". She also got a veterinarian kit...
...and it wasn't long before her veterinary practice was up and running.
And Maddy was operating her robot in no time at all too! I think Santa did a great job!
As a Christmas gift, we actually let Katie have her baby for a few minutes.
Sadly, Grandfather found a way to use Audrey's "animal surprise" against her.
The prime rib was delicious as usual, but sadly Grandma was relegated to the kids' table this year with Uncle Charlie. (Audrey has decided that she needs to wear the Scratch Cape that Patrick gave her pretty much all the time!)
The day after Christmas we had lunch with my friend Lisa.
And afterwards we explored downtown Bardstown for a little while. We found a really cute place to have a hot chocolate and a really terrible bourbon pecan roll. So terrible!
On Wednesday we had our annual UK Architecture get-together. The doggie pillows were went over very well with my doggie loving kids!
The the adults had a great time catching up....
...while the kids thought that getting in a creek in 20-degree weather was a great idea.
I'm not going to name names (Audrey!) but someone had to ride home with the heat blasting, stripped down to her underwear!
On our last day in Kentucky we wanted to finally get Maddy that visit to Mammoth Cave that she's been begging for. But first we had to get some lunch. We stopped at Bucky Bee's BBQ a place which will be remembered for many reasons, but especially as Bob's gallbladder's final straw. Maybe it had something to do with what he ordered...
(Just for posterity, let it be know that this pile of meat, beans and cole slaw was sitting on top of a piece of FRIED cornbread.)
Another reason we will remember Bucky Bee's is that upon exiting the car to go in we realized that Audrey's (creek-dipped) jacket had been left in the car overnight and the lining had frozen to the point that the sleeves were petrified! Luckily, Bucky Bee's had powerful hand dryers in the bathroom!
And also, we saw Elvis there.
After Audrey's jacket was sufficiently thawed-out we went to Mammoth Cave and luckily we were able to get on a two-hour Historical Tour.
The tour was awesome, though photos don't do the cave justice. We were all very happy that we could squeeze though "Fat Man's Misery". It was both narrow AND short.
The light seemed so bright when we finally made it out of the cave!
As we were leaving, Grandfather had requested the girls take a photo with some train cars that he refurbished. There were also a crazy number of deer milling around, completely unafraid of us!
For our last night at Grandma and Grandfather's house Audrey really wanted to play pool one last time with Grandfather.
(She's actually pretty good!)
It's aways hard to say goodbye to everyone, but it was a great trip!
And we came home with even more "friends" than we came with. 😳
Our first day driving was cold, but beautiful and dry! Not so much on the second day....we drove through 300 miles of snow and ice.
But we made it!
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