Sometimes all you can do is just laugh...

A romantic, two night escape to the mountains of North Carolina for just the two of us was what was SUPPOSED to happen this week.  But one thing I have learned time and time again in the past few years is that things just don't always go as planned.  When we arrived back home today (one day early) to find these roses blooming in our garden I just had to make sure to place one in this vase right above my kitchen sink to remind myself to just laugh.  Because that is all I can do right now as I reflect back on the past 24 hours!

Due to the pitiful economy and a lack of extra funds laying around, Josh and I went the thrifty route when picking a pre-baby/10 year anniversary trip for us to take.  We went through Living Social and booked a 2 night stay at the Lakeview at Fontana spa resort.  We got a great price on the trip and it included breakfast for both days AND $20 credits for both of us towards the spa services.  Josh was booked for the relaxation massage and I was booked for a prenatal one.  Mom and Dad had Coopman and Katie was keeping Dave.  Everything was looking great when we left town yesterday.

We had a delicious breakfast at Cracker Barrel and enjoyed the scenic drive through the mountains and river gorges.  We arrived at the resort around 3 in the afternoon and were happy with what we found.  Although the building was a little bit older than it appeared in the pictures, it was comfortable and quaint.  The sign out front advertised it as a "rustic, chic resort."  Josh read that as "rustic, CHICK, resort" and turned to me and asked..."what have I gotten myself into?"  I just laughed and explained to him the difference between chic and chick.  But I must admit there were several females in groups of two staying there together, which surprised us.  But anyway...moving on...

I immediately was impressed by the beautiful view from the resort of the Nantahala Gorge and jumped out of the car to take a picture.  Sadly, this was the first, and last picture I took.

We checked in, got to our room, and found our first small problem.  The villas only had window units for air conditioning, and with one unit and three rooms, that just was not doing the trick for this pregnant mama in 98 degree weather.  But we thought surely it would cool down as the sun went down, so we just decided to hang out and relax for a bit.  Then we headed into Bryson City and did a little window shopping, had a delicious meal at Jimmie Mac's, picked up some ice cream, and headed back to the resort. 

It was almost dark when we arrived back, and it was REALLY dark.  Being that far into the mountains is a little scary in itself, but the fact that they had so few lights on at night was a little bit creepy.  So we made sure our door was locked, but it still kind of made me nervous that the door just had one, tiny, little lock on it that felt like if you shook it that you could open the door right up.  Both of our cell phone batteries were almost dead, and we could hardly find enough outlets to charge both at the same time, which was surprising!  Yeah, I had to scrape a few cobwebs here and there and had to even kill a few spiders, but you kind of expect that when you are in the woods.  Since our bedroom still felt like it was about 95 degrees inside, we just stayed in the den in front of the air conditioner and ate our Ben and Jerry's.  I thought Josh was going to have withdrawals over the fact that there was no television in our room, but he managed.

So eventually we headed to bed in the sauna, I mean bedroom, and were just getting settled in for the night when I felt something brushing my bare leg.  I reached down and figured it was just the sheet.  Then I felt it again, moving up my calf.  Again, I just brushed it off.  The third time, though, my hand grabbed something moving and I jumped up and yelled at Josh "there is something in the bed!"  He jerked back the sheets and found that we were sharing the bed with a cockroach the size of my thumb.  That was when I jumped out of bed and ran to the bathroom to grab a tissue for him to squash it with, and in my rush almost stepped on the frog that was hopping across our bathroom floor.  At that point, I was officially done.  I just started packing clothes, all the while wondering where I could put my feet without risking something else crawling across them.

Thankfully, Josh called the owner, and he was very professional and apologetic.  Josh explained to him that we were on our babymoon/10 year anniversary trip, and told him we just did not think we could sleep there.  He offered us a full refund, and we took it and were heading out the door in about ten minutes, honestly.

So it was close to midnight, pitch black dark outside, and a storm was rolling in as we pulled out of the resort.  I looked down at my phone which was lying on the console to see if I was getting service so I could google map some nearby hotels, but the box where you type your text messages read this:

"Sweet dreams on North Carolina Interstate 19"

The message was there as if I had typed it, but the problem was, I never typed anything like that.  I didn't type anything at all.  I showed it to Josh and the two of us just felt a little bit creepy as we drove on down the road, in the lightning and thunder, with the tall mountain road to the right of our car and the river gorge to the left.  Maybe we have watched too many scary movies for our own good, but we were officially spooked at this point.  After talking about we decided that I must have hit the speech to text button on my phone before I laid it down and it translated something that one of us must have said along with our navigation talking in the background into that message.  But it was creepy nonetheless.

We had no idea where we were going, but knew we weren't staying there.  As the rain continued to pour down, we also realized that my driver's side windshield wiper was broken and was not wiping away the water.  We had extremely sketchy cell phone service and were not able to complete any phone calls to find out where any hotels might be.  I was officially anxious and Baby Colson was doing flips in my tummy.

Thankfully, after driving about 45 minutes under a lightning-filled sky, we found a Hampton Inn in Murphy, NC.  Their rooms are always clean, the beds are soft, and they have air conditioning...and hopefully no bugs in the beds.  So we ended up spending about $100 on a room that we slept in very little, but it was worth it to not be out in the storms trying to get home on those scary roads. 

I didn't sleep because of awful nightmares and Josh had apparently hurt his back (maybe it was the dive to kill the bug that did it) and he had trouble sleeping.  So we got up early and headed home, where we spent the latter part of our day at the doctor's office getting his back adjusted and CVS getting muscle relaxers filled.  Then we picked up Cooper and headed home.

Tonight, I thought back to how our trip turned out.  I was SUPPOSED to have spent my day being pampered in a relaxing spa and lounging by the pool with a good book, but instead I spent it in the car and at the doctors office and pharmacy.  And tonight, I was supposed to be be enjoying grilled trout with my dear husband overlooking the Nantahala, but instead as was at home fixing Cooper his favorite meal for dinner (chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes, macaroni).  But, honestly, I am really ok with that.

And as disappointed as I am that our trip didn't turn out, I sure am thankful to have a clean, bug-free house to come home to, and to have shared some wonderful laughs with a sweet husband that is right now playing in the garage with my very happy and healthy sweet boy (I think those muscle relaxers must be helping?).  And as I type, I can also feel one more healthy little boy rolling around in my tummy.  Life is very good here at home.  And for that, I am so thankful. 

Maybe we will try again in a few years to have a trip away, for just the two of us.  But for now, we are just going to stay at home and enjoy what we have.  I am officially DONE with traveling for a little while!