A family adventure, embracing nature

After a wonderful and relaxing weekend, I thought I would make today's post a recap post. First though, let me tell you the little bit of weather news we have... A non-tropical low is pouring buckets of water on the Carolina coasts, while it just sits there. A Cape Verde system has been awarded the name Tropical Storm Fred. He is possibly going to develop to hurricane strength, but he will likely be taking a turn to the north very soon, making him more of a threat to Africa than us, but he will most likely just end up a fish.

Now, onto the wonderful family-filled holiday weekend. On Friday, my wonderful groom's sisters and their wonderful grooms and their children arrived for a fun-filled visit. We shared a nice dinner with the first group to arrive, while waiting for the others. We decided to let G'ma and Papa enjoy the kids at night, while the grown ups sought refuge at our place. On Friday, we woke up early, retrieved the kids and went to the same spot at Reed Bingham that we visited last October, with the really awesome climbing tree, which the kids once again enjoyed. We had a lovely view of the "lake" there, and the gorgeous cypress trees. We grilled a yummy lunch, played kickball, the kids performed skits and climbed, played putt-putt, swam at the beach... and I took lots and lots of pics. It was a wonderful family adventure, and everyone had a terrific time!

On Sunday, we woke early again and headed to the Ichetucknee River for some tubing. Each person got a tube and we hit the river. The north exit was closed because they had reached capacity at 750 tubers, already (just to give you an idea of the number of people who were out there). I don't have the tubing pics "developed" yet, since they were on my film water camera, but I did catch some shots at on the way, during our picnic and at the springs with my digital. Just to list some of our notable adventures... we saw 3 wild hogs on the embankment (actually I only saw 2 of them, but my niece saw 3)... one of them was frantically digging in the ground, oblivious to the passers-by floating down the river, ants (the biting kind) invaded our picnic with a force, driving most of the children away from the blankets, and Blue Hole Springs had a family of 4 brown water snakes living there that were up by the railing for me to capture, right by the railing (I captured it so my wonderful groom to check the eye shape). EEK. The water in Blue Hole Springs averages 72°F throughout the year, so this was my reaction to the water, with my wonderful groom playing with settings. Darn tootin', it was COLD! Of course, you know me... can't keep my head out of the clouds.So... how was your Labor Day?!

Have a slendiferous day!
~Dewdrop