Sunflower Festival July 4, 2009

Biloxi, Mississippi June 2009

My first time having room service and riding a jet ski on the ocean!




We didn't take the zoom...so this was the best Mom could do getting us walking to the jet skis...by the time we got to them, the water was almost over my head. Want to feel tired and find muscles you never knew you had then WALK that far through water. Our legs were like jell-o.

That speck is us riding.


These are too much work, so we're just posing!!

We're Back!

Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg TN were fun! We loved the cabin, more pictures later.

There was snow on the way up going through The Great Smoky Mountains National Park, we were surprised to see that! It was fun seeing families have snowball fights and little snowmen that people stopped to make on the various pull-outs up the mountain.


The front of the cabin:


The view from the porch:

Happy New Year!

2008 was gangsta'! No, not really...but we did have a fun time with these sock hats that Julie's mom got a couple of the grandchildren for Christmas! We had everyone put them on and give us their best gangsta' pose...it was on a whim, and it was hilarious. I call our photo the "Pretty Gangsta' and the Goofy Gangsta'" I just couldn't stop laughing.

Julie's mom cracked us up the most!



I DID NOT make any resolutions but I did make a list of the 9 (which I changed to 10 because odd numbers are icky) things I want to do in 2009--that's within reason--no New York and Hawaii just yet...
1. Visit a new GA state park every couple of months (make use of the park pass we just bought).

2. Travel to and photograph New Orleans on a long weekend.

3. Visit Callaway Gardens and put the macro lens to good use on butterflies!

4. Ride Bikes at Indian Springs.

5. Go to more movies at the theater, like the good ole' days.

6. A long weekend beach trip.

7. Have more movie night get-togethers with friends.

8. Finish getting artwork that is sitting around here in frames and on the wall.

9. Play outside with the dogs more.

10. Rent a cabin in the mountains.

The Weekend

Wow...been since Wednesday since I last blogged. I've just been super busy doing a ton of stuff for work. Planning the Fall festival, attending way too many meetings for stuff that barely pertains to me and stressing over what I'm going to do as my lesson that gets videotaped for the entire staff to see. Ugh.

Other than that, the end of the week and weekend have been pretty nice. Friday night we went to a bonfire at Nat's house and hung out with Nat, Sarah, Kinsley, and Lee. The weather was great, just enough chilly for me. We talked and talked and talked until 11ish.

The next day Kerry, Julie and I went to Atlanta to take some "just for fun" photos. Kerry wanted to see some different things/places and I had been checking out some abandoned places people in flickr groups had already gone to--so we went to a few of those.

The first was the "bridge to nowhere" where we met two homeless men who currently live on the bridge. I'll be completely honest with you and tell you that it scared Julie and me a little bit. As soon as we climbed over the concrete wall that just so happened to have a drop off below it which made you feel slightly uneasy, and made it safely onto the bridge, we were greeted by Donald that made sure to tell us that he saw us as soon as we drove up. He never called it "his" bridge, but it was clear that he was the head guy in charge. We made sure to tread lightly and ask permission before taking pictures. Kerry of course had no problem striking up a conversation and felt more comfortable than we did.

There was one man who was reading a book on the bridge and Kerry asked him what he was reading....he was reading John Grisham! They had a grill, a clock, a few mattresses, and Donald was sure to tell us that most guys just slept right on the ground, but he had constructed himself a shack with a place to sleep.

I know that we could have easily been in a lot of trouble, but the hairs on our arms or on the back of our necks never did anything freaky. Nothing ever told us that we should run away and never look back. But at the same time, I didn't want to stay and converse very long either...just in case the "voice" was on a small donut and coffee break. By talking to Donald it was easy to tell he is very intelligent and spiritual. I still couldn't help but recall the many horror movies I've seen over the years where things appear to be going WELL and then the next thing you know you have a knife in your back. BUT lots of photographers in Atlanta have been to this bridge and made it out alive, so I HOPED we'd make it out too. I'm not saying anything about the homeless...I'm talking about strangers on the street that I don't know. It's sad, but true that you probably shouldn't be out there trusting many people.

Anyway, the part I liked the least was when we had to climb back over the fence because this time we didn't have the tire on our side to get a boost from. So, Donald went around and then insisted to help us across. When he grabbed my arm to help me it was so tight and intense that for an hour later I still felt like I could feel his grip on me. I didn't care for that. Then he asked if he could pray with us and it was the longest prayer ever and was a great prayer, but once again scenes of scary movies came to my mind---here we are all holding hands pretending to keep our eyes closed. He had a grip on Julie that left an indention in her knuckle for a long time afterwards...and I'm between Kerry and Julie thinking that this is the part where somebody comes up behind us and hits us over the head...and then we wake up in a completely terrible, new place. YIKES.

My mother shall never know of this adventure.

Once we were finally getting back into the car, he asked us if we'd mind going to get them a chicken basket and we opted for handing over three dollars cash instead. I told him thank you for letting us take pictures of his bridge and he said "No, it's the Lord's bridge."

Here is my photoshopped interpretation of the "Lord's bridge", the bridge that Atlanta folks call, "The Bridge To Nowhere" because it stops abruptly in the sky and goes nowhere.

I'll save the second location for tomorrow---because if you thought this one was scary---you might need to recover before the next one! :)


That's Donald in this next one



The view from one side

Yesterday

Yesterday Julie's office closed early, so we went to Macon to explore Washington Park and the River Walk because our photo shoot with Dyana and her cutie-pie kids got moved to Macon for Saturday. I had forgotten that she was leaving Alpharetta to go visit her grandparents for the weekend...so Macon was the place to be! :) We decided to check both places out beforehand to make sure they'd both be great for pictures. Washington Park is so pretty, I love the way water runs throughout the entire park!!

We're Back!

Our trip was fun, but naturally we're glad to be back home relaxing with the pups! The first day we got there we went to Typhoon Lagoon water park and it was so much fun...but we were only there three hours before a really bad thunderstorm with lightning came! They closed all of the rides and you had to sit underneath little huts that had lightning rods on them. We figured it was like any other Florida storm---would last about an hour and be gone. But, this one lasted all day. We sat there for many hours just chatting with people and because we spent most of the day sitting in the rain, we got a free rain pass. So, instead of paying money to go to Animal Kingdom, we spent our next FULL day this time at Typhoon Lagoon on our free ticket. So, the rain actually was a good thing because it was like we got a day and a half for the price of one ticket!

Our favorite ride was the new Crush 'n' Gusher water coaster. We rode it several times and my cousin Kerry took a video of us on it, but it's just a tad difficult to hold on to a camera while you are being thrust down a water slide, so it's not all that detailed! :) We also loved floating down Castaway Creek and would sometimes jump in just to float to another attraction.





The Wave Pool

We swam with (BABY)hammerhead sharks and fish but I didn't get any great pictures, however, Kerry paid extra to surface scuba with a regulator and got some great videos of the fish being calm and then an awesome feeding frenzy when the guy came and put out new lettuce.


Later that night we went to Old Town Kissimmee just down the road from the resort.

We did some shopping and stayed late in a tavern listening to people sing karaoke. It was highly entertaining!