From time to time, everyone seems to have those weeks when important life events seem to converge. A week ago, we were in southern Minnesota for a memorial service and a gathering of cousins whom I rarely see. Two days after arriving home, we headed for Alabama and a granddaughter's wedding. Then we sidetripped to Georgia for a quick visit with my sister before heading toward home. In addition, this week our family celebrates Pat and Jill's twenty-fourth wedding anniversary and granddaughter Brooke's thirty-something birthday. AND Sergio, a young man I mentored, will graduate from Officer Candidate School in Quantico this Saturday before returning to Iowa to finish his bachelor's degree. LOTS to celebrate.
The wedding was in a beautiful venue set in the hills north of Oxford, AL. It was a great finale to several days of meeting and socializing between families. We enjoyed a great dinner one night at Alabama's oldest tavern and an Italian rehearsal dinner the next. We got to spoil our two great-granddaughters and connect with family members who are too distant most of the time. We missed the ones who couldn't make it--our daughter and her family.
Yesterday we detoured over to the North Georgia Mountains where my sister and her husband are building a small home (and I mean building it themselves!) on a ridge where she has spent the last year developing lush gardens. She lived in an used camper that they moved in and to which they added a porch and outbuildings. It will become their guest house when the house is done.
We spent the night in a Comfort Inn on top of a mountain with incredible views. However, I decided to wait until morning to take pictures, which was a mistake. It was so foggy that we could barely see the hotel parking lot, let alone the distant mountains. But we did enjoy the multitude of colors of crape myrtles in bloom everywhere and realized we have never been in the South at this time of year.
So we haven't been camping but find that hotel stays seem a lot more complicated: hauling stuff in and out, no comfortable chairs, puny coffee pots, etc. We will be home today and plan to join our camping friends on Sunday for our annual outing at Howell Station campground on the Red Rock reservoir.
So we haven't been camping but find that hotel stays seem a lot more complicated: hauling stuff in and out, no comfortable chairs, puny coffee pots, etc. We will be home today and plan to join our camping friends on Sunday for our annual outing at Howell Station campground on the Red Rock reservoir.
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