March 27, 2007
Hey, we're freshly back from our first camping trip of 2007 and our first Folk Festival of the year. The girls and I headed up to Stephen Foster Cultural Center State Park on Wednesday morning. We spent the Spring Equinox out in the woods, in the Suwannee River, and generally just enjoying each other and our great Florida Spring. It was just the three of us until Thursday at lunch when Cynthia, Sadie and Eliot joined us. This was going to be their first time at Stephen Foster, and their first Folk Festival.
We set up camp on Wednesday, my big tent, a smaller 2 man for Jordan and Sadie, and a nice space waiting for the Eliot and Cynthia's tent. The sites are nice and large and it all fit nicely. Tents seem to be the minority, with lots of good big campsites the RVs seem to love this place.
We spent Wednesday setting up, riding our bikes - down to the river, around to the bat house, around the Bell tower and all over - cooking food, playing Battleship (Jordan trounced me, that girl is psychic I swear), making a fire and just generally chilling out. The girls got singing the Down By the Bay song while around the campfire and made up some silly verses.
"Down by the bay, where the watermelon grow,
back to my home, I dare not go.
For if I do, my mother will say......."
'Did you ever see a......' this is the rhyming, fill in the blank part.....
llama, wearing pajamas
fly, wearing a tie
snail, getting the mail
Rabbit, wearing a habit
Frog, taking a jog
Lizard, drinking a DQ Blizzard
Jellyfish, painting a pottery dish
fish, licking a dish
Sheep, driving a Jeep
Monkey, looking kind of funky
Zoombini, wearing a bikini, drinking a martini, and eating a pannini (jordan!)
"Down by the bay!" and then it all starts over again.
Ok, you get the idea, let's just say it was fun and collaborative and sweet all three of us singing together.
On Friday, Cynthia and I went to the Outfitters in White Springs - American Canoe Adventures - and Charlie there hooked us up with an awesome tandem ocean kayak, good for horsing around on and the water flows out and won't sink the kayak after a few rowdy kids, ahem, have been on it. She and I did the 3 miles down river from the bridge in White Springs to the canoe launch in SFoster. How great it was to be on the water and Charlie let us have the kayak for the day for no extra charge. Thanks Charlie!! The kids had to paddle up river, then they could paddle down river and get back to the launch. Teamwork. There was a canoe there waiting to be picked up from the same place and they had a chance to compare the two. The verdict: Canoeing is MUCH harder going up river.
The water on the Suwannee is full of tannins, so it's brown...technically. But, actually, when you have your feet in the water, and the sun is shining, there is a lovely shade of deep rose in the deeper water, changing to amber midway to the surface, ending with yellow at the surface. So, you can look at your feet (rose), ankle (amber), and calf (yellow) and have this gorgeous spectrum of colors. At first when I moved to Florida, water with tannins freaked me out. Black water, no thank you. This trip, I've fallen in love with it.
The landscape going down the river is so unique. This area floods every once in a while, so the trees close to the waters edge appear to be Cyprus, that has been washed out, and is dying, but kind of turning to a driftwood look. The swirls heading vertically are so interesting because trees are generally thought to have horizontal rings. These vertical swirls defy that thought. The various stages of decay also add interesting visual experience. Along the way, there are different levels of rock, sand, shale (possibly) on the banks of the river. Gators? yes. Charlie says they are gun shy, though...years of living in White Springs, I guess.
When we showed up on Wednesday afternoon at the canoe launch, there were 5 canoes, loaded up and heading down river with a group of folks going for a fishing/canoe day with plans of looking for a place to set up camp and stay the night. Bravery! But, it seems like that's the thing to do on the Suwannee, lots of free land and places to camp for the night. It's wild, but lovely and cool too.
Quick note: on Friday when we went to town for various things {ice, getting my van, water, etc.} we were at the little stoplight in town and on the corner was a brown dog and a goat. Uh huh, a goat and a dog, just hanging out at the corner. You gotta love White Springs!
Saturday we headed to the Suwannee Springfest for a full day of Folk Festival-ing. We saw the Avett Brothers (swoon) two times, the Biscuit Burners (loved them at Merlefest), the Everybodyfields (new band, never saw before, great surprise at how good), and another new band Scythian. The kids fell in love with Scythian, they are such a high energy group. The lead singer/guitarist got this happy, anticipatory look on his face every time it was time to get the crowd jumping and going. Scottish, Ukranian, Irish, Greek Folk singers. What fun.....it was the beginning of moshing for Eliot, I can just tell! So it was a great day there. We set up in the ampitheatre area, lots of trees, and hammocks in the back of the seating area. There are cool vendors for food and buyables, it's a very hippie like scene. Our favorite food of the entire day was the Veggie Thing, from the Sugar Shack stand. The come all the way from Vermont and make the best food. A Veggie thing is esssentially a tortilla done on the grill, layered with cheese, raw brocolli, spinach, garoc, drop some salsa down the middle, grill, fold up, hit it with hot sauce, and it's heaven in a tortilla shell. Yeah buddy. Also, they make this french toast with bananas and homemade maple syrup....ok, yup. We loved that, we loved playing Frisbee, ball, run around in the meadow. We loved the day. Grody, tired, sweaty, and happy....we drove home at 12 a.m. and crashed back in the tents.
Next day, pack it up day, Late Night Tacos is our tradition (taco shell, filled with scrambled eggs, fake bacon, avocado, jalapenos, salsa, sour cream, and cheddar. That will get your motor running and get you through breaking camp. We headed home at 1 after hitting the gift shop for a run through and were back in Mount Dora by 4. Tired Tired Tired, but happy.
We ran into trouble with the dogwatching situation, and luckily our kind kind NEW neighbors Dwight and Brenda (Spotty) offered, so generously, to watch Jack so Rich could join us on Saturday. We got home, unloaded, and turned around to go see the Avett Brothers in Deland at the C
afe Davinci. This concert blew our minds. It was in this small outdoors patio like setting, and they were so wonderful in this intimate setting. I have seen them a number of times, and this was the best show yet.
The show was wonderful, and for the encore Bob Crawford sang a solo song playing the guitar (not the upright bass), then called Scott Avett on, who sang his own solo of a song I ne
ver heard before. He finished and called Seth on, who did this beautiful finger work on this great song, again, never before heard. It was the most beautiful ending of a great show. Afterwards, the boys, all three, hung out signing autographs, chatting, mingling and it was a little slice of heaven 
for my family and me.
Lauris Vidal opened for them. He's a local boy, currently moved back to Deland. Check him out, he's cool. He had fun, it's obvious. Ran into Katie Ball, the Saturday Bluegrass DJ on WPRK, and her husband Ben. Nice seeing them closer to our stomping ground, and not just in Winter Park/Orlando. So, another late night for us doing music stuff. Love it.
Back home, and it's crash time.....but wait, not totally, Florida Film Fest is happening.....back to driving to Winter Park and onto my next blog!
Pictures above would be captioned as follows, if I could figure out how the hell to do it!!! -
Top left - Makenna chillin with Seth Avett
Top right - Jordan doing the same
Bottom Left - Ok, this is what heaven looks like to Jordan - Scott Avett and Jordan
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Camping and Folk Festival
Friday, March 16, 2007
Meet Jack!
Jack the wonder dog - 9 weeks old
This is Jack. He's our new puppy. We got him on Saturday, March 10th. He's an Australian Shepherd Mix, born on January 7, 2007. What a cute guy he is! He has one blue eye and one brown, is mostly black and white, with some speckles and is getting his not-so-puppy -like fur.
We're all adjusting to having a new baby ...ahem...puppy in the house. I'm shocked and amazed at how much it does really feel like we have a new baby. Up at night for bathroom stops, up early early just because he's ready to get going and is hungry, and we can't leave him alone for very long at all. Almost never actually! I'm sure he's going to progress at such a rapid rate that all this will be a blur in no time soon. That's what we're hoping anyway.
Friday, March 09, 2007
Our first beach day, 2007
Today the girls and I had a wonderful girls adventure type day. We decided to break away from our regularly scheduled homeschool day and make a day of our own. There is a beautiful photography exhibit currently being held at the Daytona Beach Community College called Kiss the Sky that has amazing photos by Henry Diltz. Click on the link and check it out because it's explained better there than what I could do. In a nutshell Henry was a musician that picked up a camera in the 60's and started photographing all of his friends and the musicians of the time. Not only did he photograph musicians, but he also made some very cool "head shot" type portraits of the people around him, and also groups of people, attending love-ins and be-ins, parties in the woods, people just living their lives in and around California in the 60's. The exhibit was not only beautiful photographically, but was a fascinating look back at the culture of the time. Hairstyles, clothing, face paint and makeup, how people lived on the road, it's all there in stunningly rich color. I highly recommend it! Orlando weekly had an article about the opening if you'd like to check that out. There are a few more photos there.
One thing I had forgotten as we planned our outing to Daytona was that Bike Week is happening now. It jams traffic up, and makes it a bit harrier driving with line after line of bikers, but it's actually a hoot! We enjoyed checking out all the different types of bikes, and bikers. Ahhh, people watching at it's finest.
After the exhibit, we left Daytona and headed a bit south to New Smyrna Beach for an afternoon on the beach. What a gorgeous day it was, high in the upper 70's, sunny. We parked our stuff on the 27th Street beach, which has a great little pavilion, bathrooms, and playground, and is the end of the line for those wanting to park on the beach. You can drive on and make a left, but to the right it's No Parking. We have done the "park your car on the beach" experience, but found it to be very much like hanging out in a parking lot. Not exactly what we're looking for. One year Makenna saw a girl get backed over by a truck so, that'll make you not want to be on the drive on part, eh?
We spent the afternoon stretched out in our sand chairs, reading, making drip sand castles (Makenna and my favorite), snacking, playing paddle ball, going for walks, and generally goofing off. At one point when Kena and I were playing paddle ball, the ball went rolling away
from me and an agressive seagull swooped in and scooped it up. He was actually flying around with all the other seagulls chasing him, as if he had a huge tasty morsel in his mouth. I think Makenna and I both watched the whole thing with our mouthes hanging open as he flew out to sea, then back again thankfully, with our one and only ball in his mouth. Eventually he dropped the thing not far from where he picked it up, but it was a bit of a surreal moment.
After the beach we hit the Frosty Gold - or some such name, I'm making that up, but who can remember this stuff - for some ice cream. Jordan opted for Nachos and Cheese. We got the ditzy counter girl, you know what I mean..the shop was busy and you either are going to get the one that's with it and efficient, scopping ice cream generously, moving confidently, or you are going to get the one that looks like she's never scooped a cone in her life and was faxcinated by ice cream scoops in general. We got the latter one. She scooped Makenna's ice cream like she was sculpting it, and at one point came out with a little basket of chips and asked Jordan if she wanted cheese with them. I mean, um, yes, please, otherwise it's a $4.00 basket of corn chips. Ah, yes. But we had fun, yes we did.
Home to Rich and pizza and showers and hanging out, waiting for bed time because the beach just takes it out of me.
A good first beach day.
One thing I had forgotten as we planned our outing to Daytona was that Bike Week is happening now. It jams traffic up, and makes it a bit harrier driving with line after line of bikers, but it's actually a hoot! We enjoyed checking out all the different types of bikes, and bikers. Ahhh, people watching at it's finest.
After the exhibit, we left Daytona and headed a bit south to New Smyrna Beach for an afternoon on the beach. What a gorgeous day it was, high in the upper 70's, sunny. We parked our stuff on the 27th Street beach, which has a great little pavilion, bathrooms, and playground, and is the end of the line for those wanting to park on the beach. You can drive on and make a left, but to the right it's No Parking. We have done the "park your car on the beach" experience, but found it to be very much like hanging out in a parking lot. Not exactly what we're looking for. One year Makenna saw a girl get backed over by a truck so, that'll make you not want to be on the drive on part, eh?
We spent the afternoon stretched out in our sand chairs, reading, making drip sand castles (Makenna and my favorite), snacking, playing paddle ball, going for walks, and generally goofing off. At one point when Kena and I were playing paddle ball, the ball went rolling away
from me and an agressive seagull swooped in and scooped it up. He was actually flying around with all the other seagulls chasing him, as if he had a huge tasty morsel in his mouth. I think Makenna and I both watched the whole thing with our mouthes hanging open as he flew out to sea, then back again thankfully, with our one and only ball in his mouth. Eventually he dropped the thing not far from where he picked it up, but it was a bit of a surreal moment.After the beach we hit the Frosty Gold - or some such name, I'm making that up, but who can remember this stuff - for some ice cream. Jordan opted for Nachos and Cheese. We got the ditzy counter girl, you know what I mean..the shop was busy and you either are going to get the one that's with it and efficient, scopping ice cream generously, moving confidently, or you are going to get the one that looks like she's never scooped a cone in her life and was faxcinated by ice cream scoops in general. We got the latter one. She scooped Makenna's ice cream like she was sculpting it, and at one point came out with a little basket of chips and asked Jordan if she wanted cheese with them. I mean, um, yes, please, otherwise it's a $4.00 basket of corn chips. Ah, yes. But we had fun, yes we did.
Home to Rich and pizza and showers and hanging out, waiting for bed time because the beach just takes it out of me.
A good first beach day.
Friday, March 02, 2007
Dead Boring Road Notes from our trip to Memphis
Our trip to Memphis for the Folk Alliance was freaking awesome, but here, recorded for future reference, are our boring, blow by blow road notes. Stop now. Do not pass go, do not collect $200 dollars. Don't say I didn't warn you. Mostly this is where I can put all of those notes I jot all along the way when I'm on a road trip, the ones I think I'll refer back to when I make the trip again and invariable forget where I put, or even that I made them at all. So consider this my new leaf.
Road Notes
Leave Mount Dora, Florida - Monday 2/19 a 7:45 p.m. - We decided to hit the road at night just to get some miles under our belts. We hit the Georgia State line at 11:00 p.m./178 miles later. Drove on until 1 a.m./337 total miles and stopped at the Holiday Inn in Macon, GA off of exit 3 on I-475. This was the same Holiday Inn we stayed at when Kristine and I caravaned together for our Helen, GA/Unicoi State Park trip we do every October. Price was good ($65.00 per night) and rooms are recently updated and nice. Only down side is we had to eat in the actual restaurant, a bit of a time waster, instead of those grand complimentary-hit-the-road-running type breakfasts. We noticed a Holiday Inn Express a bit further up the road, back on I-85, at exit 186...no restaurant and has that continental breakfast.
Tuesday 2/20 - 7:10 a.m. - fill up the tank and hit the road. We decided to take I-85W/285N south of Atlanta to I-20. Atlanta is a bit of a worry just because the traffic can be a bit of a jam up, but we were also warned that the bypasses can take longer if the traffic straight is moving well. Anyway, this way worked really well.
We hit Alabama 139 miles from Macon at 9:50 am EST, and the time automatically changed to 8:50 CST . Ok, am I the only one that thinks that's awesome?! I don't think so....
12 p.m. - got gas in Jasper and decided to take the "Scenic Natural Bridge" way and not I-78w get there in a hurry way.
12:45 - stopped into the Natural Bridge which is the longest natural bridge east of the Rockies. We hiked for a bit, saw Indian Face Rock and the Natural Bridge which was really nice. There were dried hydrangeas still on their bushes, and water pools from slow dripping water, mini falls, and a creek, and lots of cool erosion in the rock due to the water.
By 1:15 we're on the road again. I was really glad we took this way and that we stopped. Usually when we travel it's a point A to point B sort of fashion, so this was nice.
2p.m. we crossed over into Mississippi - we were about 662 miles from home
4:05 we cross over into Tennessee - about 785 miles.
Arrive in Memphis at the Downtown Marriott Hotel- whoohoo!
+++++Side trip to Nashville, TN to see Rob and Brenda Wilkins+++++
Rob's one of those dear old friends that you don't have to see for, say, oh about 20 years, but when you do, it's like you just have never been apart and it's easy to pick right up where you left off....yep, one of those. Aren't I lucky? Here sure can show a gal a good time and his wife's a sweety. And....they live in NASHVILLE! I left at 11:30 on Thursday and got there by 3pm. When you're that far from home, 3.5 hours seems like nothing. I left about 4:30 Friday afternoon. A quick trip, boo. but great. Thanks Guys!!
Road trip home
It was sad and we didn't want to leave, it's true. We had a good time.
Sunday - We left Corky's BBQ (last time for BBQ in TN, and I had to have the banana pudding) at 6:35 CST and arrived at the Best Western in Leeds Alabama at 10:45 p.m. It was a new hotel and we paid $72.00 per night. Let's just say it wasn't the Marriott and it was OK. It was in Leeds, AL need I say more? I thought not. We stopped here because it was feeling late and we were tired and sometimes when you are driving you pass what seems like a nothing town, thinking a better town was down the road and you end up driving for a l o n g time looking for something even remotely as good as that nothing town you passed. So we stopped.
Monday morning - left Leeds AL at 8:20 a.m. cst and stopped at Starbucks in Aniston exit 185 (20E). We noticed a lot of hotels, and well, yeah, that Starbucks so maybe next time we drive just a bit longer and we'll be there. note to self.
Entered Georgie at 9:40 cst and the time changed to EST about 5 miles into Georgia.
Arrived at TRADER JOE's in Sandy Springs at 11:48
Left Trader Joe's at 12:45 and drove to IKEA about 20 minutes away.
Left IKEA at 2;50 to GO HOME!
Arrived home at 9:50 p.m. YEAH!
Ok, so dead boring road notes done....It's been so long since this trip happened and I had every intention of making notes about all of the stuff we did, etc. and then all sorts of life happened and kept happening and did what it always does, and everything gets put on the back burner and then here I am and it's one day short of May and I'm just now updating this blog for a trip in February. How does that happen, how?
Maybe I'll go in, make a new post and add a few trip highlights and change the date and time of entry and you'll never know what I did. maybe. That would be the best case scenario, actually.
Road Notes
Leave Mount Dora, Florida - Monday 2/19 a 7:45 p.m. - We decided to hit the road at night just to get some miles under our belts. We hit the Georgia State line at 11:00 p.m./178 miles later. Drove on until 1 a.m./337 total miles and stopped at the Holiday Inn in Macon, GA off of exit 3 on I-475. This was the same Holiday Inn we stayed at when Kristine and I caravaned together for our Helen, GA/Unicoi State Park trip we do every October. Price was good ($65.00 per night) and rooms are recently updated and nice. Only down side is we had to eat in the actual restaurant, a bit of a time waster, instead of those grand complimentary-hit-the-road-running type breakfasts. We noticed a Holiday Inn Express a bit further up the road, back on I-85, at exit 186...no restaurant and has that continental breakfast.
Tuesday 2/20 - 7:10 a.m. - fill up the tank and hit the road. We decided to take I-85W/285N south of Atlanta to I-20. Atlanta is a bit of a worry just because the traffic can be a bit of a jam up, but we were also warned that the bypasses can take longer if the traffic straight is moving well. Anyway, this way worked really well.
We hit Alabama 139 miles from Macon at 9:50 am EST, and the time automatically changed to 8:50 CST . Ok, am I the only one that thinks that's awesome?! I don't think so....
12 p.m. - got gas in Jasper and decided to take the "Scenic Natural Bridge" way and not I-78w get there in a hurry way.
12:45 - stopped into the Natural Bridge which is the longest natural bridge east of the Rockies. We hiked for a bit, saw Indian Face Rock and the Natural Bridge which was really nice. There were dried hydrangeas still on their bushes, and water pools from slow dripping water, mini falls, and a creek, and lots of cool erosion in the rock due to the water.
By 1:15 we're on the road again. I was really glad we took this way and that we stopped. Usually when we travel it's a point A to point B sort of fashion, so this was nice.
2p.m. we crossed over into Mississippi - we were about 662 miles from home
4:05 we cross over into Tennessee - about 785 miles.
Arrive in Memphis at the Downtown Marriott Hotel- whoohoo!
+++++Side trip to Nashville, TN to see Rob and Brenda Wilkins+++++
Rob's one of those dear old friends that you don't have to see for, say, oh about 20 years, but when you do, it's like you just have never been apart and it's easy to pick right up where you left off....yep, one of those. Aren't I lucky? Here sure can show a gal a good time and his wife's a sweety. And....they live in NASHVILLE! I left at 11:30 on Thursday and got there by 3pm. When you're that far from home, 3.5 hours seems like nothing. I left about 4:30 Friday afternoon. A quick trip, boo. but great. Thanks Guys!!
Road trip home
It was sad and we didn't want to leave, it's true. We had a good time.
Sunday - We left Corky's BBQ (last time for BBQ in TN, and I had to have the banana pudding) at 6:35 CST and arrived at the Best Western in Leeds Alabama at 10:45 p.m. It was a new hotel and we paid $72.00 per night. Let's just say it wasn't the Marriott and it was OK. It was in Leeds, AL need I say more? I thought not. We stopped here because it was feeling late and we were tired and sometimes when you are driving you pass what seems like a nothing town, thinking a better town was down the road and you end up driving for a l o n g time looking for something even remotely as good as that nothing town you passed. So we stopped.
Monday morning - left Leeds AL at 8:20 a.m. cst and stopped at Starbucks in Aniston exit 185 (20E). We noticed a lot of hotels, and well, yeah, that Starbucks so maybe next time we drive just a bit longer and we'll be there. note to self.
Entered Georgie at 9:40 cst and the time changed to EST about 5 miles into Georgia.
Arrived at TRADER JOE's in Sandy Springs at 11:48
Left Trader Joe's at 12:45 and drove to IKEA about 20 minutes away.
Left IKEA at 2;50 to GO HOME!
Arrived home at 9:50 p.m. YEAH!
Ok, so dead boring road notes done....It's been so long since this trip happened and I had every intention of making notes about all of the stuff we did, etc. and then all sorts of life happened and kept happening and did what it always does, and everything gets put on the back burner and then here I am and it's one day short of May and I'm just now updating this blog for a trip in February. How does that happen, how?
Maybe I'll go in, make a new post and add a few trip highlights and change the date and time of entry and you'll never know what I did. maybe. That would be the best case scenario, actually.
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