Moving out of the Fog

Here are the pictures from when the fog started to life. The colors are just brilliant! I'm not sure how much longer they'll last though, especially when they are already so bright so early into the Fall! We'll just have to enjoy them while they last!

Weekend with B

This is my favorite picture from the weekend. We hung the camera on a tree branch and had to keep turning with it and hoping it would get us in it!


This weekend my little sis came up to visit and we had a great time. Friday Dave, Sophie, and I met her in Asheville and ate dinner and went to a movie. It was really nice. Saturday we decided B needed to see the beautiful fall scenery around here and went for a hike in the Shining Rock wilderness area. We took the Blue Ridge Parkway on the way up, and then it started to get pretty menacing. The weather got dark and darker until a fog appeared that was so thick we could barely see twenty feet in front of the car. I optimistically said it would "burn off," but it wasn't letting up. We pushed on. When we got there were surprised to see the parking lot so full of cars and people on a day like that. It was pretty cold and wet so we all had on layers and rain jackets. When we started we were kinda chilly, though Sleepy seemed fine as long as we kept moving. The fog wasn't letting up, and it was crazy to think the colors around us were so beautiful, yet we couldn't see a THING! The pictures, and video, are below to prove that one. About three o'clock, as we were ALMOST back the parking lot and at the end of our hike, it cleared a bit. It was amazing! We got some pretty cool pictures I must say. Without further ado....here's the fog.

Entering the Fog

It's crazy how you can hear the wind whipping around us, and how quickly Dave and B disappear in front of me.

Bath time!

So Thursday Sleepy rolled in something awfully smelly. We like to all curl up on the couch together and that was just NOT happening with him smelling putrid. Friday Dave decided he needed a bath and got right to it after he got home from work (considering he was already dirty). He didn't stay dry for long, Dave that is, so it was a good thing he stayed in his work clothes. Sleepy was not at all convinced he needed a bath!

Dave's already soaked at this point--look at his pants


Sleepy is not loving the bath--it's even warm water!


Escape!!!

Caught again. Back in the tub for you buddy! Oh well, at least you don't have to get one again for awhile.

NO CAFFEINE!

It had now been 11 days since I had caffeine of any kind, including Coke. It started as a realization that I hadn't had any for about 4 days, and maybe that was why my head refused to stop throbbing. I thought about the fact that anything that has withdrawl symptoms can't be that good for you, and it's not like my body actually NEEDS caffeine in large doses. Plus, drinking sodas is really harmful for me since I need calcium so badly and soda sucks the calcium right outta your bones. So, I'm off of it for now, I'm not sure how long I'm going to keep it up, but I'm feeling pretty good and I'm drinking more water!

I taught again last week and it went o.k. It was Homecoming at school last week, so the classes were crazy with all the kids dressing up and events after school. I also got to experience my first practice lockdown--which was interesting. Basically you lock the doors and stay that way until the prescribed measure have been completed. No one comes in or out until then, even if the principle is telling you to open up--you say no and keep the door locked. Interesting.

Yesterday was GAF--Guest Appreciated Festival--at NOC. It's the biggest gear swap on the East Coast, and it was pretty fun. Though, because it was earlier in the year this year, I feel like there weren't as many vendors. I did get a new Patagonia rain jacket (mine was pretty much useless) and a pair of pants though.

Today is a big day at our church too. We are having a picnic afterwards and a volleyball tournament anyone in town can enter. It's three-on-three and it should be pretty good. I think two of my girlfriends, Erin and Beth, are going to get the high school volleyball star to be their third (she's awesome). Hopefully I'll get some pictures of it all. Pray it doesn't rain!

Well, Dave just made an amazing breakfast of peach waffles for the both of us. I'm sad the peach season is over, I think they are my favorite fruit. I gotta get to breakfast now, see ya later!

Saturday hiking trip

A beach we found on the way home beside a beautiful lake. We stopped here and cooked dinner on the beach!

Books I am reading at the moment (and highly recommend):

1) The Last Lecture
Grandmama lent me this one after reading it on Patsy's insistence and I am just loving it! Most chapters are less than five pages and it's just easy to read and enjoy.

2) Journey of Desire
I have read this one before but not for a long time. I really loved it the first time. One of the first non-fiction books I've ever re-read!

3) Harry Potter 7
Ok, so I love Harry Potter, as you know. I just finished re-reading this one last night. They just NEVER get old! Dave actually had to tell me to quit reading some this week because I was ignoring him. One night at dinner he said, "NO Potter at the table, just me!"

4) I about to start reading "Twilight" of the Twilight series.
B let me borrow them from her. They are REALLY popular right now and I wanted to know what all the fuss is about. The movie of the first book comes out in November, the same day that the Harry Potter 5 movie was originally supposed to come out, so it better be good.

5) Lord Change My Attitude: Before It's Too Late
So, there's a back story to this one. A previous Christian boss gave me this several years ago, a book I still insist is not gift material because of the title, and I have not read it because I am stubborn...and I like to hold grudges. But, I decided that needs to stop, so I picked it up the other day. I have just read a bit of it, but I figure it couldn't hurt right? I mean, the Eddy women do have a history of big attitudes right? Maybe it's just me then. ;-)

Books I have and will read soon:
1, 2, & 3) The rest of the Twilight series
4) "Teacher Man" (same guy that wrote "Angela's Ashes")
5) "The Shack" (don't have yet)
6) "Three Cups of Tea" (don't have yet)

Gosh I just love reading. I really think I could do it all day! Is there a job in which I can read all the books I want to read and get paid for it? That would be lovely.

Reflection on the week behind...

I feel rather mellow. I am sitting here with an excellent glass of wine and a full stomach as a long week is drawing to a close. I came home Sunday afternoon from visiting my family for a wonderfully long four days. I got to spend time with each of my siblings, not something I get to do very often. I even saw a movie with David--which REALLY doesn't happen very often considering how busy he always is with one thing or another. It was great to get a day with Shannon without the boys. I told her I probably hadn't done that since middle school :). Sunday evening I got to spend a few precious minutes with my Sophie (my B.C. adopted sis) in Black Mountain. She made me pasta and we had coffee at the nearby coffee shop (awesome place).

Monday I awoke to Sleep going absolutely crazy with itching--flees. I had to go to the vet to get a pill for him and gave him some Benedril just to stop the scratching (it didn't even put him to sleep). With that, and going to the laundry, my morning disappeared pretty quickly. All afternoon I worked on the homework I effectively put off on my visit home :). Beth and Erin came over that evening and we happily played Settlers.
Tuesday I was at the high school all day and then off to class in the evening. Dave came with me to do some rock climbing in the gym there. Wednesday I went to work at NOC with a great group of kids from an international private school in Atlanta. Awesome group really. Thoroughly enjoyed them. One of the teachers asked me if I would like to teach at a school like theirs and I said "in a heartbeat." Today I worked with the group again and again had a great time. The cool weather has been perfect for working outside the last couple of days. The high yesterday was 72--love it! Tomorrow I'm off to the high school again, the first time I will have been there on a Friday and will get to dress more casually. Saturday I may be raft guiding, but if not Dave and I are going for a walk somewhere. I'm actually hoping they don't need me because we haven't been on a good hike in quite awhile!

Well, that's really all I had to say. Just thought I would update you on my day-to-day. Hope you are all having a great week!

First teaching day

Today was my first day I actually got to teach...and it went really well! We had a short day though, only hour long classes. I was originally going to teach yesterday, which would have given me a full 90 minutes, but today they had student council elections which threw everything off. So, I had to cut down my lesson plan, but I still think it went well. I had this little squishy nerf ball thing which I threw to the students if they wanted to answer or ask a question or give input of any kind. I have two regular senior English classes and two honors English classes, so they are generally pretty talkative (sometimes at the wrong time, which is where the ball comes in). It worked well until third period when my ball went missing (aka someone stole it). Oh well, it was free anyway. All in all a good teaching day and SOOOO much better than observing. I'm tired of handing out papers and moving the projector around--it was good to do some real teaching. I feel like they actually learned something today too, and that makes me feel quite nice.

A single girl and her ferret (I know right? weird, but hey, at least it's not a German Shepherd) just stopped by and I think they are going to rent the apartment next door. It will be great to get someone back in there so quickly! Our last tenant just left 2 days ago!

Well, that's all the updates I have for now. I got tons of lesson planning to do, see ya!

Ode to a new school year

Ah so pretty, don't you think?
I just trying this out,
so please don't pout,
hope that's ok,
but I'm not sure if it's here to stay
(the background that is, just to be clear).

Well, I have started another school year,
I'm teaching now ya know,
just once a week or so,
at the high school in town
(my classroom is a bit run down).
Tuesday is my first day to teach.

Think of me then, I do beseech,
I'm lesson planning like crazy
Though I feel awfully lazy.
I'm only taking night classes twice a week,
Still at WCU (my prof's say I'm far from meek)
On the weekends I'm still at NOC

My students would say "there I be!"
(but of course that's not the kind of language to use)
Did I tell you I once saw a pet goose?
Sorry sorry, this is getting out of hand,
I must bring this silly post to an end.
Toodles! I hope this post brought a lovely smile to your eyes! ; )

To jail and back

On our last day we went out to breakfast at the Huddle House and then to Southport because it was raining. We walked around, in the pouring rain, and saw the sights. The old jail was one of the first places we stopped.

I think G is in the first stocks pic and S is in the second. Shannon am I right?

Family beach trip '08

We had a great time at the beach w/ Shannon, Landon, and the boys again this year. We taught the boys how to play Bocci ball and it was a lot of fun. Plus, we all swam a lot together Dave and I really enjoyed playing with the boys. I did get stung by a jellyfish, but it wasn't too bad (Shannon took care of me). Here are a few pictures of the trip, I'll put up more soon!

Ice cream at Leaky Tiki


Sleeping Beauties

Dave playing with the kids in the ocean

Bocci Ball--the kids loved it. Too bad it didn't last long--meaning it got stolen w/ the rest of the stuff, oh well.

WE'RE GOING TO THE BEACH!

See you there Shannon and fam!

The weekend: fun times and frustrations

We went to Belechare on Saturday. We were going to go camping, but it rained the night before and we weren't sure it was going to be pretty, so we decided to head to the big festival in Asheville (Belechare). Belechare (really not sure if I'm spelling that right) means "Beautiful Living" in Scottish. It's got a lot of artsy things there, really really cool junked-turned-art kind of things and beautiful paintings and stained glass windows. They also have lots of wood creations as well they inspired the hubby for future endeavors. The festival had six different stages spread out through downtown playing all different kinds of music. We ate dinner early at one of my fav's (Doc Cheys) and listened to live reggae music outside. All in all it was an awesome day and we had a great time walking around and seeing all the different things there were to see.

However...

There were corner "evangelists" all over the place with their mega-phones and crappy signs. And I put the "evangelists" in quotation marks because they did NOT represent my Jesus well at all. Their signs were in large letters, and they had a list of all the verses where Jesus talks about homosexuality and how it is wrong. I'm not saying the verses are not true, they are, but the way they went about this evangelizing was completely wrong. Their preaching was falling on deaf ears because they were doing it all backwards! In Romans 5:8 it says "God commendeth His love towards us in that while we were YET sinners Christ died for us." It does not say, "and once we were without sin Christ died for us"--NO! We cannot change our sinful nature or even get away from it without Him. We are to come to Him as we are, and once we hand our lives over to Him, He helps us change that sinful nature. We can never attempt it without Him. It made me so sad to see those people doing that. I just thought, "that's not my Jesus...these people are being turned away from my Jesus because of these people with mega-phones." It made me want to scream and cry at the same time. Jesus came with love first. He sat down with sinners, and through love and conviction changed their lives. He did "not come to call the righteous, but the sinners to repentance" (Matt. 9:13).

So...we had a great day at the festival, but it made me sad to hear the mega-phones not preaching Christ's love, but preaching the "you're going to hell" message to all the people of Asheville.

Must see!!!!

I just got back from seeing the cutest, funniest, most enjoyable chick/musical flick ever! Two other girlfriends and I went and saw the movie version of Mamma Mia today. IT WAS FANTASTIC! I'm not really a musical person, honestly, but this was just hilarious! The cast was amazing--Meryl Streep, Christine Baranski, Colin Firth, Pierce Brosnan, and Amanda Seyfried. They were phenomenal. I laughed all the way through and even cried a little bit. Shannon and Mom, you guys should go see this together. You would have a blast! I will buy this AS SOON as it comes out on DVD. I could have gone back in and watched it again right afterwards!!! Definitely the best chick flick I've seen in years....especially considering it's a musical too!

p.s. The Dark Knight was awesome as well. Great action, but a very very dark film.

Recent Proud Achievements

1) loaded a raft bus with 6 rafts (130 lbs each) from the top--I pulled them up all by myself
2) finally vacuumed out the car
3) kayaked and still had the ability to roll--most of the time
4) figured out how to make an odd numbered group of people fit into the right amount of rafts
5) went to a party where I only knew the host and still had a good time

Here are a few photos of my boys and my new hair color. The ones of Dave and Sleepy outside are from their backpacking trip last week.

new hair color--can ya see it?

I was talking on the phone to B at the time I took these. Not very clear really. You can see it better in the sunlight. Maybe I'll take some more tomorrow so you can see it better :).

First time I've actually replied to a tag

I don't usually do tags, cause I feel they are kind of like forwarded e-mails, I usually ignore them. But, this one isn't too ridiculous or difficult so I'll consent.

What I was doing 10 years ago:

Well, I was 15, so I was probably at camp for the summer, maybe AWANA camp. I probably spent the rest of the summer with friends around the pool, pining over the boyfriend I had gotten at camp that year, or elsewhere, lol.

What are my favorite snacks:

I love salt, so some of my favorites are roasted peanuts and salsa w/ corn chips. When it comes to the sweet stuff I like Terry's chocolate oranges, which are hard to get over here, so Helen and Mervyn & Sylvia sometimes bring me over some when they come or mail me some for specially occasions (thanks Helen for the two for my birthday! One is already gone!). I love nice creamers to go my coffee too, those are great for desserts or nights of coffee w/ board games. OH, and I LOVE Coke. I crave it sometimes. And when I go to the movies I almost always get chocolate covered raisins--love those too!

What are 5 things on my to do list today:

1) go to the grocery store
2) tidy the house and try to put away Dave's camping stuff
3) take the dog for a walk, if he's not too tired from backpacking for the last 4 days
4) vacuum and clean out car (done)
5) take trash to dump

5 (plus 1) Things I would do if I were a billionaire

1) give more away! Wuhoo! I love to be able to give things/money to people that need it. It's so much fun!
2) start a trust fund for children we MIGHT have in the future, B & D, my adopted sister, and all my nephews and nieces
3) build a fully energy efficient house wherever Dave wants to live
4) buy a motorcycle for both Dave and I and a green camper van (like the VW van but better) that can run on vegetable oil
5) travel, travel, travel, travel......TRAVEL!!!!!!!!
6) buy my parents an awesome, brand new car, and fix my dad's Maverick.

5 jobs I've had:

1) worked in a camp kitchen for the summer-hot, dirty, exhausting job!
2) lifeguard and swim lessons teacher at RCP for several summers--good times!
3) worked in an after school program at a christian school with 3-5 graders for a year in Winston-Salem
4) was ropes course manager and climbing club coordinator at Medeba for a summer
5) lead instructor and raft guide for Group Adventure Programs at NOC (still there!)

5 places I've lived:

1) New London, NC--grew up here (1983-2000)
2) Winston-Salem, NC--went to school at PBC for 2 long years (2001-2003)
3) West Guilford, ON, Canada--Medeba LDP program for a year(2003-2004)
4) Richfield, NC--lived here for the year before I was married and during summers off and on (04/05)
5) Bryson City, NC--moved here when we got married and still lovin' it! (2005-?)

5 random things people wouldn't know about me:

1) I don't really like animals, honestly, but my dog is special, I love him, but I really don't like other animals, unless I can eat them.
2) I am pretty certain I want to adopt children in the future
3) I want to be a teacher, but I'm scared to death I'll suck at it.
4) I'm scared of ladybugs. I know it's stupid, but I just am.
5) I am an advocate for christian love to people of all races, religions, denominations, political parties, and sexual preferences...and i understand that you may not understand this.

5 cd's I would take to a desert island:

1) Pressure Chief by Cake
2) Willie Nelson's Greatest Hits cd
3) a dance music cd, probably R & B or some kind
4) Newsboys greatest hits
5) a James Blunt cd

And I'm not tagging anyone, cause you guys have already been tagged. Enjoy!

Good times w/ Mom

Since Sunday mom has been visiting. Dave is off on a camping trip this week with the youth group, so I asked mom to come and visit for a few days. Sunday I met her in Asheville and took her to lunch at the Olive Garden for a late birthday lunch. It was so nice just to sit down and talk and laugh with my mom, I have missed her badly. Afterwards we went to the mall and did a bit of shopping. We stopped at Starbucks for coffee, and again, it was just nice to have a conversation with her. I used to really enjoy sitting down for coffee with mom, but I hardly ever get to do that now. I realize I only see my family a handful of time per year, and that is difficult since I grew up with everyone around. But I've always been the traveler and the adventurer, and I try my best to balance that with time spent with the family. Sunday night Dave, a friend of ours, and I taught Mom how to play my favorite game now, Settlers. She really liked it, but I think it's still a bit confusing. It's ok Mom, it's a lot to take in :). Monday Mom and I went tubing down Deep Creek. She really loves tubing there and it was pretty relaxing and funny as well. We got stuck here and there and I got tipped out once. I love to hear her laugh. We went out to eat for lunch. That night we curled up on the couch and watched a movie. Tuesday we had a relaxing morning and I cooked brunch around 10:30. She talked to Dad a bit on the phone and figured out B's school schedule for the fall. That afternoon we went rafting. It was a nice time just to talk and get soaked, but then it started to rain and we got a bit cold. We were both a bit worried about going through the Falls in such a small boat, I hadn't guided one that size in a long time, but we made it through without tipping over. Mom would have killed me if I let her fall out, again :). After that we were pretty chilled and decided to have homemade potato soup for dinner. It turned out pretty well. I got the recipe from Grandmama's church cookbook. Best cookbook I have ever gotten, seriously. Well, Mom left this morning, I was still in bed, I think she left before 7, and I have to head off to work in a couple of minutes. Just wanted to update you on what I've been up to.

P.S. Mom, you'll be glad to hear I replaced Fred's water. He looks much happier not swimming in green goo :). I love you. I had a wonderful time this week. I wish I could see you more often. Call me to talk more often ok?

Happy Birthday Daddy!

I know you are out of the country right now, but I wanted to send you some birthday love anyway. You taught me how to ride a bike, though I bent my arm without my training wheels shortly afterwards (seriously folks, BENT, not broke it, at an 45' angle). You taught me how to shoot a basketball, kick a soccer ball, and hit a baseball, and practiced with me for endless hours. You gave me my love for the outdoors and now I love working and playing in them. You showed me that heights were ok with the right kind of gear, and now I can do my job with a calm heart, knowing my rope will hold me. You introduced me to "horsey trees" and taught me how to identify trees. You spent time with You modeled what it looks like to have a Godly father and showed me how my Heavenly Father feels about me. You showed me what real love is and what to look for in a future husband. I love you Daddy, thanks for being there for me, past, present, and future.