Nashville--Day 2

I have to do a little mini-post right here before I get back to our adventures on our trip to Nashville to give a big ol' shout out to my God! This is Elliot, my husband's cousin:We have been praying since before this little guy was born for him to be healthy. There have been many setbacks and scares, but God has answered a prayer today in a BIG, BIG way for Elliot and his parents, Heather and Jay.

Elliot was born with esophageal atresia. Basically, there was a 4.4 cm gap between the two ends of his esophagus. He could not eat or swallow. He had to have a drain tube in his nose to remove saliva, etc., from his upper pouch, and a tube in his belly to feed him. We've been praying for the last 8 weeks or so for the stretching procedures they've been doing in the hospital to stretch the upper end of his esophagus to the belly end. As of today, there is only about a 1 cm gap! Praise God! It looks like 4 more weeks of stretching, followed by surgery, recovery, and then--at long last--HOME for the first time! I am so excited and encouraged by this news. Please pray for this family to continue to get great results like this. God is so good!

Okay, so with that said, back to fun in Nashville!

After a restless night in the double bed with Emma, who for some reason continuously tapped me on the leg with her foot all night (while Jason snored like a bulldozer), we got up and headed to Shoney's breakfast buffet. Emma ate her weight in sausage. I've never seen anyone enjoy sausage quite like that child did that day... Luke refused to eat anything. ANYTHING. This is Shoney's, man! You can find something for every picky person on the breakfast buffet! It was a frustrating start to the day. He still wasn't feeling like his normal self yet.

We used Jason's GPS to guide us to the Nashville Zoo at Grassmere. (We call it GYPSY.) GYPSY took us on a wild goose chase. She had us go one way on the interstate, only to have us turn around and go the other way shortly thereafter. It was literally a wild goose chase.The zoo was really great. We got to see the anteater on its first day of exhibition. Those things are cool/weird-looking. God has such a great sense of humor.The only complaint I had about the zoo was that everything, and I do mean everything, seemed like it was uphill each way there. There were lots of trails and different ways to go to each exhibit, but there were winded, lost people everywhere we went. (We had a map.)Luke could've cared less about any of the animals. Emma liked the animals a little better, but Luke was ALL about the playground. They played HARD. So hard, in fact, Luke ended up with a massive splinter in his hand! Jason played Dr. Daddy and removed it with a pair of zoo-provided plastic tweezers. Those are going in my first aid kit in the car! They also enjoyed the carousel.When we left the zoo, we were starving. We went over to Opry Mills Mall and checked out the Aquarium restaurant. What a neat place! The dining area is laid out around the 200,000 gallon aquarium in the center of the building. It was dimly lit, but was so cool!We couldn't bring ourselves to order fish, though. It just seemed wrong to eat it in front of other fish. The kids didn't even realize they were eating, they were so enthralled with the fish swimming by. Emma's extended time on the Wii game, "Endless Ocean" paid off as she named all the fish as they swam by. I was mucho impressed! [Sidenote: There was a couple in there that I would've sworn was a cleaned-up version of Brigitte Nielsen and Flava Flav. Definitely an interesting mix of folks in there.]

The kids and Jason headed over to Stingray Reef afterwards to feed/pet stingrays. I opted out of that one. I watched as unsuspecting old guys and ladies got soaked by those slimy looking things splashing them as they searched for food, or a victim to stab, or whatever they were doing. Too icky for me!We headed back to the hotel, changed into swimsuits (yes, even me...Here are Luke and I in my cover-up, kangaroo style!) We trekked down to the indoor pool and staked our claim on a patio table and chairs. We put our hotel pool towels, keys, shoes, cover-ups, goggles, a pair of my earrings, and all our various and sundry items on and around that table. There were 30-40 other chairs and/or tables around the pool. We'd been in the pool around half an hour when this mom, grandma, and two kids came down. Grandma sat down at "our" table. (There were many, many "available" tables.) Then mom told grandma to hand her a towel. SHE TOOK OURS. She wiped her face on it, and returned it to the pile. *GAG* Granny even stayed there when I not-so-subtly stood there dripping as I toweled off right next to her. Is there not some sort of unwritten rule about pool ettiquette? If I see your towels or flip flops, I'm outta there! I know when a claim has been staked! No way would I have done that. I was pretty grouchy by the time that was over.

We headed back to Opry Mills mall after showers. We played glow-in-the-dark mini golf. It was great fun! Emma loved the glowing balls. Luke played like Adam Sandler's character in "Happy Gilmore." He held the club like a hockey stick and smacked the daylights out of the poor ball.
So, that was Friday. Kudos to you if you read all the way to the end! Saturday will be coming soon!