Sea World here we come!!! The kids were very excited to be headed out to their adventure “under the sea”. The drive was about one hour and they kept themselves busy doing what all twenty-first century kids do in the car – watch movies and play games.
After a day in the car the kiddos were revved up to get out and burn some energy. I think they would have been happy doing anything but we decided that a good dip in the ocean would do them all some good. It takes a while to get us all lathered up in sunblock and out to the sand but we eventually made it right around the time the sun was a massive ball of fire directly overhead.
Today we left for our family vacation at the beach. We had plans to be in bed early and on the road by four so that we could get the kids out of bed, still sleeping, drive most of the early morning and arrive around lunch with an afternoon of swimming to look forward to. But after finally getting into bed somewhere near three-thirty four didn’t sound so appealing. We did eventually get on the road but not until after nine. Not too far down the road, right before pulling onto the expressway, Carol was curious if I shut the garage door. Of course I did…right? We had to go back into the house several times for this or that prior to leaving and neither of us could remember if we shut the door the final time. We called in a favor and the thought paid off – sure enough I had left the door wide open to the world.
I am never sure whether to feel happy or sad whenever I get to visit the Ranch. On one hand I am happy that these animals get to live, basically get a second chance, and at the same time provide some up close encounters for the kids, sort of entertainment. On the other it makes me feel that this is just another form of making money that, while providing entertainment, lacks what it is perceived to offer. Many of the animals are caged indefinitely without even the chance of freedom. I can only hope that our kids take the time to appreciate Nature for what it is and the impact that We can have on it in both large and small scale.
Now enough of me on a soap box. All the kiddos were going to be away for some or all of Spring Break this year so we thought it would be fun to do something out of the ordinary with them before seeing them off. We didn’t tell them what we were doing until we got there and even then I don’t think they really understood what we were going to do until we started seeing and feeding the animals. We packed a backpack full of old food stuff and picked up some corn and apples at the concession as well.
The day has passed now and since been replaced by a dizzying array of southern winter weather. We have had ice, warm rain, lightening, 75° weekends, slush, wind, downpours and pretty much tiny slices of everything else since that snow. It was a fun day for us though. It started late in the evening, past the point where we needed to be out, and continued throughout the night. I don’t know what the official “inches” were but I would guess that it was four to six, maybe even a touch more. Once we were bundled up and the kids were anxious to head out into the blizzard and play. There were certainly snowmen out there that needed building and snow balls that needed targets and they were bound to oblige.
Last night Berkeley Lake Elementary School had its school concert for the third and fourth graders. Jacob has been excited about going for the past few weeks. He has been asking us to play various Michael Jackson videos online and has every now and then been dancing like a zombie in the kitchen. I didn’t know why, or didn’t put the two together, that he might be performing something special for us. Well now…were we in for a treat.
Well…this is certainly a case of better late than never. A post that should have happened months back never did. I started and stopped writing it several times but never finished. So in lieu of keeping it perpetually updated and eventually posted, here it is:
Labor Day weekend was fantastic. The family, all six of us, took a road trip to Indiana. Specifically the greater Indianapolis area. I wanted to introduce Carol, Isaac, Jacob and even Violet to my grandfather, aunts and uncles, cousins and the various kids they have all produced or acquired. I also wanted a chance to show Carol around the areas that I grew up. In all cases, and in contrast to the Bush definition of such, the trip was a “mission accomplished”.
The trip was indeed fantastic, regardless of how many months ago it might have been. We were able to visit most of not all of my family, the Indianapolis Zoo, the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis (the Atlanta version could learn a great deal from this place), eat ice cream from Mrs. Curls, and inhale a particular northern culinary delicacy – The White Castle.
I am not normally a nervous person. I speak well in front of people, rarely with a slip of the tongue or bead of sweat. I remember ideas instead of lines to get my point across more on the fly, rolling with any punches that might get in the way, than by recalling words from memory. I can ramble with the best of them to keep a conversation going while I figure out what point it was I was trying to make…this list can go on and on but I might start to get an ego, and regardless of how inflated my ego might get, not a one of these traits, trained or otherwise learned over the years, helped me one bit on a very special night in November of 2009.
Halloween has come and gone. The loot has been categorized into various zip lock bags and put into deep freeze for behavior based distribution. The kids had a month of various Halloween activities: Netflix provided movies, Carol provided the arts and crafts and I provided labor for scooping out pumpkin guts. Costume selection happened about a month ago and the kids are already planning what they want to be for next year. The costumes were fun. Jacob was Ninja, Isaac was a Special Ops Soldier, Piper was Silvermist and Violet was Ariel. The all looked great and the got to pick their own costumes – thank you Internet Gods for not making us drive all over creation looking for the perfect costume.
Fall is here…although sometimes I think fall actually skips the southeast and winter tries desperately to blow in early, dragging wind and rain with it. Such was this particular day. With winter…fall, comes the annual Dahlonega Gold Rush festival. This was a new festival for the girls and I. We have been to the Duluth Fall Festival and the Norcross Art Festival but hadn’t ventured out much beyond. It was fun from the beginning and much, much larger than the others – not to mention more organized. There were certainly some planned destinations as well. Carol and Bonnie wanted to eat lunch at the “Smith House“, watch the parade on Main Street, and checkout the goodies offered by the hundreds of vendors.
