ONE HUNDRED THIRTY ONE…uh oh, did someone say road trip???

We are channeling the Clampets on the road home from our three-week hiatus. We have stuffed the inside of our car with as much as we possibly can

and we are heading home with a bed frame loosely attached to the roof of our car.
I use the term “loosely” because it’s getting quite a bit of air as we drive along I-95. I suspect it may not actually be touching the roof while in transit. It’s difficult for me as a passenger to peel my eyes away from the sunroof in wild anticipation of the possibility of it taking flight, at which point I will instruct Greg to, “step on the gas and don’t look back.” The amazing $50 daybed we inherited has increased our gas consumption by 1/3, has extended our 10 hour trip to a brutal 12 hours because we have had to stop and start so many times to make a few adjustments to the straps and voila, we avoided the disaster a bed frame flipping through the air was sure to cause. Yeah for us!!

It reminds me of the time Greg and I drove to Detroit for Thanksgiving in our little white Toyota Tacoma. We had packed up plastic bins with clothes and put them in the bed of the truck and tied a tarp on top. We were doing about 75 on I-75 when all of a sudden the lid from one of our bins, flies off and goes flipping through the air on to the hood of a semi. Needless to say, he was not happy with us. Rightly so. We endangered everyone around us, I’m not trying to minimize the potential disaster we could have caused. However, due to the fact that no-one was hurt, it was hysterical to see this tiny little blue lid flipping through the air and landing on this enormous Semi. The truck driver blew through the lid, it went off to the side and landed in a ditch. As the trucker drove by us, Greg and I both were all hands covering our faces embarrassed. I peeked through and saw him yelling, waving his hand and spittle flying out of his mouth as he flew past. It always makes for a great story every Thanksgiving.

I digress.

First on our stop was the always beautiful and dewy Tennessee.

It was magical this year as we crossed the North Carolina border into Tennessee where the foliage was lush, green and voluptuous. We took the Asheville Hwy into Greeneville TN., drove past the quaint downtown, passed the beautiful newly built campus of Walters State Community College and my brother’s office, turned around the bend, drove up and down several hills, around another bend and into my mother’s driveway.

I had a handful of things I wanted to accomplish on this trip. As it turns out, a handful is too much when your only visiting for one week. So I had to prioritize the important from the “ooh this might be fun”

high on my list was
1. I wanted to visit my brother’s farm and get some pictures of the girls playing in his creek and feeding his cows,

2. get pictures of the girls playing with their cousins Ellie and Wesley,

3. visit our friends Stephanie and Matt and their brood,

4. travel to Beech Mtn., North Carolina with my brother and his family and stay in their vacation home and snap some amazing pictures,
5. and maybe take a day trip up to Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge area do a little shopping.

We ultimately had to let 4 and 5 go. Although 4 sure was hard to let go of the conditions of the mountain were cold, rainy and overcast. No picture-taking opportunity so, it made my decision a little easier.

I have 3 weeks of pictures to sift through and stories to cultivate. I am looking forward to it.