Zip Line!!

Joey and I went to Gatlinburg last weekend and we got the chance to ride this zipline. It had 6 different lines we rode and at some points we were 250 feet up in the air and above the trees!

We didn't buy the pictures they took there, but we were able to see them online. (So, I swiped a few off their website) Hopefully noone from that company will ever gain access to this blog! Click on them if you want to see a bigger one.

Here I am, nervous, going off the very first one:


After I realized I probably wasn't going to die


It started to get more fun



Here's Joey coming off the first jump



If you wanted to slow down you had to do it yourself, notice how Joey is braking


Joey coming in for his landing

Highlights

Remember this magazine. It's been around for 60 years now. We received an ad this week wanting us to subscribe. It made me remember how much I loved this publication when I was little. I have always been a collector of reading materials, I guess I'm afraid I will read everything and nothing will be left! I mainly saw this magazine in a doctor's or dentist's office, so I would gather all the issues they had and put them in my lap to pass the time. I especially loved the hidden picture puzzles. The artists who draw these are very talented. I can remember being especially mad if I found that someone had circled the pictures with a pencil. I wanted to find them! You might also remember the rebus stories or the Timber Toes comics in Highlights.
After looking over the ad, thinking that Parker might enjoy it, I decided to check to see if they had a website. Highlights was immediately googled and you will never believe what I found.
Go here.
See it for yourself!
It's hidden picture puzzles. On many different levels. Lots and lots of hidden picture puzzles. They are so fancy on this site. When you find the object it dances or makes a noise and moves over to the puzzle key. When you complete it the entire picture colors itself. I am in hidden picture puzzle heaven! There are just some things that you never outgrow!

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

G is for Green Beans

This post is brought to you by the letter G!
These are green beans from Granny Lerion and Pa Lyle's Garden.
They are gorgeous. Granny does not pick green beans that are less than grade A.

Granny's green beans look great after they are done and go good with grilled food.

Granny loves making them with her granddaughter.
Oh, and by the way, Granny's favorite color is green!

Wordless Wednesday

We biked the bridge!

Yeah, we biked from Fisherman's Wharf in San Fransisco across the Golden Gate Bridge and to the next town. I know it's hard to believe, sometimes Trace and I aren't sure it really happened! Trace has to get the credit for this one, she saw some other people doing it while we were vacationing and thought if they could do it then so could we. Turns out she was right and luckily I have the pictures to prove it. We are not 100% sure of our exact biking distance but we figure it was at least 8 miles, maybe 10 miles.
Here are J and I ready to get started. I was the only one who opted for a helmet in our group.

This pic kind of gives you an idea of how far away we were when we started. We had already been biking for a bit when we stopped for this photo op of the Golden Gate in the background.

J and Joey rode ahead of Trace and I most of the time. I think they were waiting on us to catch up and me to take pics here.

Before we rode over the bridge, we rode below it. You can see we are getting closer, but there was one last hill to climb!

Once we made it to the top of the last hill, it was time to go over the bridge. We stopped for a break. You can see in this pic the name of the place where we rented the bikes "Blazing Saddles".

One last group photo before we head across our main destination!

So, here's the proof, Joey and Tracie on their bikes actually on the Golden Gate Bridge.

And me and J. You can see they have a nice section of the bridge dedicated to bikes and walkers so we weren't in danger of getting run over by traffic.

Remember that pic from above of Trace and Joey "below the bridge"? This is the bridge view of that same photo. You can get an idea of how far away we still were from the bridge at that point and you can see part of the bike trail up on the hill.

We made it! That is San Fransisco in the background....where we started! We biked all the way to Sausalito where we had a late lunch and then took a ferry (with our bikes) back to San Fran. I think it ended up being the highlight of our trip!

Muir Woods

Me, J, Joey and Trace went to Muir Woods one of the days we were in San Francisco. Muir Woods is an old-growth forest of Coastal Redwoods. It's kind of one of those things you have to see in person to appreciate the largeness of the trees, but I thought I would post some pics anyway!

Redwoods can grow to nearly 380 feet tall, but the tallest tree in Muir Woods is 258 feet. These trees come from a seed no bigger than that of a tomato's.


I can't remember how tall the fallen tree below was, but I liked the pic of Trace and J posing in front of it. We aren't very big believers in taking "scenery only" pics so those two above are a pretty rare thing. We prefer to take a pic of ourselves with different scenery in the background!

You can kind of get an idea of the size of this forest when you see how small J and I look in the pic below.

The average age of the Redwoods in Muir Woods are between 500 and 800 years old with the oldest being at least 1,200 years old. This one was a fun photo op where you could walk inside one of the trees.

Wordless Wednesday