It's Not 65 Degrees in Cincinnati Right Now!

We finally had what my Grampa would've called a "Large Day". It was gorgeous and sunny and around 65 degrees. It's been so dreary in Cincinnati since Winter hit, that I was looking forward to Mobile's sunny weather during our visit. But it's been rainy and dreary in Mobile. I guess we brought all the gloom with us on the trip down here.

Anyhoo...It was far from gloomy today! Mom suggested we check out the Five Rivers Delta Resource Centre, which is located on the Eastern end of the Causeway.
Here's the website: http://www.outdooralabama.com/outdoor-adventures/5rivers/

It was really nice. There were some native (and some past native) animals on display, who had been to visit the taxidermist before arriving. The board walk and piers were fantastic. We didn't get to walk on the trails yet, but will save that for next time. Of course, I took some pictures.

I had no idea that the Buffalo were native to and once roamed in Alabama, but apparently they did. I also have no idea why someone would attempt to climb across the rocks to get to the pier, rather than just walk down the boardwalk. Of course, whatever weird thing my Mom is trying to do, Archie wants to do as well...Phillip and I were almost counting on both of them falling in the water at some point!

Since we had Mom with us, I finally got in a picture instead of having to take them all myself and not get in any.

Here is a view across the delta, in which you can see the skyline of Mobile, AL...It looks a lot different than the Cincinnati skyline! Those couple of buildings look almost lonely!

Right before we left, Mom decided Archie needed a piece of bamboo so he could make a fishing pole or something. After she asked for Phillip's pocket knife, I was hoping we wouldn't be making a trip to the emergency room...she was precariously leaning off the dock while trying to cut the bamboo. At the very least, I figured she'd go home minus one shoe from getting it stuck in the mud when she fell in! But lo and behold...we got the bamboo pole without incident.

We headed over to Meahr State Park across the road to see if we could spot any gators sunning themselves or floating in the water. Phillip and Archie saw some last time they visited, so we hoped for the best. There is a nice dock or boardwalk out along the water and into the marshes. Here are Archie and I taking a break:

We didn't see any gators this time. Maybe they are all 'wintering' in Florida, just like Snowbirds. On the way back, I asked Phillip to stop so I could get a picture of the Battleship for my year book:

My camera batteries died just after this picture, and wouldn't ya know it...I left the charger in Cincinnati. It's a good thing we're leaving on Wednesday!

We are currently having a laid back sort of New Year's Eve...I wasn't in the mood to fight the crowds at the drinking establishments or any fireworks shows. I'm getting just about vacationed out. Archie had Lily over to play with his Christmas stuff at my parents' house. Phillip watched the Auburn game, and I've been working on my blog and struggling with electronic equipment, in general. I snapped the cord to the laptop in the recliner while I was trying to get out of the way of Wii play, so now I'm off to see if it can be repaired with electrical tape. Darnit. Happy New Year!

World War Wii

The family has been enjoying our new Nintendo Wii very much. At Julie's birthday party, the family played some cutthroat bowling, and had some brutal boxing matches. Playing the Wii makes one look ridiculous as you will see from the video I am posting, but you have too much fun to worry how silly you look. For those who are at work where the MAN is controlling your computer usage and can't view the video, I have posted pictures as well. I figure Old E and Ann, in particular, will get a kick out of the video:

Boxing Match number 1: The "Peruvian Powerhouse" vs. the "Baldwin County Brawler":

Sara...ahem...I mean...The Peruvian Powerhouse...proves herself to be quite the scrapper. My Aunt Julie wasn't too happy about her subsequent defeat, as you can tell from her shouting and berating her boxing representative on the tv in the below video. But then she decided all was well and hugs all around. Are you supposed to hug at the end of boxing matches? Perhaps it's a trend that will catch on!

Regular E and his Lady Sara got into it as well. She crushed him like a bug! Peruvian Powerhouse indeed!

Unfortunately, the picture doesn't portray the victory dance Sara does every time she wins!

Most of the family missed the Boxing Main Event, as it took place after most of them left for the evening: Mother-in-Law vs. Son-in-Law! It was quite a nail-biter...In the video, I find it extra amusing that Mom's fighting stance consists of running in place!

It's difficult to tell if Mom's face portrays the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat in the picture below...It went both ways many times during the match. But ultimately, Phillip was victorious!

Wii Love Christmas!

We weren't able to have our Christmas celebration with my family because they were off on a cruise during the actual holiday. So we celebrated upon their return! We had a lovely lasagna cooked by my Mom and Julie supplied the pumpkin pie from her Christmas dinner. I tried to take credit for baking it, but everyone knew better!

We received a really cool family gift: Wii!!! I played it at Regular E's house shortly after it came out and fell in love. I usually hate video games, but the interactive feature just made it great! Plus there aren't a million buttons on the controller to have to figure out.

Regular E and Sara got us a couple of games, and we were ready to go! Below, you will see me beating Phillip to a pulp in the Boxing game!

I actually was quite the boxing champion: I beat Regular E, Archie, Phillip, Sara and Morgan. I was thirsty and sweating before it was over! The last game of the evening, however, Morgan asked for a rematch and won. I think it was because my arms were feeling much like jello after all that punching and weaving. I'm sure she thinks its because of her 'mad boxing skillz'. We'll just have to agree to disagree on that one! The next day when I woke up, my arms were pretty sore from all the boxing and other Wii activities from the day before.

We've enjoyed getting together with old friends this week. We've eaten lots of seafood, although I would still like to take some home for the freezer! We've been mostly kicking back and taking it easy. I'm very much looking forward to getting back home on Wednesday.

A Southern Kind of White Christmas

Christmas Eve during the day, there just wasn't much going on. I was getting more than a bit worried that the 10 days we're going to be here might last forever! Luckily, Joe and Leighanne had the brilliant idea to grill out hamburgers and 'dogs in the evening. Pat and Linda came out for burgers, but left shortly afterward. Joe made a fire out back and we sat around the fire and had a couple of brews and chatted. Some of the kids made an appearance out there every now and again, but mostly kept busy getting Christmas Eve things ready, like doing cookies and reindeer food. The older girls were doing the cookies and helping the younger ones with the reindeer food. It was a very pleasant way to pass the time. I really miss doing that kind of stuff with them. We don't really have people like that in Cincy yet who like to sit around the firepit and just hang out, watch the kids play and chat. *sigh*

We don't do the santa stuff in our family (Phillip and I), so we were free agents the rest of Christmas Eve, as well as Christmas morning! Unlike those folks that had to stay up late and put a bunch of stuff together! Archie and Morgan get the same amount of stuff that other kids do, I guess...but it's just from us instead of the Man in the Red Suit. That's been kind of a tough part of the Christmas Season for us...it always has been. We get santa shoved down our throats for two months (more, if you remember that retail stores begin putting out Christmas stuff before Halloween!) and sometimes it's tough to not do what everyone else is doing. Not many of the Christmas specials focus on what Christmas is REALLY about, except for the Charlie Brown Christmas. It's all about santa, dancing snowmen, flying reindeer, and more santa. I was trying to find Christmas books in the library in Cincinnati that didn't have any mention of santa, but only found two so far. TONS about santa. So being the homeschoolers we are, I turned it into a bit of a school project to find out where the legend of santa came from. And it was kind of a neat story. As with all legends and stories, the original story gets exaggerated and added to over the years. And surprise...now we have a fat guy in a red suit squeezing down chimneys delivering presents simultaneously to millions of children using reindeer which defy gravity, one of whom has a red glowing nose. The fat guy is now nothing more than a marketing tool used by retailers in order to lure kids into a web of deceit in which their parents can't get out of because 'everyone else' does santa and it's all about the magic of Christmas and you are labeled somewhat of a scrooge if you don't fall into the trap.

Hmmm...perhaps I'll get off my soap box now and continue with what I came here to write about. The frustration has been mounting...I've been needing to get that off my chest for well over a month now!

Christmas Day...ah yes...we didn't have to get up super early, so we slept in and started our day well rested. We had a leisurely morning. I made some biscuits and sugar syrup for breakfast and we went over to Leighanne and Joe's to play with all their toys! They got some really neat stuff, my favourite was the Eyeclops...this telescope-type thing which magnifies whatever you're looking at 200x which shows up on your tv. It was neat looking at skin, hair, fingernails and jewelry. The bottoms of the kids' feet was particularly gross to look at, as the dirt was HUGE on the tv. Coins and dollar bills were neat too. I might have to save my money for one of those. I could see where it would be neat to look at fireflies, flowers, leaves, ants, etc.

After playing with all their stuff, we went to the beach. A different thing to do on Christmas! This is where our white Christmas came from! Here are a couple of pictures:

After the beach, we had dinner with Julie, who lives very close to the beach! We were happy to see the hors d'œuvres because we were STARVING after getting back from the beach! We had a lovely dinner of a pork roast with mashed potatoes (of course) and stuffing. The best part was the pumpkin pie. It was so yummy! Julie was kind enough to give me a pie 'to go' as well! I will serve it when we do Christmas presents with my parents and I will claim credit for it! Thanks, Julie!

After dinner, Julie opened a bottle of her Biltmore wine, of which she poured me a glass and herself a glass. Old E had apparently gotten her some kind of wine preserve type of special cork to go back in the bottle which pumps out the air. This proved to be very difficult to figure out. Here is my uncle Kenny taking a stab at trying to get it to work properly:

Fortunately, between him and Julie they finally got it to work properly so we only drank our one glass and we didn't have to drink the whole bottle of wine that evening. *whew!!* We really dodged a bullet there! :-)

Christmas Dinner with the Duttons-Sunday

We did our Christmas activities with Phillip's family just before the actual Christmas Eve or Day so all the siblings could participate. Patrick, Sharron, Emily and Ryan were down from Atlanta, we came from Ohio and, of course, Leighanne, Joe, Analise, Sydney and Lily live here.

Phillip, Archie and I began the day by going to our Mobile church, in which the new building was completed. Archie was a bit overwhelmed at the size of his Sunday School room! It was really great visiting with folks again, and we look forward to seeing them again on this Sunday.

After church, we went over to my in-laws for the festivities. The kids were, of course, begging to open gifts before supper. It was fun to tease them about opening the gifts the next day instead, or not at all...they were easy targets! Sharron was really thinking ahead by making gingerbread people and bringing decorating stuff with her from Atlanta! The kids had a blast decorating their gingerbread people (notice how pc I'm being...not gingerbread MEN but people???) and getting very messy. All of them had different coloured teeth and mouths before they were done.

Here are a couple of photos. Morgan made one too, but she did hers way after the other kids did theirs, so I didn't get a picture of her doing one.

Analise was very sweet to help Archie get started!

Here is Sydney with her Gingerperson creation:

Archie's finished gingerperson! I love Archie's blue teeth!

FINALLY, even before dinner, it was time to do the gifts! Phillip's family does the gift procedure differently than my family does. In his family, everyone gets their 'stack' and at the count of three opens all at the same time. My family, on the other hand, does one at a time, and everyone goes individually. Both traditions are fun for different reasons. When we do gifts with Phillip's family, it's over so quickly and it's hard to watch the kids' reactions to particular gifts. Especially if you have more than one kid to watch! But the noise of tearing and the paper flying in the air is loads of fun to experience! I took a short video of The Opening of the Gifts at Phillip's parents:

I don't really know why the television was on in the background...I don't think anyone was watching it. It looks kind of weird having it on in the video! Anyhoo...it was a fun day and I was exhausted after it was all over. I'm SURE my in-laws were too!

Christmas Lights Galore! Part 2

The Duttons have been going to see the Christmas lights at Bellingrath Gardens for as long as I have been married. We went on our Annual trek to check out the Christmas lights on Saturday night. Linda (my Mom-in-Law) decided to step it up a notch by handing out these cool glasses to enhance our experience at the lights. When you have the glasses on and look at lights of any kind, you will see a seasonal image around the light. We had snowmen glasses, snowflake glasses and santa glasses. Everyone traded until they found the ones which suited them best. Here is a photo of everyone upon receipt of their glasses:

It was really fun to make the drive to Bellingrath with our glasses on...I had the Snowmen glasses and all the tail lights of the cars looked like an army of red snowmen! I think this was the most crowded I've ever seen Bellingrath for the entire time I've been attending the lights with Phillip's family. We had to park along the side of the road leading to the parking lot. After the hike to the ticket spots, we had an extremely difficult finding everyone, as we had to take three separate vehicles. Just as I found one set of family members, I'd lose them in the crowd and find another set.

After we finally got everyone together, kids to the bathroom, then all back together again, we set off to enjoy the lights. Linda's glasses added a whole new fun element to the viewing of the lights! We created quite a stir among the other visitors to Bellingrath. It was difficult to say whether folks were wondering where we got those cool glasses, or whether they were wondering why we were walking around looking like dorks. Probably the latter.

Here is Phillip sporting his santa glasses over his glasses!

And Joe...

Here's Lily:

And my Mom-in-Law and Dad-in-Law after we stopped for hot chocolate.

What good is a visit to Bellingrath without a photo of some weird flower:

Archie, Lily and I took a break from walking:


Lily and Archie:

Riding the Stone Lion:

It was a fun, but exhausting evening! After Bellingrath, we all went back to my Mom & Dad-in-Laws' house for some adult beverages on the back porch. After a while, it began raining, then blowing, then blowing harder. All of a sudden, there was a very loud clatter on the roof covering the porch. It was NOT raindeer. I thought it was a bunch of hail at first, but my Dad-in-Law said for everyone to get down, because a tree was coming down. As I ducked down under the patio table, all I could think of was that I was seeking shelter from a falling tree under a GLASS patio table! Fortunately the kids were inside playing. Or sleeping, in Ryan's case! After all the noise stopped, we checked around the side of the yard, and found this:

Fortunately, there was no damage to the house or roof. Another tree broke this one's fall before it hit the house. Some branches and stuff fell on the aluminum roofing on the porch which sounded quite scary! We resumed our festivities and had an event-free evening after that!

Right after that, the pelting rain began. We could barely hear one another as we shouted across the patio table to eachother! The storm was loud and intense, but didn't last too long. Not peaceful like a snow storm at all!

Christmas Lights Galore! Part 1

On Thursday night we used our free Zoo Lights tickets. It was very, very crowded, but okay. It was kind of neat to see the zoo at night. Some of the animals weren't out, but I'm not quite sure if that was because of the cold or because of it being night. It was Phillip's first time at the Zoo ever, which is kind of odd, since we have the membership and everything. I guess we always go while he's at work or out of town or something. We'll have to make a point to go with Phillip on the weekend or on a vacation day. Here are a couple of pictures I took:

Here are Archie and I in the Children's Zoo section, riding an elephant!

Then we went to the Zoo Shop and tried on hats and funny glasses!

After the zoo lights, we had to get Morgan's car from a parking lot because the starter (or something electrical) malfunctioned. Phillip fixed it right in the parking lot! Fortunately we got it home that night and he was able to drive it Friday.

Friday was full of preparing for our trip to Mobile. A teensy bit of last minute shopping and some groceries for our journey. We left Cincy around 4pm and arrived in Mobile an exhausting 11 hours later. We visited with my parents and my brother before they left for their cruise on Saturday. I noticed the massive number of suitcases for their FIVE day trip. My Dad offered to smuggle us on board in their suitcases. Unfortunately, my Mom packed too much for that. Perhaps she will pack a little lighter next time. But probably not!

Our First Snow Storm

I didn't really know what to expect when the news forecasters predicted an actual snow storm. Phillip decided that since a snow storm was predicted, we would need to rake the lawn again so as to not muck up our beautiful snow with brown leaves. I think perhaps we were the only people preparing in this manner. I'm sure lots of people were purchasing the last spark plug or whatever at Home Depot. Much like hurricane preparation on the coast...I don't know why I need this, but since the store still has some, we'd better get some! So Phillip was out raking leaves in the dark on Wednesday night, and I finished them up during the day on Friday. And we decided to do without the spark plugs and Spam! :-)

I've been through a number of storms before. Numerous too-many-to-count thunder and lightning storms and of course hurricanes. Regardless, we were pretty excited to experience a snow storm. The storm was to move in our area late Friday night/early Saturday morning. So when we would wake up on Saturday, we would be pretty much in the thick of it.

So Saturday morning, I woke up around 8:30 and all was very, very quiet. So I figured the weather people were going to be eating their words in the next newscast. I went back to sleep for another 45 minutes or so and when I woke up, all was still quiet. On the walk back from the bathroom, I looked out the back window and...who knew??? It was snowing like crazy! The snow was already deeper than our first snow. It was very gently, silently falling. Big flakes of it!

Now when I think of storms I don't think of peace and quiet, gentle precipitation, you-don't-even-know-it's-there-til-you-look-out-the-window type of storm. Storms, where I come from are loud, whooshing, sometimes screaming wind, rain pelting the roof, terrible cracks of thunder and lightning type storms in which I am usually praying that the lightning will go away soon and I'm waking up Phillip (and my parents when I was a girl) because I am so afraid.

This storm reminded me of the Old Testament Bible story where Elijah goes up to the Mountain to find God. There was an earthquake, a terrible wind and fire, but God wasn't in any of those. Instead, God spoke in a soft whisper. That's what this storm reminded me of...I was expecting howling wind, possibly hail, or pelting rain. Instead I got a soft whisper. It was really coming down, but it was so, so silent!

We got up and of course had to go right out in it and check everything out. The snow was so pristine and perfect! It was almost a shame to walk in it! The street was entirely covered, and you could hardly tell the sidewalk from the street. When cars did come, you couldn't really hear them because the snow muffled all the sounds. It was so peaceful!

This is how it looked on the street when we began our walk!

This was shortly after Phillip nailed me with a snowball. Or before...I don't really know. There were quite a few snowballs lobbed between us.

But as with everything else, all was not perfect with the world...When we made our way up to the main street near our house (Harrison Ave), this gross, disgusting mess is what we found!

The picture doesn't even begin to capture how yucky this was. When they put the salt on the roadways, it turns everything into a slushy, dirty mess which gets on your car, your clothes if you happen to brush the bottom of the door area when you get out of the car, on your shoes, and ultimately in the house from your shoes. Since this was too disgusting a mess to face first thing in the morning, we turned back to our street, where fortunately everything still looked pristine.

It was beginning to sprinkle, as in freezing rain, so we went in to eat breakfast. We saw on the news that the freezing rain was to continue and would melt the snow, so we figured we needed to hurry up and get out there for some snow play! And the rain continued to fall. And we got soaked! Phillip shoveled the snow from the driveway and packed it on the steps in our back yard to sled down. Here he is trying it out! He looks like the Silver Surfer in the Fantastic Four movie!

I went down, went a bit sideways because sleds are VERY hard to steer, and hit a rock wall. It nearly knocked the wind out of me! I am still very sore from that little spill. I suspect my hip will be bruised from that one. Phillip said it's because I'm old. And I'd better not go around and break my hip. It must be true...a spill like that wouldn't have slowed me down a bit when I was younger. WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN TO ME????

We decided to try building a snowman. Snowmen are apparently much harder to build in real snow than televison snow men in made for television snow. I have a whole new respect for Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes for his snowmen in various gruesome poses! Phillip couldn't make the three ball high snowman work. Not even a one-ball high snowman! So he had to take a page from Calvin's book and make our snowman rising out of the ground. Morgan says he looks like Budda. With awesome pectorals? I don't know. Mom and Dad's church has Buff Jesus. We have Buff Budda in our backyard. And No, Dad...Not Buff the Stuff Bagwell. Buff Budda. Here is the finished product.

At this point, it was still freezing raining, and our clothes were soaked through. My water resistant coat and gloves were soaking wet and it was time to go in for a nice hearty lunch. About this time, Morgan finally made her way out of bed and went out with Archie. They built a snowman too, but I didn't get a picture, because my outside clothes were entirely too wet to put back on. Plus the rain was coming down a bit harder. Phillip made a nice fire in the fireplace where we were able to dry everything out. It rained for the rest of the day, but some of the snow is still there. Presently, as I write this (at 4:30 am because I woke up because my hip hurts), the rain has turned to snow again, so we'll see what tomorrow (or today?) brings. Hopefully some more snow will fall, enough that we can sled. I'll try to be more careful.

Oh yes...I also wanted to include this...Archie got his bunk bed on Friday morning! He sleeps on the top bunk (of course). However, he did climb into our bed Friday night at some point during the night saying he was cold. But he wasn't cold. It turns out, after talking to him Saturday morning, he had nightmares about falling out of the top bunk and got scared! So far this evening, he's still in the top bunk, hopefully without the nightmares!

The bottom bunk is a full sized, so we can now have overnight company without sticking folks on the crappy couch bed! Archie has already decided that Mimee and Pawpaw can sleep on the bottom bunk, with Archie on the top, and Granny on the fold-out chair in his room. I'll bet Granny will be REALLY looking forward to that! Phillip and Archie had the first Jamma Party in it on Friday night. Here they are watching Scooby Doo on the laptop:

Tree Decorating At It's Finest!

Since we had Steak Kabobs for Thanksgiving and will be having Gumbo for Christmas, I decided to cook the traditional holiday-type meal this weekend. I spent most of Friday night chopping stuff and preparing for the feast for Saturday.

Saturday morning I woke up and put the turkey in to roast. Phillip and Archie got butchered by a local barber, then we were off to get our Christmas tree. I know there are a few tree farms around here, but since it was kind of rainy, cold and crummy out, we opted for the easy pre-cut tree. Christmas trees up here are so much cheaper than they are in Mobile! Even the local to Mobile ones can get pretty expensive! We got a very nice, fat Blue Spruce for $25! Dad, just so you can relate...it's the BLUE TAG one. We almost got a RED TAG ($15) one, but we decided on the fancy-schmancy Blue Spruce!

We tied it to the top of the car and drove home. We found all our Christmas stuff and got it out of the attic. I put the stand together and we tried to get it in the stand. Phillip had the trunk cut too low at the store. And we couldn't shave branches off because the trunk itself was too wide at the branches. We tried setting the trunk on a block of wood in the stand, but the tree kept falling over. Then we tried nailing the block of wood to the tree stump, but we were still having problems with an unsteady tree. Finally, we turned the tree upside down, assembled the stand on the tree trunk and turned it upright. It took a few hours just to get the tree in the stand! We had our holiday feast and got to decorating. Phillip did all the house decorations and Morgan, Archie and I did the tree.

The first decorations to go on the tree are the light strands, of course! I got them unraveled and untangled and lo and behold...None of them worked! None of them! I couldn't believe it! Not wanting to trek the extra distance to Target for some lights, we opted for the corner Walgreens store to get some more light strands. And paid high corner store prices. And while we were there, Archie happened to spy some candy canes on a shelf, so we had to get two boxes for the tree! So we got home and tested the new lights with success this time. Finally!

We had a lovely time decorating while listening to my favourite Christmas movie...A Christmas Story while decorating. It has never taken as long to put up the tree then decorate it as it did this year. Perhaps we were all learning a lesson in patience. Phillip in particular, while wrestling the tree into the stand all afternoon!

Here is Archie putting on the star with some assistance from Morgan!


Here is the finished product:

It looks great in the windows!

Sunday morning, we went to the church down the street where Archie was singing with his Sunday School classmates for the service. Below you will find a little snippet that I video taped. Just press 'play' and it should work:

And if that doesn't work for you, I took a picture when we went back for the Candle Light Service in the evening. The service was very nice with outstanding music with cake and goodies afterward. He's the first one in the bottom row. He looks sort of angelic in his little choir robe, doesn't he? Ha!

We had gone shopping during the afternoon on Sunday. To the mall! Gasp! I usually try to steer clear of malls at any time, especially Christmas Time, but it was nice to get some gift ideas. Morgan was trying on some jeans, and we waited for her in some chairs outside the store. Here is a photo of Phillip while wearing Archie's Batman hat!

Snow!!!!

The snow finally came Tuesday night! It snowed late Tuesday night and Wednesday morning until about noon. It wasn't much as far as northern standards go, but it was enough that if it had snowed the same amount in Mobile, the city would've been in gridlock and the streets would've been lined with an army of dirty snowmen! A dirty snowman in every yard and snow drift! I didn't see any snowmen here, so I guess perhaps we need a few more inches to make a good one.


When Archie woke up, I asked him if he looked out the window yet. As soon as he did, he gasped and said in an awe-struck voice, "Oh, Mama...look!!!". He couldn't have been more thrilled. We had to call Daddy at work to make sure he noticed. Just in case he didn't look around on his ride there! We also had to call all the grandparents. I knew there was no point in doing our sit-down academics, so we just called it a snow day and played. Actually we learned lots about how to make our sled go faster and farther, where was a good place to slide and why, friction, etc. So I'd call that a good school day!

We walked to the library for story time and took pictures along the way. Archie didn't want to walk on the sidewalk where the snow was melting...he wanted to walk where his feet sank in the snow along the grass!

He pretty much stayed outside all day long, with a couple of quickie trips inside to warm up with hot chocolate and a bite to eat. Wednesday night his feet and shoes were absolutely soaked and very, very cold.

When we lived at the North Bend House, we found a plastic sled that was in the basement. It must have been left by a previous tenant. We took it with us when we moved to our house, just in case. It finally came in handy! Phillip got it out, as well as a cardboard box for sliding down our terraced back yard. It has three levels...the top level where the house is, a lower middle level, then an even lower still bottom level. It's a huge pain for cutting grass, as you have to do the slopes via weedeater because they're too steep for the lawn mower. Well, we finally got the benefit of those slopes!

Archie and I were sledding for a while. Morgan and Phillip came home at dark. I told Morgan that she had to try the sled once, then she could go back in. She complained about the cold, but came out to give it a shot. She stayed out long past dark with us while we all took turns sledding down the slopes! We had a great night. And all the snow reflected the moon and street lights, so it seemed very bright, even after dark. Some pictures are below.

This is the view off the back deck.

This is the front of the house, just before we left for Story Time at the Library. The snow was a tiny bit slushy, but it froze a little harder toward the end of the day.



Archie thought it would be fun to lick some snow off of Morgan's car!

Archie took a picture of me sledding. Morgan and Phillip got back too late for pictures. It was getting too dark. I got one of Phillip sledding, but it's too dark to see him very well. We'll have to get them next time!

The snow is still around. It doesn't melt as quickly as it did in Mobile... on the odd occasion that we experienced it, that is! This morning when I got up, I noticed that the entire back deck was iced over. Archie did use the sled a little bit after our school stuff, but we really need some more snow. We're looking to get another two inches later tonight, on into tomorrow morning. Hopefully we'll have a good sledding snow!

I never really 'got it' when Southern Transplants would say how much they missed the change of seasons in the South. Now I get it. The change is so significant up here. It's been really neat to experience it!

Wine Tasting at Henke Winery--Klassy!

I love this city! Just down the street two blocks from our house is a winery. We saw an advertisement in one of the city papers that they were having wine tasting at Henke on Monday and Tuesday. They also serve food, which smells divine every time we walk by, so we thought we'd have a kid-free evening and give it a try.

I've never been wine tasting before, but I suspect there may be some form or fashion of spitting involved, as they gave us a large empty bowl container with a carafe of water. Julie will have to school us on the finer points of wine tasting. But anyhow...they have a seven different wine taste choice on the menu, so that's what we opted for. The lady that started us off told us all about what we were trying and where the grapes came from and all that jazz. We had a great time!

I'm sure Julie will want to know what we tasted, so Phillip, being as organized as he is, kept a list!

They were out of Chardonnay, so we started out with a Seyval, which is a Dry White Wine. Then the Merlot, a dry red. Then Red Zinfandel. The Vendange A Trois, also a dry red is "blended for bringing out the boldness of Cabernet Sauvignon, the black cherry of the Cabernet Frank and the softness of Merlot". (How's that for good notes?) That one was the most expensive on the list. Then the Riesling and then the Vidal, both slightly sweet white wines. The last was the Cellar Blush, a sweet Blush wine (as you can tell from the name). The cellar blush was my favourite, along with the Merlot.

By taste number five or six, we were both feeling slightly goofy because the only thing we had eaten were those little tiny bread squares that they gave us with the wine tastes. After arguing the finer points of various grammatical and spelling rules, we ordered dinner. Some of the menu was in french. Fortunately, I found the menu online earlier in the day and was able to remind myself what pommes de terre du jour were. I think the restaurant was just being pretentious. I had French Onion soup and salad and Phillip had the Chicken Alfredo. He told me he wanted some "noodles avec mi pollo." Hmmm...French, English and Spanish in the same sentence...Yeah...it was definitely time to stop tasting and start eating!

We each ordered a glass of the wines we each liked from the tasting and had a lovely dinner with good conversation. We both decided that if we ever came into any money, we would still have blue collar attitudes. We're woefully inept at the fancy stuff. The waiter guy remarked about us not using the giant bowl at the end of our table, but he never told us what it was for, and we didn't ask him. I'm sure he knew we weren't classy. We're Klassy. With a K. Phillip said the carafe of water was for refilling our water glasses, but I don't think he was right.

What in the hell is that huge bowl for, anyway? I am not doing any form or fashion of spitting in public. No matter how acceptable it is for tasting wine.

Odd Things that Usually Never Happen

Our family is rarely sick. I got a phone call from Phillip from Paducah last Thursday during the day. He sounded absolutely horrible and was in a lot of pain and had been vomiting. So after much coaxing, he finally went to the hospital where he found out he had a viral infection, and was dehydrated. He began to feel somewhat better after they gave him fluids. On Friday, he went to work, as usual, then came home. By Saturday evening, he was feeling mostly better. Then Morgan got it. She was out of commission all day Sunday, then most of Monday. Monday afternoon, I decided to sterilize the house (particularly the bathrooms) to expel the sickness outta here. Just as I finished the bathroom, up comes Archie with a re-visit from the ham sandwich he had about 20 minutes prior. He made it about half-way in and half-way out of the bathroom. It will be a looong time before I will be able to smell ham and not gag!

Archie said he prayed and prayed that he wouldn't have to throw up again, but he did. Multiple times. I am tired of cleaning puke. So I re-cleaned the bathroom (you could probably have dinner in there, it's so clean!) and prepared for the fact that my turn was coming soon. I washed clothes, did some grocery shopping, and a bit more cleaning and went to the library for some movies. I didn't let anyone within three feet of me! I didn't even cook dinner last night because I couldn't think of anything that I wanted to see later on in the evening again.

I began to feel worn out and achy around 7 and went on to bed with a movie. After the movie, I went to sleep til about 12:30 and just felt terrible! All hot/cold and shivery, nauseous, my skin hurt...I felt rotten and awake all night, but no throwing up! Perhaps being in good shape for a change helped me resist the throwing up part! I slept til about 10:30 this morning and am feeling somewhat better. I guess God knew I needed to have my turn while everyone was asleep! I hope we are done with sickness for a while. I am way too busy to be sick!

Last Thursday evening, I had to pick Morgan up from school because she was staying late. On our way home, I was driving along, when this huge group of people spilled out into the street right in front of me. I had to stop to avoid hitting them. I realized that it was a bunch of kids (prolly anywhere from 14 through 17 or 18 years old) that were beating this one boy. It was just brutal! I've never seen anything like it. We waited about 30 seconds or so...I was hoping it would break up because of the traffic, but it didn't. And no one was helping! So I got out of the car, walked toward the group and yelled very loud, and wouldn't you know it...they all scattered and ran away! One girl kind of came at me like she thought she might do something, but she looked me in the eyes and ran with all the rest of them. I'm guessing she thought I was a kid at first glance, but when she realized I was an adult, she scrammed too. I went to the boy (he looked to be about 18 or 19) and fortunately he got up and seemed okay.

After we got home and I had a chance to think about it, I find it odd how one woman, 5 feet tall, can scatter a group of 8-10 teenagers up to no good, just by making myself heard. One person. Phillip says I need to learn to shoot (he's said that more than once) and get a gun. At the very least travel with a bat.

It's Difficult to Watch the Iron Bowl in Ohio

On Saturday evening, Phillip and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings to catch the Iron Bowl on TV since we don't have cable at home. Buffalo Wild Wings is a sports bar which has AT LEAST 20 TVs of all sizes all over the place. You'd think it would be a piece of cake getting one of those TVs tuned to ESPN. It was more of an ordeal than it should have been. Why is it that a sports bar can't find the ESPN channel? As it turned out, they finally did tune one of the TVs to ESPN, but it was the big screen that was directly over our heads, so we didn't know they tuned the game in until Phillip had to go to the bathroom.

Oh yeah...I almost forgot...we even got carded when we ordered drinks! Phillip is 37 and I'm 33. Somehow, I have a difficult time believing that we look under 21. But be that as it may, we whipped out our Alabama IDs (we still haven't made the Ohio change yet). So you'd think that it would be pretty easy figuring out which customers wanted to see the AUBURN VS. ALABAMA game. The folks with IDs from the State of Alabama, of course! We finally got someone to tune in a TV that we could actually see from our table. I believe we were the only Iron Bowl watchers in the place.

It was nice getting out together, just the two of us. We don't do enough of that. I wasn't feeling 100 percent, but I still enjoyed myself. The part of the game I enjoyed most was when the player got bit by a security dog in the end zone. I've gotten where I can sit and follow a game and be somewhat entertained, but football still isn't my favourite. Phillip is an Auburn fan, and since they won the game, all was well with the world.

We've had an indoors week so far. I have a goal to finish with our Kindergarten curriculum by the first of the year, and it looks like we're going to make it. Archie is really excited about his reading and we've been working hard, focusing on reading and writing. We'll probably take it easy in January and have more of a mathematical focus, since we've had a focus on reading and writing these past few months. We'll begin First Grade in February, when the weather is too yucky and cold to do any outside stuff anyway.

Regular E and Sara went camping also during the Thanksgiving Holiday. Except they went to Panama City Beach, where it WAS NOT in the 20's at night. But they still used an electric blanket in their tent! Wimps! I scoff at your electricity!

They went fishing and caught blow fish! Two of them! Marty said they made weird noises when he was trying to get them off the hook and even started inflating. I asked him if he cooked them, but apparently they look pretty gross, so he threw them back as quickly as possible. Here's a picture of Sara, very proud of her catch, as you can tell! She doesn't look at all disgusted! :-)

Thanksgiving in the Wilderness

We went to Red River Gorge to camp for Thanksgiving. It is a little bit east of Lexington, KY, only about 2 hours from home. We left home Thursday afternoon and we arrived not really knowing exactly where the campground was. But it was a nice drive trying to find it. If you go through the little community of Nada, you approach the Gorge area through the Nada Tunnel. It's a one-lane roadway through a huge rock. It was a bit longer than I expected inside it and when we went through, it was pitch black inside. I guess you just have to hope no one is approaching from the other side. Here is a picture:

Apparently it was an old logging road that went through the gorge. The tunnel was dynamited for easier access.

On our campground search, we saw some really gorgeous areas. Here are a couple of pictures:

After a while, we found our campground. It is off-season in Red River Gorge, so there was no bathhouse or electricity available at our site. There was a water spigot, but it wasn't at our site. I wasn't sure if it was potable or not, so I boiled any water we consumed from the spigot. And it was cold water. Morgan was most unhappy about the lack of hot showers.

We selected an out-of-the-way campsite almost in the woods. Fortunately there was a vault toilet relatively close by. Our campsite consisted of a flat tent site with a metal fire ring with a grill-top and a picnic table.

Phillip went to pay the camping fee and I set to work gathering firewood. From past camping experience in campgrounds, the best firewood is usually left behind by someone who went to the expense of purchasing firewood and didn't want to carry it home with them. So I was scavaging all the abandonded sites around us for some firewood. I hit the jackpot on a site near the trail head. There was enough wood for the night's fire, stacked neatly near the fire ring. It was like firewood from Heaven!!

Phillip came back and we set to work setting up the tents. Eventually we want to do some backpacking, but we need all lightweight gear to do that. Currently we have only one lightweight two-person tent and one lightweight sleeping bag. The rest of our stuff is good for car-camping. Here's a picture of setting up the campsite:

We bought a flint/magnesium thing at the outdoor store to see if we could improve our fire-building skills. Here's Phillip giving it a try:


It didn't go very well. To be fair, it was sprinkling out and had been raining off and on all during the day. So all the leaves were wet. And everyone was cold and wanting to hurry up and warm up. So we used the more modern barbecue-lighter with lighter fluid method. Before long, we had a fire and were ready to cook Thanksgiving dinner. We had steak-kabobs and some campfire fries. Otherwise known as 'Squishy Fries', so named by Archie. Basically potatoes with some butter, salt, pepper and parmesean cheese wrapped in an aluminum foil pouch and cooked over the coals for about 45min or so. They were a bit squishy, but good. We had campfire banana splits, which are bananas stuffed with chocolate chips and marshmallows and wrapped in foil and cooked til hot for dessert. Much like the pilgrims' first Thanksgiving, I'm sure!

We sat around the fire and chatted and had hot chocolate. It was very nice. Until this guy pulled up in the parking area. We were pretty far away from the parking area, so it was kind of hard to get a good perspective. It was around 9pm, and he parked and headed straight for the site where I had scavenged the great firewood from! I was very concerned that I might have accidentally stolen some guy's firewood. We watched him for a while, the flashlight going back and forth from his vehicle to the campsite and back again. Archie said he was scared and Phillip started fussing at me for scavaging. The site had really looked abandoned with no tent or camp stuff, and fallen leaves were all over the picnic table! I certainly wouldn't have taken someone's wood if I had any thought that they might still be camping there! Well, we finally decided that he had just arrived at the campground, probably had Thanksgiving somewhere and was just getting there late. We didn't worry about it anymore. In the morning, he didn't seem to be looking for lost firewood or anything, so we figure he was just arriving. Whew!

It was in the 40's when we went to bed Thursday night, but was in the 30's when we got up on Friday morning. It was snowing a teensy bit! You can see the snow on our picnic table and on our stuff!
We went on a hike after breakfast which took up all the remaining daylight hours on Friday. We figure it was about 7 miles or so, upon our review of the trail map. Normally, I could do seven miles in much shorter time, but we had lots of climbing and exploring to do at just about every turn! We had snow flurries off and on all day long during the hike. Of course, I took some pictures along the way

There were lots of these little cave-like crevices and large rocks. We didn't get to see any of the arches and natural bridges this trip. We'll have to come back! Archie loved climbing all the rocks. Here are Archie and Phillip on a ledge:

This is an underneath view of the same ledge Phillip and Archie were on in the previous picture. It was difficult to capture in the pictures how steep everything is.
Archie decided to climb a tree limb along this ledge.

We stopped for lunch on this rock. Phillip secretly brought along his nifty burner and cooked some soup!

We kept having to cross this stream in multiple places along the trail. At least I'm assuming it was the same stream. Archie crossed most of the streams with Phillip grabbing his puffy coat to keep him from falling in the water!

Morgan seems to be very light on her feet crossing the stream!

Well...maybe not...People who are light on their feet do not crab-walk across the stream!

This was a pretty neat spot. Red River Gorge reminds me a lot of Petite Jean Mountain in Arkansas. We saw lots of these huge old trees and gigantic rocks there as well.


Archie and I decided to see if we could push the rock out of our way.


Our hike was a circle hike, and none of us had a trail map. The maps were posted at the trail head, so we had to do it from memory. It was getting on in the day and we weren't really sure exactly where we were and how much longer we had to go. I was beginning to panic as the sun slipped below the canyon walls, because the trail blazes were faint in places and it would've been extremely easy to get lost after dark. And it was cold. Real cold. I kept trying to think of what we would need to do if we had to spend the night out there without tents or sleeping bags to keep us warm. But fortunately, we made it back to camp just before it was completely dark. I could not have been more relieved!

We rode to the little town and bought some firewood, because we were too tired and cold to scavenge. We had a nice dinner of foil-pouch roasted vegetables and bacon-wrapped chicken over the camp fire. We had to eat really fast before the food got cold! And hot chocolate all around, of course! Friday night it got down to 23 degrees. It was cold. Bitterly cold.

At breakfast earlier on Friday morning, I got an idea from an episode of Survivorman I had seen previously. I had Phillip place a large rock in the fire early in the evening before dinner. We took it out about 45 minutes before I went to bed for the evening. I put the warm rock in my sleeping bag with me and it worked beautifully! My feet and sleeping bag were pretty darn toasty for the first several hours! Phillip tried it with success also! After that experiment, I learned that I should have done two rocks...one for when I first go to sleep, then leave another one in the dying fire to stay warm for 3 o'clock in the morning for some fresh heat for my sleeping bag. Because it got really cold when I woke up at 3!

Morgan says we've been watching too much Man vs. Wild and Survivorman. I say you can NEVER watch too much Man vs. Wild or Survivorman!

On Saturday morning, I decided that 23 degrees was too cold to cook and eat breakfast, so we wimped out and packed it up and headed to a Waffle House near Lexington. I know...Survivorman would just eat some grubs and get on with his day, but we're not quite Survivorman material just yet. Almost...but not quite.