Gallery
East Coast Adventure '06 - Day 27 - AT
Today we left Asheville and headed into the mountains. We drove about 30 miles northwest of Asheville to Hot Springs, NC. Hot Springs is one of the cities that the Appalachian Trail goes right through the middle of. The sidewalk that is on the main street of Hot Springs has “AT” trail blazes embedded right into the cement. Our visit was more to the AT than to Hot Springs, so Mazie loaded up into the kid carrier and we headed out for the trail.
I knew we weren’t going to get much of a hike in. I figured Mazie would make it an hour in the carrier and she did just about that. She did a great job walking by herself on the flats. She navigated the roots like a star and looked smashing in her bright green fury jacket.
It was fun to be on the AT and hiking with the white “blazes” of the AT in sight. Honestly the trail was no different than any other hiking trail we could have been on. However, this one could take you all the way to Maine if you just kept on walking. How cool is that?
Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.
Mazie at 8 Weeks
This Tuesday Mazie will be 8 weeks old. It’s time for us to schedule her 2 month appointment. I remember thinking how insane that was. We went from the 2 week appointment and then 6 whole weeks without seeing professional help. How would we do it!? Well, it’s been fine. Mazie is doing great and so are we.
She’s put on a good amount of weight. She’s already well over 12 pounds. This last week in particularly seems to have been a watershed week. She’s been so much more engaging and interactive than ever before. She will smile and play with you for a while. She loves it when you tickle her and play with her while she’s on her changing table. Also, much to the pleasure of Tammy and I she’s actually started to smile at us, instead of randomly at walls and other objects in the house.
She’s been doing well with sleep, although sometimes she puts up a bit of a fuss trying to get to sleep. But once in the bed and snoring away, she does well. She seems to be spitting up a lot more lately than she did at first. I’m guessing that has to do in part with a lot more volume of milk going her way. It’s pretty funny how being a parent pretty much makes all your “eww, gross” reactions go away. A pile of spitup goes all over your shirt, you wipe off the visible stuff and continue on your way, no worries.
She’s a strong girl too. I’ve been holding her up and letting her support her weight with her legs. She can do this for a few seconds at a time and then needs a break. She likes to lean up against me in a standing position for minutes at a time.
That’s all for now. Of course I put up some more photos as well. You’ll notice two pictures of me sleeping with Mazie. This seems to be a not to uncommon occurrence.
Labor Day!
Labor day is such a bittersweet holiday. It is always a fun time, but for those of us in the Northern climates it signals the end of the summer and the coming of fall. This year it comes with even more bitterness since we have had such a sad excuse for a summer this year. It feels like fall is in full swing. As we were traveling this weekend it was obvious that the leaves were about to change. I bet it will be full fall color season in a week or two.
Tammy and I went to Lanesboro for much of the holiday weekend. We went to explore the Root River & Harmony-Preston Valley Sate Trail. Lanesboro is the perfect place to explore this more than 50 miles of wonderfully paved bike trails. Out of here we had three days of great riding. We started Friday night with a short ride from Lanesboro to Fountain for 22.4 miles round trip. Then on Saturday we did a longer ride from Lanesboro to Houston which was 62.2 miles round trip and finished on Sunday with a ride to Harmony and back for 45 miles total. We got around 130 miles in for the three days and had some really great trails.
We stayed at the Habberstad House Bed & Breakfast. This is a great B&B! It was at the top of the list with our favorite B&Bs that we have ever stayed in. The owners, Nancy and Dave, are fabulous. The rooms are great, and breakfast was wonderful. We will definitely revisit upon a return to Lanesboro.
In addition to cycling in Lanesboro we also added a piece to our art collection. We stopped by the Cornucopia Art Center while we were there and saw some work by a Superior, WI artist named Erik Pearson that we really liked. We can’t wait for it to arrive. It’s unique and different than our other art and I think it’s going to be great fun.
We returned to the cities and a lot of rain. Due to the rain we ended up not going to the Jack Johnson concert we had tickets to and instead went to see Collateral. Good movie, lots of action. It was a bit predictable though.
On Labor Day Tammy ran the MDRA Victory 10k. I got up early and rode my bike up there to get some miles in and watch her do the run. I really don’t like getting up at 6:30 am on a holiday, but it also lets you get so much done in the day! I had a nice ride to the run and then cheered on runners as they went by. I saw a shirt for this movement called Run Against Bush. Pretty amazing how motivated our current president has made people, myself included.
All in all, a great, relaxing holiday! I put up some miscellaneous photos if you’re interested.
Renaissance Festival
We made our 2nd trip of the year to the Renaissance Festival, this time with Tracy and Jeff. The RenFest is like a one day vacation. Great time to laze around in the afternoon, have some cheap wine and enjoy some relaxation.
