Georgia Visit and Beading Again!

Time has been whizzing by as usual… This month, we took a trip to South Georgia to visit our youngest son, and got to have all 3 guys together at once which is rare these days.

There are many signs to help us along our journeys, but this and related ones aren’t the ones you want to have to look for…. Our trip from PA to GA began early AM Aug. 12, with plans to meet friends for supper that evening in Greenville, SC…. Well, that didn’t happen….. 2 hours from home we lost 2 1/2 hours while we had front brake hoses replaced. The front of the mini van began shaking and we thought we had a bad tire… The brakes were new, but not the hoses.  Then…. 2 hours on down the highway, the chugging and sputtering began…. not good in traffic on a busy highway in HOT weather.

The photo above shows Ken and Zack checking a part… this was I think the second auto parts store we stopped at (after the brake incident) to have a computer hooked up that didn’t really tell us what was wrong… We have learned that Advanced Auto and Auto Zone stores can do the computer checks. Thankfully there are lots of them along the route. It seemed that the heat and the AC running caused the most trouble. Once it got dark, we had no more trouble that day. We did miss supper with our friends and managed to stop on the way home instead. The  motel room late night was welcome.

The van didn’t do much better the second day, but we ended up going into downtown Atlanta GA to meet relatives for lunch. Lots of traffic getting out of there, and more chugging later, we got to our destination just above Valdosta, GA at our son’s house. (Needless to say, I didn’t do any driving with Zack along for an extra driver… I don’t do cities)

Nick’s driveway is a little narrower than ours at home, and it goes through a bit of a swamp. The road he lives on makes our gravel one look like a highway… red clay with a bit of sand on top that washes into the ditches with heavy rain, causing slimy ruts. I’ll keep our PA rocks and gravel, thank you.

The trees in Nick’s yard are really pretty with the Spanish moss hanging from them. It was very hot and steamy there, and with rain most days, I only got out for pictures in the yard one day. I had to let the camera lens warm up from being in the cool house- it fogged over just like my glasses did  in the “outdoor sauna”.

There is one pretty Crape Myrtle tree in the side yard. The flowers were a bit shattered from heavy rains… the grass under it was sprinkled with pink florets.

The Taro is something I can only grow in my greenhouse, and it is growing wild along the driveway and even larger ones by the front door. It seems to love the heat and humidity of this summer there.

Here is an old house we passed by a few times. Most of the houses in the South are smaller than here up North, and many of the older ones have porches on both the fronts and backs. A lot of the sheds and barns were constructed similarly.

This shed was in the back yard of the house… we saw a lot like this… lots different and smaller than the old barns and sheds around here.

Cotton fields were in bloom, so I had to get some photos. Above is a newly opened flower. I saw mostly pink from the road, but the flowers begin white and turn pink as they age.

The faded flowers were the pink I was seeing from the road.

Hidden down in the foliage were even some cotton bolls beginning to open.

While riding in the car and while staying in GA, I got back to some beading… The above photo shows my old laptop case filled with a good selection of beads and supplies needed to add beads to art quilts or pins. I got a bunch of pins beaded… even the first Christmas trees of the year.

The Orange Echinacea piece has been half beaded for a long time…. I finally finished it!! I added the beads to the upper left rocky section and accented the flower center, too. This is one of those pieces that wanted to be made…. the pieces landed next to each other on the cutting table, and I put it together even though it is not in colors I normally use.

These are some of the pins I got beaded, ready for the backs to be added. The photo is not great due to lighting conditions in the car while riding…  I got a few more done during the remaining ride home. It felt great to do something productive for a change.

Now that I am home again, I will be getting better photos and finish the binding of the art quilt so I can list them in my Artfire Studios.

One Final Photo…..  The main reason we went to GA and had the 3 boys together for a couple of days….

We gained a new daughter-in-law! They had a really nice small, simple ceremony with just close family and a couple friends… We will be going back in the Spring for the “big wedding” that will include all friends and family… Nick is now on his way to Afghanistan for a 4-6 month deployment. We look forward to meeting more of Megan’s family and friends after he returns home.