Old photos

Alondra just started college!

 Emily is now in middle school.

And Jorge is a high school football player.

River rapids

We celebrated Jorge's 14th birthday with a family white water rafting trip on the Nantahala River.

The younger children and their mothers were in the designated calm boat.

Everyone else was in the "wild" boat. The river guides did a terrific job of customizing each boat's ride to what the people on board requested.

After the first rapids, Juniper proclaimed that she loved it. The second, bigger rapids splashed us with 52 degree water and began the permanent cold foot puddle at the bottom of the raft. Juniper was in tears and proclaiming that she wanted to get off the boat. But a few minutes later, when she was asked which fork of the river to take, she enthusiastically replied, "The longer one!"

The grand finale of the ride was the Class III Nantahala Falls, where all of these pictures were taken. Our guide gave us a heads up and a safety reminder before we approached the falls Juniper was nervous about the possibility of falling out of the boat and said that she was "all scared," definitely not a mix of scared and excited. She started to perk up when she saw a sign that advised: "Danger! Falls ahead. Screaming advised."

Approaching the falls...

Going over!

Even the calm boat got a big splash here. After we were done, Juniper said that she was "all excited, not at all scared!" Once she got over that initial cold water shock, she really loved the rest of the ride and can't wait to do it again.

Mark kept getting in trouble from their guide for paddling too hard. She told him he'd make a great river guide, but that as a passenger, he needed to turn it down to about 25% because he kept turning the boat around.

Nice to see the birthday boy having so much fun...

...and his grandmother too. Let the record state that my mom is an awesome good sport.

Can you tell which member of a party has done this enough to know where to look and how to ham it up for the camera?

Fernbank adventures

Over the holidays, the Fernbank Science Museum had some performances and decorations celebrating different cultures around the world. Juniper joined in with other kids in learning some dance moves from an African dance company. She was about two steps behind, but that didn't stop her from having a blast. This is a photo that's worth opening full size; I don't think you can see her giant smile in the small photo on the blog.



Hazel is now old enough to be aware of and interested in new and unusual things that she sees.



There was lots of pointing and exclamations of "boah!" which is her standard way of indicating "that things there!"

Apple season

We recently headed up to Ellijay for some apple picking fun.



Juniper was excited to pick apples...



...until she learned that she couldn't eat them until we paid for them.



Jorge was a much better sport than Juniper.



Thankfully, there were lots of other fun activities:



Milking a dairy cow



Assorted tractors to drive



Pig racing



A warehouse where we could observe the commercial side of the operation



A giant "bounce pillow" ...



... which Juniper loved



Fun facts about cows (which our nerdy girl also loved)



Did we mention the tractors?



Next time we go apple picking, Hazel will hopefully be able to do more than just observe (and sample the goods).



You know it was a good day when the kids are this tuckered out at the end.

Dragon Parade

Labor Day weekend is the annual Dragon*Con parade. Juniper was giddily excited the morning of the parade. She woke up at 5:30 to use the bathroom and hopefully asked me, "Is it time to go to Dragon*Con?" This year, she decided to dress up as a dragon for the parade.



Just an ordinary crosswalk in downtown Atlanta on Labor Day weekend. Juniper loved it.



Hazel, on the other hand, was hot and tired and bored and desperately wanted to go home and have a nap.



We met several friends for the parade, including Juniper's buddy Thomas. His favorite thing about the parade was the "Busterghosts" or "Ghostbustards." Juniper's favorite was Captain Planet. The morning of the parade, she expectantly asked whether we would see Captain Planet. I tried to lower her expectations, since this isn't exactly a popular modern comic franchise. I needn't have worried. In addition to Captain Planet himself, there were scads of Planeteers and even a couple of ecovillains. I wonder how many people at the parade recognized, by name, both Hoggish Greedly and his sidekick Rigger. Thanks to the $0.50 bin at the comics shop, we did.



After the parade, we went to Centennial Park to eat a picnic lunch and splash in the fountains.



Juniper and her cousins all had fun splashing and playing.



Hazel thought that the park was much more fun than the parade.



Till next year, kiddo. Your dad and I are officially and publicly promising that next year we will get our lazy act together to come up with some sort of family costume. Probably not Klingons, but we'll do something.

More strawberries!

Strawberry picking has become a Honeycutt-Dill family tradition. We can't resist a fun activity that results in getting to eat lots of something that's really delicious. Piles of plain strawberries, strawberry shortcake, strawberry salad, yogurt with strawberries, strawberry jam, and lemon-strawberry marmalade. And did I mention the bowls full of as many strawberries as we wanted to eat?



This was Juniper's third time picking strawberries. Hazel's first, though I'm not sure it really counts since she can't even eat strawberries yet.



We obviously went at the right time; the strawberries were ripe and plentiful, and picking was easy.



Juniper was a great picker. This year, she put more strawberries in her bucket than in her mouth (many more, in fact).



Jorge also filled up several buckets.



Meanwhile, Hazel chewed on her father's hat.



Of course, we had a fair amount of snicking along with our picking.



If superhero-astronaut doesn't work out for her, perhaps Juniper has an agrarian future in store. She's come a long way since her first strawberry outing.



This one's for Ellen, who was impressed with how plump and red the berries were.