While June was filled with moving days and all of the work that that creates, July was a month of vacations! On the 10th Dave took the girls to Syracuse to spend two weeks with Nana and Papa. They had a wonderful time camping at Green Lake and going to Thunder Island Waterpark. But eventually Dave and I missed them and decided to get them back.
We met up with Nana and Papa in Raleigh to make the exchange. While Dave and his Dad played cribbage at the the National Open, Shirley and I took the girls to the Museum of Life and Science in Durham. We spent most of the day there, seeing the Magic Wings Butterfly House and the Catch the Wind exhibit among other things.
We had a great time in Raleigh, going to a movie, playing miniature golf, and of course, going to our favorite restaurant, the 42nd Street Oyster Bar. On Tuesday Nana and Papa left for their trip back to NY, and we headed west to meet up with some of my family...
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We stopped to do some mining in Hiddenite. They have a place there where you can buy buckets of dirt for sluicing, and also go down on the creek to dig for things like amethyst and smoky quarz, adventurine, and even sapphires and rubies, which apparently look like round black rocks before you crack them open and polish them...we didn't find anything valuable, but we had fun and have a new rock collection.
On Wednesday we travelled on to Dad's cabin in the Smoky Mountains, not too far from Asheville, and on Thursday we went down to hike along Deep Creek. It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed being outside.
But all of those people tubing down the creek were having a blast, and we couldn't resist. We got ourselves some tubes and went down the creek, too, wearing our clothes as we hadn't brought our swim suits with us
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Thursday night Steve arrived with Kelly, Zoe, Kyle and Jordan. We convinced them that they really needed to go tubing down Deep Creek, so Friday we headed back out...
It started out great, we brought our suits this time, Dave decided to sit out and take pictures, Jordan stayed on the bank with him, and Zoe sat in Kelly's lap.
Here we go!
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Wait a minute! What are you guys doing out of the tube?? oops, Kelly and Zoe got dumped at the first drop, and Zoe wasn't too thrilled about it...
She managed to hang on a little bit longer, but when we were able to get close to the bank, she got out with big brother Jordan and Uncle Dave.
The rest of us floated on, sometimes facing forward, sometimes backwards, rescuing shoes when necessary, losing each other,
catching up again, and finished the trip in without incident.
Then we grabbed our tubes and hiked back up to go again! Zoe may disagree, but we think this is fun!
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Dad had reserved a pontoon boat for Saturday, so we spent the day on Fontana Lake, enjoying some swimming and a little fishing.
We had Dad to navigate and the kids took turns driving the boat, so what could go wrong?
Well, actually, nothing, it was a perfect day...even Zoe decided water was not so bad and got in for a swim.
Sunday, and we must all return to our homes and jobs. School will be starting in just a week, how can summer be over already?!
We had a great dinner, we are all too full, but that won't keep us away from the tree! Those presents are just too tempting...the wrapping paper starts to fly.
