The United States' Best Kept Secret

Over Labor Day weekend my family always goes to West Virginia to visit friends, enjoy their great little cabin on Indian Creek, and do a little sightseeing. Every time I go to West Virginia I think, "Why do more people not live here?" It's the best kept secret in the United States. It should be declared a state sized National Park. They have wonderful weather with beautiful summers, just enough snow in the winter, and these mountains. Oh my, these mountains. There are some beautiful, well kept old farms. There are beautiful, well kept new farms. As a general rule, all of the homes in West Virginia are well kept - you see very few of the dumpy places we have polluting our countryside. There are deer and turkey in almost every field. As a matter of fact, you have to be a cautious driver cause the deer use the roads, too.

This is a beautiful pond at the restaurant/buffalo farm we ate lunch at one day.

On the way back from lunch, we hiked about a mile to this firetower. The views from the top were amazing! The left side of this ridge is West Virginia and the right side is Virginia.

The scenery behind my dad in this picture reminds me of the book, Follow the River by James Alexander Thom. If you've not read it, you need to. It's a very good book that takes place in the early settling of our country. A lady, Mary Draper, gets captured by indians, is forced to live with them for several years, and I won't tell you the rest cuz you need to read it... Oh, and it takes place on the New River in West Virginia, which by the way I found out that Indian Creek flows into the New River, which flows into the Kanawha River, which flows into the Ohio, then to the Mississippi, then to the Gulf of Mexico. (That bit of information was free.)

Anyway, if you've never been to West Virginia, it's well worth the trip. And possibly the move.

Fight LIke a Girl

Four years ago, my mom and dad walked into my office here at home and told me something that rocked my world. Something that changed our family. She had found out that she had breast cancer. What? Breast cancer? She can't have breast cancer. It doesn't run in our family. She has annual mammograms. We found out then that breast cancer doesn't care if it runs in your family. It doesn't care if you don't want it. It doesn't care if you have had annual mammograms and it certainly doesn't respect anything you have done to prevent it. It's nondiscriminatory. She fought through the next 1-1/2 years with faith and prayer as her weapons of choice along with some super physicians with a lot of God given knowledge. And their own arsenal of weapons. Four years later, it's all good.

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Last week Tony's mother found out she has breast cancer. We are arming up again with the Great Physician as well as great physicians... Thanks in advance for your prayers!

They've Come a Long Way!

In Alex's second year of softball (when she was 7), she was on a team with Abby. We didn't know Abby at the time but we knew who she was. We knew who she was because I had gone to high school with her dad, Chris, and because my brother goes to church where her dad is the preacher. Over time, we began going to church there, too. When it came time for them to move up a league into kid pitch, we were able to keep them on the same team and added Hannah. And Chris was the coach - preacher/coach/clipboard thrower/clipboard breaker. He is one of Alex's all-time favorite coaches but she can never, ever, under any circumstance let him know that. Sometimes she slips and says it out loud but lucky for her he has not been around to hear it. Over the years these girls have played with and against each other in basketball and softball so I have lots of these pictures. Unfortunately, these are the only ones I can find right now. They all three made the all-county basketball team, they played all-star softball together, and now they are playing softball against each other at their middle schools. And Chris is coaching Hannah and Abby - not Alex :'( - but we still got the picture!

I hope I can keep adding to this collection of pictures with these three sweet girls. And Chris.

Lucky Me

This was my sunrise this morning.



Ain't God good?

My Favorite Picture. Ever.

My printer that came with my computer long ago gave up the printing ghost about 2 years ago. We purchased another printer but it didn't have scanning abilities. Or copying. I guess I wasn't paying too much attention when I bought it but those were two features that I used quite often. When I ran across the picture below, I had to rethink the old printer's semi-retirement (semi since she was still plugged in to make copies). While she refuses to print from the computer she will still scan and copy. Of course, it wasn't as easy as just reconnecting her to the computer. It never is. But I was determined to make it work and finally it did. So, many minutes later, and after much persistence and determination I was able to scan in my very favorite picture I have ever taken. EVER.

There are two reasons I wanted to get this picture scanned in. The first is because it had disappeared for many years and I was so excited to find it that I couldn't take the chance of losing it again. It was taken so long ago that it is not on a computer photo file or backed up digitally. And I think this is the only copy. I would have to find the negative. Ughhh! If you could see my box of negatives you would understand. The second reason I wanted to scan it is because I love it and want to share it. After all, it is my favorite picture. EVER.

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Oh my. It makes tears come to my eyes. Have you ever? These boys are first cousins. This was taken when they were 3, so 12 years ago. They're not inseparable, they both have their own friends as well as a lot of common friends. They don't always have the same interests though they do have a lot of common interests. They don't always stay out of trouble but they do stick together and have each other's back. They have a lot of history and they'll never run out of stories to tell their kids. They're family. But it's more than that. These boys are friends.

The End of an Era

When I was in my first year of college, 1989, my dad decided to run for public office, County Commissioner, to be exact. I remember having one of his campaign cards on my corkboard in my dorm room. At the time, I don't think I really even knew what that was. "He's running for what?" and "What's that?" In the years following I realized how important this position really is. We stress the importance of our national elections, and they're definitely important, but the decisions that are made on a local scale are the ones that effect us on an every day basis. For the next 20 years, he spent a lot of time talking on the phone and attending meetings. Lots of meetings. This year he has decided not to run for re-election. He retired from his job earlier this year and he's retiring from public service now. While I think he will really miss this opportunity to serve, he and mom think they will have (know they will have) a lot more time to camp and vacation without being tied down by meetings.

I am ashamed to admit that Thursday night was the first time I had been to a commission meeting, and it was his last one. We went because we knew he was going to be recognized for his 20 years of service and we wanted to be there for that. As I was sitting there I realized the real reason I hadn't been to any of the meetings. I am angered too easily. Before they get to the actual meat of the meeting, they have an open forum time for the public to make statements. Three minutes. Each person who wishes to speak gets three minutes. Three long minutes. There's a timer on the wall that counts them down, then turns red when they're out of time. When they're out of time, though, they continue to speak. They. Just. Keep. Talking. I think it should be like that Know or Go game on Ellen - the floor should just open up and swallow them after three minutes. In reality, just turning off their microphone at the end of their three minutes would suffice (but wouldn't be nearly as satisfying or entertaining). And the stuff they come there to talk about? Oh my. I had the uncontrollable urge to roll my eyes. I have never felt the need for eye rolling as strongly as I did that night. I looked up at all of the commissioners sitting in front wondering if they were really listening. CAN you really listen to that for twenty minutes or so without needing deep medication? Anthony and I decided they may be playing Solitaire on their laptops. Or on Facebook. While they seemed to be attentively listening I wanted a gong. And as Dad explained to me later, everyone has a right to be heard. Hmmm.....

While the droning was going on, I took some pictures.

I think my mom and I were occupying ourselves in a very similar manner. Afterwards, we compared notes on water spots on the ceiling, peeling paint, and who clapped for which speaker - you can tell a lot by sitting on the back row in a County Commission meeting.

Since I had never been to a meeting, I didn't know how technologically advanced they had become. There's this nifty screen on the wall so you can see exactly who votes for or against every item. And who skipped out on the meeting altogether. This excited me for some reason.

Before getting on with the meeting, they recognized all of the outgoing commissioners.

While we complained over the years about the time he spent attending meetings and gathering information, we knew that it was something he really enjoyed. And something he was good at.

This is not a job you can keep for 20 years if you aren't really, REALLY good at it.

Dad, we're very proud of you and what you have accomplished in the last 20 years. Good work!

More Of Our Busy Summer

We have had a very busy summer. We were trying to get a lot of fun in before Tony left for Qatar. I have managed to take pictures of some of it, though not a lot.

Anthony couldn't wait to have his grandparents join him to shoot his guns. Papaw enjoyed it, Anthony did fine, but Tony is the one who rocked it that day. He didn't miss a target. I, personally, still think you shouldn't shoot at something you can't see. Anthony has also been to a gun show with some friends, played air soft, camped out at the creek, played in his church softball league, and has been to Indian Boundary for a week with a friend.

Anthony also will continue to do Civil War reenactments, which hopefully will start back up in September.

One night, we went to a friends house to pick blueberries. We picked four gallons and ate nearly that many, I think. We have eaten blueberry muffins, ice cream with blueberries, blueberries in our cereal, and just plain blueberries. As well as shared some of them.
Of course, Alex has been playing ball. She has tried out for a new team for next summer, which she made. She is very excited about playing with this new team - it's somewhat of a step up from the team she was on last year.


Before she can get started in tournaments with her new team, though, she has to finish her middle school season. They can't play travel ball and middle school ball at the same time. Softball really is a year round sport now for her. She will not have games in December, January, and February but they will condition and work out during those months. It's tiring but I figure she won't want to do it forever, then we'll probably miss it.

We also had Tony's class reunion this summer, which was a lot of fun. After the picnic we drove by the place where Alex used to take pitching lessons. She would meet her coach at this school and pitch off the sidewalk to Tony or I. We sat on a bucket in this same spot that mom's and dad's had been sitting for years. And years. Many years, like 30 or 40 probably. The spot had been without grass and packed down from many years of use. The very sweet and kind man that she took lessons from died this past spring and this spot hadn't been used in several months. I thought it would take FOREVER for the grass to start growing back. But it didn't take long.

Life goes on and the grass always grows back.