Big Canoe 2011

We just got back from our vacation to Georgia.  We went to Petit Crest Villas in Big Canoe GA.  We went there in the summer of 2009 with our friends (the Johnson family) and we decided for a repeat this year.  We left on Friday which happened to be Alyssa's 6th birthday and Brian and Amy's 11th anniversary.  We celebrated that night at Fuego's Mexican restaurant which is right outside the gates of Big Canoe.  Saturday we started the day with getting a pass to the waterpark area and it gave us access to the canoes, paddleboats, pools, and rock slides.  All 4 kids love the rock slide which is an overflow area from the lake there in the community.  We did the rock slide thing Saturday and Sunday because that was the only time that lifeguards were there since there schools had already started back and it is officially off season there.   

Monday we went up to Tennessee near Lookout Mountain and then we drove up to See Rock City and Ruby Falls where Abigail took over the binoculars and loved looking around at what they did for her!  We got lots of cute pictures in the rock garden and the caves leading to Ruby Falls.  We got a late start and didn't get back to the cabin till around midnight.  When we got back we saw a raccoon running off from the trash can and a bunch of our chicken wings were laid out on the railing where he had stripped what meat had been left on the bone.  We had to clean up the trash and put the lids back on the cans.  We thought about when in 2009 the crows tore through our ziplocs and stole our leftovers we had left at the picnic table.  Animals seem to always be after our food around there!

Tuesday we went to a nearby river and let the kids play in the river.  Jordan walked up on a water snake and it took them a little while to get back in after the thought of being in the water with snakes crossed their minds.  They played for several hours and then we made a grocery store run before we went  back to the cabin to grill some supper.  We went to the park area and grilled zucchini and porkchops.  The kids played ball in the park and we had our laid back picnic.

Wednesday we went to Helen GA and went tubing down the Chattahoochee River.  What we didn't know was that the water level was really low and we had to walk the Chattahoochee at lots of places.  Brian lost his wedding band while he was pushing his tube across a shallow area and by crazy luck Amy was able to find it resting on the bottom of the river.  You could say that Amy saved the marriage!  HaHa!  Then we had dinner on the river at "The Troll Tavern" and we headed back to the cabin.  When we got there something had tore out the trash again and there was one trash bag that had been half pulled through the banister of the walkway.  Trash was everywhere and Brandon and Brian picked up all the trash and put it back in the can.  What was weird was whatever it was did not like watermelon-they left that laying.

Thursday morning the neighbors told us they watched as 2 bears went through our trash the night before and drug off what they wanted.  We were upset we hadn't been there to witness that!  We didn't do much of anything on Thursday because a day trip would have been  a bit much driving because of the anticipation of following day driving home.  We did go out for a 3-4 hour hike around the lake that day and hung around the cabin to watch a movie.  Late that evening we went to the park to grill our leftovers and let the kids play in the park.  When it was almost dark a little old lady was doing her daily exercise when she asked Brandon and Brian to hang around till she was finished walking because there had been a bear sighting the night before.  The guys had to tell her about our trash and they were at our cabin.

Friday we headed home around 10 am.  While we were packing the cars our neighbors told us the bears had been back the night before and someone from the villas had picked up our trash already.  While we were making trips back and forth to the cars (all the while with the cabin door wide open) we heard Brian calling "Come here! Come here!" in a low, distressed voice.  Brandon ran out to find out what was going on and a bear had just ran under the cabin and Brian saw it fleeing.  I ran back through the house and hollered something's outside!  and the kids followed me to the front deck and we were able to see the bear below the deck out from the cabin.  One of the kids squealed and the bear ran a little further and stopped and someone squealed again and it ran on off into the woods.  We were all so excited to have the bear for company.  We have seen bears off the side of the road in the Gatlinburg area, but we had never had one visit our home!  On the way home we stopped in Commerce GA at some outlet mall to pick up a quick gift for a friends' little girl.  We ended up finding some awesome end of the season sales and we shopped for several hours.  We didn't get home till 6:30 and I didn't get everything unpacked and put up till 8:30. 

Our little villa 611

Outside Fuego's on Alyssa's birthday

Abigail preparing for rock slide

Abigail preparing for landing at bottom of slide

Emily and Jordan waiting there turn at rock slide

Everyone but Alyssa meditating

See Rock City Girls!

Me and Abigail posing for picture in Rock City

Outside of Ruby Falls

Walking back up for another turn on the rock slide

Abigail and Alyssa in the Rock Garden path

Girls at the Mushroom Rock

See Rock City BABY!

Rock City Flower Princesses

Swinging Bridge across Rock City

Sitting on the porch of souvenir shop

3 of our little birdies!

Fat Man Squeeze-Yes we were able to walk through there!

Me and Brandon near Lover's Leap

Emily and Jordan outside Fairyland

Ruby Falls

From here you could see Seven States

Me and Brandon posing in Helen GA

Abi in Helen GA

Abigail resting after an afternoon of playing in the Amicalola River

Amicalola River Explorers

Me and Amy and our 2 little mermaids

Helen GA

Helen GA

Abigails flowers of interest

Girls posing in Rock City

Emily had ball practice Saturday morning and we had a birthday party to go to Saturday evening and here it is Sunday afternoon and I am exhausted!  I am so ready to go back to work so I can rest!  The kids start school this coming Thursday and I am kind of ready for us to get back into a regular schedule. 

Grandfather Mountain for Abigail's Birthday

Somehow I skipped posting anything about our surprise trip to the mountains on Abigail's Birthday. We took the Wednesday off and Tuesday after work decided to tell the kids we were going to go get ice cream after supper. We rode up to Lincolnton to the Morgans Dairy Bar and Calf-A and got ice cream. By then it was 9 pm and we told the kids it was just too late to go home and we were going to go ahead and go to the mountains. We rode to Blowing Rock and got a hotel and were fresh and ready to go to Grandfather Mountain Wednesday morning. It was only 67 degrees up there and very nice clean fresh smelling air. I couldn't but keep saying IT SMELLS SO GOOD HERE! We went out on the mile high swinging bridge and then we found a hiking trail that was labeled AGGRESSIVE-PROPER HIKING EQUIPMENT REQUIRED! We looked down and everyone had good sturdy tennis shoes, so hey we were equipped! It was a 2.4 mile trail that at times you had to use cables to pull yourself up or to rappel down with. Some rocks were only climbable with ladders that were bolted to the side of them. This was one of the funnest trails we had ever been on. We were almost to the top of the "cliff side" when Brandon decided it wasn't safe anymore to hold onto Abi with one hand and only have one hand to hold and pull up himself. Emily and I went a little further on our own because we wanted to see the last ladder area. We will definitely be going back here to hike these trails again. Abigail kept saying THIS IS THE BEST BIRTHDAY IDEA EVER! We actually had 4 happy people in our party and we were so happy that we chose to spend the day there.

HAPPY 6th BIRTHDAY ABIGAIL!!!





Thank goodness Emily grabbed me before I went over the edge for good!!!  No... this actually looks like the edge, but there is actually a grassy area we walked to around behind this rock!





I took this picture about the place where Brandon turned around with Abi.  The lady in the green was standing at the bottom of this ladder that was pretty much on the side of a rock that we had to scale to get up to the ladder.  Brandon and Abi are teetering on  a mass of tree roots that just barely had enough room for you to perch to get over to the ladder.  It's hard to explain or even show in a picture how scary this actually was. 



Another ladder area-not so bad...

3 of the most important people in my life 1 mile above sea level!  High on Life!!!!

Summer Happenings!

Abigail had a waterful birthday!  We had about a dozen kids there even though some of our friends were out of town.  This seems to happen to poor Abi every year since her birthday falls near a holiday.  We also had two families that we are friends with out of town with their kids to play at the State Softball tournament so we will excuse them this year.  Haha! 

We just got back from the beach and I think all 4 of us are glad to be back.  We did have fun and the girls were able to do lots of fun things while we were there.  It just bothers me that you drive all the way to the beach and all they want to do is go to the pool.  I can drive 15 minutes from home and have them at a pool!  If I am at the beach, I want to be ON the beach, but I am the only on that feels that way I guess.  The water was too rough to get in and while the lifeguards were on duty at the beach there was no swimming signs out.  Depending on which lifeguard was out there you could only go shin deep to make waist deep if they were not looking.  The water was the roughest I had ever seen it and at waist deep it would beat you and pull you to death!   We did spend one day at the Alligator Adventure place.  I personally thought it was a waste of time and money, but Brandon seemed to like it.  The best part of that day was watching a dead alligator being eaten by 2 other ones!  I am not sure if the public was supposed to see that or not...

I guess we will gear up now and get ready for our summer vacation to Georgia.  Can't wait to spend some time with the Johnson family and catch up with them.

Tyler Graduated!!! And Other Tidbits...

My nephew graduated this year from high school and will be off to Utah to work out of town with my brother's company until he saves enough money to send himself to college.  So proud that he is done and moving on to another stage in life.

We have started the summer off with a bang.  We are never at home so don't try to catch up with us there!  Leave a message and we may get back to you before the fall!!!  Emily went to softball camp at UNC-Charlotte the first 2 weeks that she was out of school.  They worked her hard and she got her exercise that's for sure.  We traveled several nights this past week to see the West Stanly All Stars play softball in Rockingham.  Congrats to them on their district win and they are going to Wilmington for the state tournament!  Even though Emily and Abigail weren't a part of the teams it was still good to get to go see them win.
We bought Abigail's birthday present a little early (the waterslide) so we could get as much use out of it as we could this summer.  Every weekend we have someone new over to play with them on it.  It was a good investment for the entertainment department.
We went to Wet and Wild Emerald Point this past Tuesday and we got rained out around 3:30 so we collected our rain check and went home.  We went home took showers and headed to the Speedway for the Summer Shootout because my brothers wife got us free tickets, but then it was rained out.  So our backup plan was to go eat at Hooters.  Brandon got into a game of trivia that lasted 1 1/2 hours and he won us free Intimidators tickets for the following night.  So Wednesday night went went to the baseball game and were handed free coupons for Arbys roast beef sandwiches.  At the rate we are going we are going to have a summer filled with free activities!  Aww Right!!!  Thursday night Abigail went with a friend to the Oakboro festival  to ride carnival rides and she got home at midnight.  Tonight both girls are with Brandon's sister at the Oakboro festival.  Tomorrow we are going with a friend to use a pool at the house of a Nascar driver! No I am not making this stuff up!  It's crazy fun around here.  I am wondering how long we can keep this up before we crash!  Well this is our past few weeks in a nutshell.  Hope everyone has a wonderful summer.