The Last Official Weekend

There's only a week left until we begin the moving process. The movers won't be here until the first week of September but the kids and Jeremy and I will be camping out in the new place once school starts. We'll have 3 days hanging out with his parents and 2 days of sleeping on the floor until the furniture actually arrives. School and piano lessons start next week and so, really, this past weekend was our last little bit of free time before we head to Roanoke.

Jeremy was off for 4 days to get things done around the house but I didn't want to spend the weekend only working. And so on Friday we had the neighbors over for cards and drinks and chips and salsa and laughter. It was great, I won the poker game and the kids stayed up way to late :)

Saturday was all work and no play and so I was determined that Sunday would be different. I convinced Jeremy to go hiking with the kids and I early in the afternoon. It's no secret that I love heading up to Skyline Drive and there's a trail that I've been wanting to check out for months. It was an easy 2 mile trek to see some old Episcopal Mission ruins and the weather was perfect - 70 degrees up on the mountain.

The bugs were terrible because we were at a lower elevation than normal but the endless butterflies were beautiful. We found the ruins along the overgrown trail and passed an Appalachian Trail cabin (J and I keep talking about completing the 2000 mile trail once the kids move out...). There's not much left of the old mission. A few stone walls, some steps, and some random rusty metal...things. But it was fun and the kids had a great time climbing rocks and looking at the flowers that were insanely tall. I'm anxious to find new places to hike on the Blue Ridgeway Parkway (which will be less than 5 minutes from our new home) but I'm going to miss the spontaneous trips up on the Drive.

The weekend ended on a perfect note when our friends Dave (Uncle Dave!!) and Pat ("What? How does he rate Uncle status?") came over for dinner. I haven't laughed so hard about nothing for a long time and it was a great evening. I'm getting nervous about the move and knowing that I have visits like that to look forward to seems to make it all ok.

The next few weeks should start getting complicated so we'll keep you posted and let you all know the new address and phone number once we take over the lease for the apartment...Stay tuned.

Same Road, Different Trip

The kids and I decided to spend a night with Jeremy "on location" again this week. It was just a quick overnight jaunt but it ended with us arriving home tonight exhausted and ready for the weekend.


We hit Skyline Drive again because I was hoping to take some shots of the kids with the amazing amount of mountain laurel that is currently blooming up there but I made the mistake of stopping off at Big Meadows first. We wandered for a long time, enjoying the sun and following the winding deer (and people) paths. We saw lots and lots of these:


And plenty of these:

including this girl who cracked the kids up by taunting a puppy on a leash.

The only problem is that when we started driving again, the kids were hot and sweaty and not wanting to hike and let me take pictures of them. Somehow that just did not sound like an excellent time. I can't imagine why not??

So we headed up to see Jeremy and arrived just in time for dinner. Amazingly, even though there are even numbers on both sides, the kids outvoted the grown-ups and we had to go to Olive Garden for dinner. Ahh, the sacrifices we make...

I had a pretty sleepless night and was worried that I'd be a grouchy, tired mess for the return trip but after a little breakfast and some hot tea I was good to go. We had a few hours to kill so we headed to the Luray Zoo. Now, I know you're thinking what kind of zoo is in Luray? But they actually have a great reptile section with a gazillion snakes, some pretty cool rescued animals that they've "adopted" over the years, and a small petting area. It was a surprisingly fun way to spend a couple of hours (especially during monkey snack time). And really when you get to talk to a donkey named Burrita and she does this:

that, My Friends, is a good zoo trip.


A quick stop for lunch and we were back on the road to make a trip to Grammy and Papa's. We went swimming and the kids had a blast racing each other across the pool. Then it was time for dinner, conversation, looking at pictures from their recent trip to Israel and ice cream sandwiches. It was a great little visit and a nice way to spend a summer evening.



A long day and what felt like 45 hours of girl power music (Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus and iCarly, anyone??) knocked the kids out on the way home. And so, I drove in the quiet dark, flashes of heat lightning in the distance with the lure of home urging me on.