On June 30th I took a flight from Atlanta, GA. to West Palm Beach, FL. to visit my parents. They were so excited to see Hayden and I. We had a good time talking about all the things we missed from not being together. Which, honestly, it was mostly about Hayden. I suppose that happens
when you have the first grandchild on one side of the family. (Hayden is the 3rd grandchild on my husbands side, but the 1st grandchild on my side). I had a great time visiting everyone that I could. I only had a week, not the 2 weeks I had originally thought I was staying for. I saw some old friends and went to the movies which was so awesome! It's been forever... ahh, the little joys in life. I saw my sister, she was so happy we came to visit. I miss her terribly.
[My dad and Hayden playing together]
[Hayden and his best buddy, Ajaye, who is the son of my best buddy, Tanya.]
I got some strange illness while I was there. Something called Hand-Foot-Mouth Disease. Your hands and feet get these blisters on them like you been opening jars for a year with bare hands and walking on hot stones while doing it. My mouth got like a hundred cold sores and my tongue was on fire at the littlest temperature change. I didn't know what it was at first... freaked me out. My little nephew, Connor, got it later on in NY. He had it worse I think. Poor kiddo. But he fared well. Eventually it goes away but now I'm left with blister marks on my hands and my skin is kind of peeling, like an old blister bubble. It's so freaky, but it doesn't hurt or anything. So I'm glad for that. And doubly so that Hayden didn't get it all. Whew!
[Hayden's 4th of July outfit]
On July 9th, my sister-in-law, her 2 kids, my son and I packed up her van (to the brim it seemed like) and took a 10 hour trip back to Atlanta. We hung out for a few days, relaxing from the driving, enjoying the summer with swimming, and just taking a vacay. When we went swimming, Hayden's Granny was teaching him how to hold his breath under water. I was reluctant but she was the experienced parent among us and apparently taught swimming lessons for years, I was just learning, but I was holding my breath the whole time! Maybe for him, maybe for me, but I wasn't breathing. The first time he went under he did great! He held his breath and came up smiling. The second and third time though he sucked up some water and was weary of Granny for the rest of the swim. I ended up burning him, too! He had a sun burn, but it didn't seem to bother him. I, of course, was distraught.
We all took a little trip to this gold mining sight that has been decommissioned and turned into a tour. You can purchase dishes with sand and sift for actual gold in these trough-like areas. It was really neat. The kids each got a pan and they sifted their little hearts out. They got a couple pieces of leaf gold and put them in vials as souvenirs. Then the kids and 1 got a gemstone bucket and sifted through those with sifting pans (square pans with mesh on the bottom) and got some really neat looking uncut gems. Then we went on a tour of the old mines that used to have so much gold, it was bursting at the seams (literally) and now has very little gold that is not worth mining commercially.Sam arrived on Wednesday night and we loaded the rented 15-person van up. We all got on the road and began the 16 hours to Hammondsport, NY. The ride wasn't so bad. Crampy and sleepy but not too bad. We got to our hotel in Bath and unpacked. Our hotel stank of cigars since it was a smoking room (all the other rooms were booked). But we fared well. We spent most of our time at Sam's Grandparent's house, anyways.
The big family reunion was held at the fire hall. There were a lot of us there. A lot of kids too. A lot of people from my husband's family that I had never met before. We hung out, took lots of pictures, I got to know everyone a little bit. We spent that evening at Sam's Grandparents house. I love their house. The town they live in is so quaint. For a small town there sure is a lot going on. The weekend we were there they had this antique boat show and the boats were gorgeous. There was also an art festival but we didn't see that really. People were walking everywhere, it was nice to see that in a town. I'm from a big city and though people walk around in big cities, it always seems like they're walking with a sense of urgency. Like they need to get wherever it is they neet to get to before something happens. But in Hammonsdsport, everyone seems to walk around because it's just so beautiful. Mountains and lakes and a nice breeze. Old churches and colonial houses. It's amazing.
We went up to the glen hidden in the mountain, off of the mountain side that you can see from the front porch. It was only a couple minutes of a walk and it was so beautiful. The kid's loved it there. They swam in a pool at the base of a small waterfall. Everyone who lived around there proclaimed the water to be warm. The water was too cold for me personally. But I'm from Florida and what we Floridians think o
f as cold is apparently anything but. I like my waters warm at about 85-90 degrees. The lake and the waterfalls were at least 70 degrees. Buuuurrrr. I must have eaten ice-cream everyday since I'd been there. They have 2 ice-cream shops. One is totally old fashioned. It's more of a parlor. It doubled as a cafe, too. I like being there but they didn't have a big selection of flavors. The other place looks like your everyday ice-cream store but they had way more choices. I liked the blueberry cheesecake flavor! Hayden had been learning to walk this whole trip. He was only taking maybe 5-6 steps when we first arrived in Atlanta, but by the end of the trip he was traipsing around corners so quickly, what happened next was bound to happen some time. He smacked a door so hard his little forehead grew a welt the size of a kumquat on it. It turned black and blue immediately. He was fine though. After the initial rap to noggin, where tears ensued, he barely noticed it.
I enjoyed being there with everyone, but by this time, I was ready to head back home. I missed being in my house with my things, my walk-in shower, and total quiet when the baby napped. I loved visiting everyone and hope to do it again real soon. I don't know if it will happen that way, since Sam will be away for a year and then we might be over-seas but possibly maybe everyone can come visit us? We could be in Italy or Japan or even Hawaii. Bet no one will bat an eye at the prospect of visiting Hawaii some time?
