sore legs and happy hearts

the drama of the wasp sting began to subside (unfortunately much faster than the swelling of her face) but abby felt good enough to hit the trails.  and why wouldn't she?  after all, it felt amazing outside.

the little people donned their camp cashiers shirts, and we headed over to whiteside mountain for a hike.  after a quick group shot at the bottom of the mountain...

...we started up.  everybody grabbed a partner...

we swapped partners around a bit...

and somehow poor josh ended up with two partners (who happened to be quite tired and in need of hiking help).

but we finally made it to the top, and it was well worth the effort.  gorgeous!!!

poor jack couldn't wait to get to the top of whiteside so he could see the "water fountain" (i got my mountains a little mixed up and might have told him there was a waterfall at the top) and you can see from the photo above that he was heavily disappointed.  but grandpam and papaw knew just what to do...

we left whiteside and drove to hike at a mountain with running water.  and not only was there a waterfall, but you could actually walk behind the water!!

WE DID IT!

wordless wednesday (the wasp)

you know you're in the mountains when...

josh and i were so excited to get to head to the cabin for a few days over the fourth.  we kind of felt like we had taken a bit of a beating over the previous few weeks so we were thrilled at the prospect of leaving town for a while to visit with family, hike, bask in the 68 degree weather, and just stop for a while. 

one of the first ways that we were reminded of our arrival at true mountain living was when we got to the cabin late that first night and pam called downstairs to jim to remind him of a very important task:  "jimmy, go outside and turn the water on!"  we swept a few bugs off the floor, spread out our sleeping bags, and tried to convince the kids that they really did want to go to sleep. 

you've already seen what parts one and two of our first full day in cashiers held, but we were thrown full-force into a whole new world when the music festival began.  everybody was digging the authentic bluegrass of the first several groups...

...especially jack and josh.

and then "sweet tater" took the stage.  who (or what) in the world is that, you ask?  let me enlighten you.

this, my friends, is "sweet tater" (along with their beards and overalls)...

these men loved every minute of what they were doing, and despite the fact that i wanted to rip my ears off and eat them, it was such a joy to watch them play.  especially this guy...

how precious is he?!?  if you're like i was, you're staring at his "instrument" trying to figure out a) what it's made of and b) what kind of music it makes.  well, you're in luck because he told us a little story about the "gut bucket" (no joke, people, that's what it's called.)

he's playing a tin wash bucket turned upside down with a hole drilled into the top.  this type of instrument is typically made with a long stick of some sort to attach the string to, but this jolly little man got creative and used his grandfather's musket to make his version of the GB. 

you can't find stuff like this in birmingham, folks.

we finished the night out with a few more bands, a fireworks show, and a lot of fun laughs with family.  good, good times.

the weekend was off to a fantastic start, but unfortunately, things took a bit of a nasty turn the next morning when abby had a run-in with a wasp.  don't think a wasp sting is that big of a deal?  come back tomorrow...

i'll have three tickets to extended naptime please

once the campers had their t-shirts properly decorated, we scooted over to the cashiers town square for a day of fun at the festival.  before we staked out our seats for the music and the fireworks that night, though, we turned the kids loose on what seemed to be an eighteen-acre land of entertainment.  there were monkey bars:

slides:

and really cool poles that made jack think he was a fireman.

(too bad he had to have papaw help hoist him up so he could actually exercise his new-found fireman skills.)

there was a fantastic old red tractor there, too, that i decided i really needed for some sessions coming up.   but hard as i tried, i just couldn't figure out how i could get it back to alabama with me.  I-85 doesn't seem very tractor-friendly.

but the highlight of the playground was most definitely the tire swing.  it may look pretty tame...

but let me slow my shutter speed down just a bit so you can get a feel for what it was really like.

it looked like so much fun that i decided to give it a go myself.  abby and i were having a nice little ride...

that is until man of muscles came along.  josh thought we would enjoy a bit of a more, um, adventurous spin on the old tire swing.

**i would like to point out to all you fellow alabamians that i was wearing a sweatshirt in the photos above.  in case you're not familiar with said clothing, a sweatshirt is designed to keep one warm when the weather is chilly outside.  it was heaven.**

jack was digging the swing, but what he really wanted to do was play chase with daddy.  wish granted, my son.

while the guys ran off some of that unbridled boy energy, izzy and i slowed it down for a game of "make this face".

smiley face:

crazy face:

kissy face:

and my personal favorite (and izzy's specialty)..."do your eyes":

"make this face" is a game of ultimate focus and concentration, and it must have taken it out of izzy because this is how she spent the next thirty minutes on the playground...

when the troops started to fade, we spread our blanket and perched our chairs in the grass near the stage so we could listen to the music.  and let me tell you, you ain't heard nothin' til you hear "sweet tater" rip it up on their gee-tars.

stay tuned, my friends.  you don't want to miss this!

arts and crafts

it took eight hours to get there, but we finally made it to cashiers a little after 10:00 on friday night.  our previously pooped carload of little people turned the corner quickly and went a little crazy once we arrived at the cabin.  fueled by the excitement of seeing grandpam and papaw as well as the discovery of the fact that the kitchen is upstairs in the cabin, they started bouncing off the wood-paneled walls in no time.

the first task at hand was deciding where to put everyone to sleep.  the cabin has a bedroom and a half (that's what we call the 6'x8' nook that has a little bed in it) as well as a couple of couches in the living room.  somehow, i didn't get a single picture of the arrangement we came up with so my written description will have to suffice.  grandpam and papaw slept in the main bedroom with both of the dogs and the cat.

wait, i didn't mention that there were pets there, too?  oh yes, we had four grown-ups, six children, two black labish dogs, and one cat in the bedroom-and-a-half cabin over the weekend of the fourth.  WOW!

where was i?  ah yes, grandpam and papaw slept in the main bedroom with both of the dogs and the cat, and we put our late sleepers (in comparison with the eastern time zone crew) in the little bedroom like this:  i slept on the bed, izzy slept on a blow-up crib-sized mattress in the two feet of available space to my left, abby slept in her sleeping bag in the two feet of available space to my right, and jack did the same at the foot of the bed.

and somehow it worked out beautifully!   (this was izzy celebrating her first "tee-tee in the potty" experience at the cabin.)

if you're doing the math, you know that this left josh and three little people to sleep in the living room upstairs.  one couch and a row of sleeping bags fit the bill perfectly, and we were one, big, happy family in a packed house!

no sooner had we gotten up the next morning than grandpam announced that the first activity of the weekend was going to be arts and crafts.  ok, that might not strike you as odd, but pam isn't much of a glitter-and-glue kind of gal so we were all anxiously waiting to see what she had in mind.  come to find out, she had spent a couple of hours in michael's the week before (she said michael's was like walking into a foreign country for her!) gathering all the needed supplies to make "camp cashiers" t-shirts for all the kids.  she stayed up late getting them all started and then she let the kids put the finishing touches on their individual t-shirts.

with "camp cashiers" shirts in place, the weekend could officially begin.  ;-)

july fourth - take one

josh's family invited us to join them at their cabin in cashiers, north carolina this past weekend for the fourth, and with the weight of what we're dealing with here in birmingham, an escape to the mountains sounded like music to our ears. 

the first trip we ever made to the cabin was over july 4th weekend of 1999 (man, we're old).  please enjoy these snippets from one of the 37 scrapbooks i made between 1996 and 2007 (before the beautiful blogger revolution).

take a close look at this next one.  i want you to know that i cut out every one of those little starbursts by hand and painstakingly glued them in place on the page-- do you get how thankful i am for the new age of digital scrapbooking?!? 

our next visit to those gorgeous mountains wasn't until late in 2005.  that trip also served as a bit of an escape as we were mourning the loss of our second baby -- but joyfully celebrating our fifth wedding anniversary as well!!!

here's what i remember about the trip through four states to get to cashiers:  in 1999 when it was just josh and me, our drive was full of deep conversations about the future, laughter, and quiet moments of contemplation.  in 2005 when it was just josh, me, and little abigail, our drive was full of deep conversations about the future, laughter, and quiet moments for fear of waking the baby.

then there's the 2010 trip. 

not only did josh and i add two more children to the mix but we also took cousin natalie from birmingham and cousin ansleigh from savannah with us on our trek.  and our drive was full of anything but deep conversations or quiet moments of any sort.  but we definitely had laughter...

(that's the big girls doing their best "praise team" impersonations while singing our god is an awesome god at the top of their lungs.)  unfortunately, after about five or six hours in the car, the troops started to fade, and this is what we all looked like:

josh started to get a little grumpy...

but he felt a lot better after a little nap.

(put the phone down.  there's no need to call DHR...he was driving with his left eye open.)

we did get pretty bored, though, so i was forced to bust out the camera for entertainment.  things started out mild...

...but then i got curious as to what a woman would look like if she hung out of the window of a van moving at 70 miles per hour down the interstate.  wonder no more, my friends.

that's all i've got in me tonight.  but stay tuned for the next installment of our july fourth weekend where we actually arrive in the mountains. 

wordless wednesday