Walls of Jericho

We went hiking at the Walls of Jericho this Saturday, Nov 5. We had been wanting to hike there for over a year and finally made it. It was a great hike but the most challenging one we have done yet. It was a 7 mile round trip hike with over 1,000 feet descending elevation to get to the Walls of Jericho, which meant we had to hike 1,000 feet back up to the start. The Walls of Jericho is a limestone gorge with waterfalls and a natural amphitheater that is 50 yards wide with 200 ft tall cliffs on each side. It was a beautiful fall day to be outside.

Camping and Hiking

Last weekend Jesse and Teresa came down to visit us and we had a great time. Friday afternoon we drove to Fall Creek Falls State Park in Tennessee and camped overnight. Saturday we spent the day hiking. It was beautiful there and we had sunny weather in the 70s. Couldn't have asked for a better day. We first hiked to the cascades and nature center crossing over a hanging bridge. We then went to Fall Creek Falls which is 256 feet tall, the tallest waterfall east of the Rocky Mts. We enjoyed the view from the top and then hiked to the base and ate our lunch. After that we hiked to Pikey Falls and then to Milikens Overlook.

Sipsey Wilderness

Saturday we went hiking at Sipsey Wilderness which is located about an hour west of us in the Bankhead National Forest. I was so excited to finally get to hike, since it had been so hot this spring and summer that we couldn't. It was a beautiful hike with the river on one side of us and the bluffs and caves on the other side. We will have to go back in the spring when there is more water flowing to see the waterfalls.

Burritt on the Mountain

Back in July we went to the Burritt museum which is located on Monte Sano Mountain. The mansion was built in 1955 by Dr. Burritt and is now turned into a museum. There are 19th century original homes from alabama that have been relocated to the mountain to make it a historic park. There are also hiking trails located around it. It was a beautiful day to be there with a great view.

Garden Update

We have been eating vegetables from our garden every night since June. Our garden has done pretty well for our first year. We've had some problems with insects and now lately the birds eating our tomatoes, but we've still harvested a lot. Our running total so far is 61 tomatoes, 95 okra, 11 peppers, 21 zucchini, and 39 yellow squash. Hopefully there will be much more to come. Our favorite things to make with the tomatoes are salsa and spaghetti sauce. With our other veggies we usually saute them or put them in a frittata.

Veggies!

We've started harvesting vegetables from our garden. So far we are up to 18 yellow squash, 4 zucchini, 2 okra, 3 beets, 1 green pepper and some spinach and lettuce. We would have more okra if it weren't for the darn ants eating them. We also have a problem with catepillars eating our broccoli and tomatoes. We caught two very big catepillar killers on Saturday. They were executed at 1:45 pm by a shovel handled by Andrew for eating our tomatoes. It left a very green and gooey mess. We dug up another garden where we planted sweet banana pepper and salsa peppers and some more okra and squash.

Storms

April 26 we had multiple storms and tornados come through our area in one day. We were woken up at 6 am to the sound of tornado sirens and then heard them throughout the rest of the day, until the storms took out all the power in the area and they could no longer go off. There were 600,000 people without power by the end of the day. I had never seen storm clouds like that before and so close to us. We were so blessed that we had no major damage. Power went out Wednesday night and didn't come back on again until Monday morning. You don't realize how much we rely on electricity until we don't have it. I was glad we had done laundry a few days before so we had clean clothes to wear. And we were blessed that we had a gas heater so we could still take hot showers, unlike so many. We needed to eat all the food out of our freezer and fridge that we could, so we built a fire to cook it since we didn't have a grill. I was so glad we had some coals and lighter fluid in the garage because the lines at the few grocery stores that were open wrapped around the store and to the outside and we would've been waiting for hours. Below is a picture of the fire that we made and we camped out in our backyard. Thank goodness we had great weather for a few days so we could sit out and eat and then look at the stars at night on our deck. You can see so many more stars when no one has power. School and work were canceled because the city didn't have power, so Andrew and I just hung out at home. I think the kitties enjoyed it! On Sunday we went and volunteered at neighborhoods where trees were down and houses were leveled. We spent the day cutting down trees and moving debris to the side of the road. We saw a trampoline wrapped around the top of a power pole and someones mattress a half mile from their house. The power of the tornados is hard to comprehend and it is by God's protection that so many survived, and their stories are unbelievable considering what they experienced. There were soo many people out helping and that was encouraging to see. There is still a lot of work to be done.

Here's a pic of our growing garden. Yeah! I keep praying that it will produce lots of yummy veggies, and then next year we can make it even bigger.

Andrew leaves Wednesday morning for a rocket launch in Virginia and Thursday afternoon I pickup mom from the airport. She is coming to stay with me and hang out while Andrew is gone so it'll be lots of fun.

Garden part 2

In our garden we planted tomatos, peppers, eggplant, yellow squash, zucchini, broccoli, beets, spinach, lettuce, and okra. Hopefully it will produce lots of vegetables. We've already got some sprouts coming up. In the picture below Andrew is putting our grass clippings in the compost bin that we built.

garden

Guest Bedroom

Before mom and dad came down to stay with us for spring break we surprised them by getting a bed for the guest bedroom and finishing the headboard. They thought they were going to have to sleep on an air mattress all week. For the headboard we used a door from grandma and grandpa Olson's farm. The door on this bed is from the closet in their old bedroom. Now our next project is starting the headboard for our bed.

Foster Falls

Tuesday March 22, 2011 we took mom and dad to Foster Falls in Tenessee. It was a beatiful day outside. We had lunch there and hiked to the bottom of the falls and back up. We then drove to Sewannee Tn and hiked a trail there. We hiked to a stone tunnel where people had carved their names in it. We found a name dated at 1900. It was a fun day. There are lots of other trails at Sewannee, so I'm sure we will be back.