Vacation (part 3)

Goats On The Roof-That's the store's name!

It's a gift shop/ice cream shop with built in entertainment.

Notice the goat walking from the roof of one building to the roof of another.

Adam sending an ice cream cone of food up to the goats by pedaling a bike.

This goat knew the system!

Caleb sending his food over in the pulley system

What's that?  There's bunnies too!

Then we took a day to float down the Chattahoochee River.  It took about 2 hours and the boys loved every minute of it. This was Caleb's first tubing trip so we didn't know if it would be his thing.

Caleb even took a short nap.

Adam floated like this for much of the trip.  He was grabbing rocks off the bottom as he went by.

Our Georgia Summer Vacation (part 2)

After Panther Falls, we continued down, or I should say up, the trail another mile or so to Angel Falls.

This waterfall kept going up and up and up. No way to get it all in one picture.

Both Chris and Justin slipped and fell down the last 10-15 feet of this section of the falls.  Thank goodness they didn't wipe out any of the 4 kids that were standing in the falls around them.  Justin was actually going so fast at this point that he went right over this drop with Chris standing below trying to catch him.  The falls continues after this so I'm glad they were both able to stop here.  It's all funny in the picture, but Justin is fairly certain he broke a rib or two because he's still very sore 2 weeks later.  Boys will be boys.

Adam and friend Sadie catching the first fish from the pond on our  cabin's property.

Our Georgia Summer Vacation (part 1)

We spent 10 days in the very northeast corner of Georgia at the foot of the mountains this summer.  We had some friends with a cabin so we joined them for a few days and then they left it to us for the remainder of our vacation...so nice!  We packed every day with fun and yet it was still relaxing.  We visited a number of state parks in the area, climbed high and low, floated rivers, found and swam in waterfalls, and ate our faces off! 

The hike to the first waterfall, Panther Falls,  with our friends

Caleb, the legit hiker

We found the waterfall, must climb it

And climb it some more! 

I can do that too!

The climbing crew.  Caleb got so filthy we stripped him down to his diaper.

Kayaking Ticfaw

We took a Saturday to have fun on our kayaks about 45 minutes down the road from us on Ticfaw River/Bayou.  We were looking to give Adam some confidence on his new kayak so we didn't want open water (you can't tell you're getting anywhere on that) and we didn't need any rapids yet.  This turned out to be the perfect spot.  Caleb also thought it was perfect because his absolute favorite book right now is Liza Lou and the Yeller Belly Swamp by Mercer Mayer. We've read this book over 100 times for sure.  He's obsessed with Swamp Haunts, Witches, and Gobblygooks. He kept seeing them all through this swamp.  We had a wonderful day paddling over 2 miles and Adam did the whole thing solo.  We ate lunch on the water and just enjoyed ourselves.  Love this family hobby!

Eating Lunch

Adam's Summer Swim Lessons

Freestyle while working on side breathing

Floating on back

Treading water for longer periods of time. 

Adam is such a fish and he loves the water so much  that we are thinking of putting him on the pre-swim team this fall. Not to compete yet, but to learn proper strokes for if he wants to persue swimming.

Caleb Completes Little Gym

He earns his first medal!!!

Time for some last minute tricks.

Caleb really came out of his shell at Little Gym.   He was always the first to volunteer to try a trick and he just bounced from each piece of equipment all hour.  He was like a human pin-ball machine. Can't wait for the fall semester!

More From Memphis

Friday evening is the time to prep for the all night cook.  Here, Chris is dry-rubbing 5 pork shoulders.  There are 3 judges and they each get their own shoulder to eat from.  They were hoping they could get 3 great ones out of cooking 5.

After cooking all night, the guys pulled the pork apart and prepared the blind tasting box.

Then it was time to clean up the joint.  All the judges would be visiting the booth for 15 minutes to get the low-down on how they cooked the pork, the equipment, and the seasoning.  We had to have a place setting ready for each one.  I was so happy with how the flower arrangement turned out...notice the wood chips and the skewers sticking out. 

They sat down with the first judge who was great.  She actually came back to them after the judging was over and said they had the best pork and wanted to take some of the mustard sauce home.  She also gave them some great tips for next year. 

Chris posing with TV BBQ guy Miron Mixon from Jack's Old South.

Most of our team, we small but dedicated few!

Our team playing the Cracker Game.  If you ever play it, the funniest game ever, know it originated with our BBQ team at MIM 2011.