Lake bound!

In just over an hour, we'll be at the lake for the first time of 2013, and it is going to be an absolutely gorgeous weekend!  We'll be coming back next week to stay for spring break, so today I'll probably do a good end-to-end trailer cleaning. It shouldn't be too bad because we did a good, deep cleaning at the end of the season last year. I know we'll have to spend time in the yard next week (yuck!), but I hope we can get that done early so we can enjoy most of the week.

I hope to do a better job of documenting our time at the lake this summer. Hopefully, we'll have lots of little visitors this year. Sam and Layton will have a blast, and I'm sure Camille will enjoy it as much as a 6 month can. :)

I definitely plan on spending more time as a lake resident this summer than I have the last couple of summers. I would love to paint the kitchen. It needs it, badly! And I really want to build a fire pit. Roasting marshmallows would be a perfect way to end a fun day playing at Pop Pop and Grana's, don't ya think?

I guess that's it for now.

Keep dreaming!

Welcome to Crider Shores!

This past weekend, we had a community project at the lake.  The guys built a new fence, so the old green fence (that could have been pushed over with no effort...literally!), and the old red cattle gate are no more.  Mom said it looks like a REAL gated community now.  And it does!  LOL  I wish I had gotten a picture of the BEFORE, though.  It was uuuugggggllllyyyy!!!!

Bev suggested Crider Shores as the name of the neighborhood because before the lake was backed up, the land there was known as the Crider farm.  She thought it would be neat to have some of the history included, and she thought "shores" would be nice because it's different from all of the other places that use "point" or "landing".  Amy and I agreed, so that's what it's going to be.  :)  I've always wanted to have a "name" for our neighborhood.

We still have a few things to do before the project is completely finished.  The fence and gate need to be stained, of course, and we are going to redo the garbage bin (which will be a HUGE improvement over the one that has been there for who knows how long!), and we're going to plant some crape myrtles behind the fence.  When everything is done, it will look so nice.  And then people will come down the hill and see our trailer and wonder who the redneks (misspelling intentional) are.  LOL  Someday...someday...someday...

Pictures of the work the guys did:

Fence posts set! 

 Jay, Tristan, and Dave worked hard!  The poles will be trimmed and capped later.

This one makes me laugh.  How many men does it take to cut a piece of lumber?

 Putting up the brace.

 Hmmm...the brace didn't look right, so after a discussion, we decided it needed to be nailed to the back side.  Back up the ladder, Jay.

The finished product!  The original plan called for the fence to be just like the gate, but after some discussion, the guys made a decision to go with four boards straight across.  To do it RIGHT, it was going to take a LOT longer because of the angles that would have to be cut, and they probably wouldn't have finished on Saturday.  Since rain was coming, we didn't know if we'd have Sunday to work or not.  I like it just the way it is.



Once the wood has had time to dry, we're going to stain it a dark reddish-brown.  We're planning on putting the solar caps on the top of the posts by the gate so we'll have some light at night.

John and I have to finish up our walkway project this coming weekend.  He has two sections to grind (and I to paint) on one side, so it shouldn't take all day like the others have when he's had sections on both sides to do.  Once that's done, I think our projects for the summer are done.  Well, except for getting a port for the SeaDoo installed.  :)

As always, KEEP DREAMING!!

Spring time at the lake

Spring time at the lake is one of my favorite times of the year.  First, because it isn't so hot you can't stand it unless you're in the water or under the air conditioner.  Second, because you never know what you'll see in nature.

Over the last couple of weeks, the oak leaf hydrangeas have bloomed out, and Saturday morning, I saw a flower I'd never seen before.  Thanks to Google, I learned that it's called Indian Pink.  I'm thinking I might dig it up and transplant it.  I want to give rooting a hydrangea a shot, but from what I've read, I need to try that later in the summer.

While I was painting the walkway rail yesterday, John called down and said that a hummingbird had found my feeder. YEA!!  I was enjoying coffee on the porch this morning, and saw not one, but two, hummers!  I'm going to get more feeders this week.

SO FAR, my plants haven't keeled over, so maybe they'll make.  The fern I dug up has hung on for three weeks now, and the elephant ears I transplanted from Patty have hung on for a couple of weeks.  The hosta and coleus I planted last week still looked good, too. 





I love this picture of John.  I took it when we were at the lake for spring break. 





His two pound crappie.  This baby is still waiting to be greased.  :)

Walkway rail before...

Walkway rail after...We're only about half way finished with the rails, and then we have to do the actual walkway.  When the water goes down this fall, we'll finish up the area under the walkway.  This has been a chore!!!

Foggy morning on the lake.  We couldn't even see the other side, and it isn't THAT far!  I love the lake when it's like this.  It is so quiet.

Now that the hummingbirds have found the feeder, they're drinking the nectar down pretty quickly.  I probably should have refilled it before we left today.

Indian Pink.  They are GORGEOUS!

This fella was on the porch screen when we got there Friday night, but I couldn't get a good picture of him.  He was hanging out on the underpinning of the trailer Saturday morning.  I wish he'd have found a prettier place to light.

My coleus and hosta.  The fern and the elephant ears I transplanted are on the back side.  I moved my rooster to this area today.  If I do dig up the Indian Pink, I'm going to put it in this bed, too.

I took this picture last weekend, so it hadn't fully bloomed.  I love hydrangeas!  They are one of my favorite flowers.

Two more weeks of school (and then three days the following week for teachers...ugh).  We're doing our Big Ass Road Trip 2012 to Memphis with Susan and Tim right after I finish up with school, and then I plan on spending as much of the rest of the summer at the lake.  I know I'll have to come home every week since I'll be starting allergy shots this week.  What I hope to be able to do is to keep Layton one day a week, too, so that will work out just fine.  :)

For now, I'm going to call it a night and let Mr. Sandman come for a visit.  I think Ali and Bama have already made it to dreamland. 

As always, KEEP DREAMING!

The water Harley

We have a new toy for the lake.  Well, we traded one toy for another.  When I got home Thursday, John told me he wanted to take the boat to one of the marinas here in Dadeville to see if we could get a good enough deal to trade it in for a SeaDoo.  We started talking about it at the end of the summer last year, and he talked to a couple of people about it, but none of them had the right deal.  This time, they did. 

When we first got our boat, we were really in the market for a pontoon, but honestly, the ski boat was such a deal, and we weren't finding a pontoon that was, we didn't think we could pass it up.  And we had fun on it.  It was such a huge hassle, though, to get it in and out of the water.

We do have a launch in our "neighborhood" and we launched it and loaded it from there once, but because our road is a curvy and only one lane, getting the trailer back to our place was not easy.  We don't have a great place for turning a trailer around, so John had to back it from the launch to the trailer.  Not fun.  We usually kept it in dry storage at a launch about ten miles from the trailer, but that meant going every weekend, hooking it up, taking it to launch, taking the trailer back to the unit, and then doing the reverse every Sunday.  A couple of summers ago, we did leave it in the water at Danny and Linda's boat dock.  Talk about gross when we pulled it out!!  Lance and Jess were up that weekend, so Lance got the fun job of helping John clean it off.  With the SeaDoo, we can launch it at our place with the four wheeler, so it is much, much easier and quicker.

We took it out yesterday for about an hour.  I've ridden on a PWC only a handful of times, and I had never driven one until yesterday.  At first I was a little nervous, but once I got the hang of it, I.  LOVED.  IT.  I would have NEVER taken the boat out by myself, but I won't have any reservations about taking the water Harley out by myself.

Until next time...KEEP DREAMING!

Gorgeous weekend!

Of course, any weekend at the lake is gorgeous as far as I'm concerned. :) We got there about 7 Friday night, so we didn't do much. At least it wasn't yet dark, so we got to enjoy some porch time. Saturday was so nice! I went out on the dock about 10:30 and ended up dozing off, so my face got a little red. OOPS! I try not to let my face burn anymore. My amazing grill master did steaks Saturday night, and as usual, they were fabulous. We cleaned off the table on the porch and dined al fresco. Heavenly! While we were eating, I saw the ducks swimming a couple of lots down. I can't wait to see them up close again. The only negative was the pollen. When I swept the kitchen floor, there was a very distinct yellow tint to the dirt I swept up. And the furniture had a nice yellow coating. Joy. I have only six more weeks of school before I can go to stay. All, six weeks and three days. We have professional development days on May 29-31. Yuck! We're taking our trip to Memphis the first weekend in June, but once we're back from that, I plan on being a Winston County resident as much as possible! Guess that's it for now. KEEP DREAMING!!

Open for Business!

John and I went to the lake a couple of weekends ago to really get things up and running for the summer.  Or that was kind of our original plan.  After spending a week or so working on the bathroom at home, we decided that we were going to do nothing for the days we were at the lake during spring break.  Nothing is pretty much what we did.  And it was great!

We left on Saturday morning to go up, and so by the time we got there, it was early afternoon.  We did only what was necessary...unloaded the truck, turned on the water, flipped the breakers...and then we enjoyed the late afternoon quiet.  Better enjoy it now because there won't be many weekends when it is quiet.  Even though the water was still quite cool (I dipped a toe in), a few brave souls tubed.

On Sunday, we went to visit Billie, and then we took her back with us to spend the night.  Even though she wouldn't remember it now, she has a great time.  She fished and caught a nice size bass, and that tickled her to death.  I wish I had thought to take a picture of her and her fish so she could put it on her bulletin board at the nursing home.  Maybe we can take her back another time or two over the summer, and she can catch another one.

John did some fishing and had some good bites.  He caught a couple of bass and one really nice stripe.  He hung two (maybe the same one??) but he couldn't get them in.  It took about ten minutes of work to get the one he did catch.  He got three crappie too.  Those are in the freezer waiting to be fried up.  YUM-O!!

We left on that Thursday morning for home.  Talk about depressing! We had planned to go to Memphis with Susan and Tim, but the weather got pretty yuck with lots of rain, so we rescheduled that trip for June. 

As soon as I get home and we load up, we're heading up for the weekend.  This will be another do nothing weekend!  John deserves to rest after the hard work he put in on the bathroom.  :)  Maybe the fish will be biting again.

I'm gonna go get my stuff ready so I can be out the door as soon after the bell rings as possible because I am ready to be lake bound!

Remember...KEEP DREAMING!!!!

Not quite the last hurrah

I came to the lake yesterday to get in a few R&R days before school starts back.  Originally, I had planned to come up yesterday and stay until NEXT Sunday, but Connie and Libby are going to see Layton on Monday, so I'm going home Sunday so I can go with them.  The plan right now is to come back on that Tuesday and stay until that Sunday.  That will be the last hurrah for my summer.  :)

After I got everything unloaded and put away yesterday, I took my camera and went down to the dock to get some late afternoon shots.  I love sunsets on the lake.  And I really love the way the sun is peeking from behind the cloud in this one.  One of these days, I'm going to invest in a really good camera and take a photography class.  Photography is a hobby I'd really like to develop.

 Relaxing on the dock is another hobby of mine, but I've pretty well developed it.  I think I'm almost at pro status.  I spent about three and a half to four hours basking in the sun today.  It was hot, but being able to take a quick dip makes it bearable.  After having left the pups inside, they've been stuck to my side/lap since I got out of the shower.  :)

After supper I'm going to sit on the porch with my book (and the fan) and enjoy the quiet.  And probably an adult beverage too...



As always, keep dreaming because you never know when those dreams just might come true!