A couple of weeks ago, I took Lexi camping at the same time as my sister’s family so she would have some of her cousins along with us since it was Lexi’s first camping trip. Before this, she and I had spent one single night in the tent in our backyard and she barely made it through the night. However, I knew she would enjoy all things camping because she loves hiking with me and playing in water with me. We went to Fall Creek Falls State Park in Tennessee because it has a lot to do and is less than 2 hours away, and I had not been there in more than 15 years probably. She loved every second of the trip without a doubt.

When we first got there, we did a junior canopy tour since she isn’t big enough to do a regular one yet. Most places don’t even have options for kids her age so I was excited about it. It was one where you are self-guided and it has different obstacles between platforms and included three zip lines. She was nervous about it at first because she really didn’t know what it was and the full harness worried her I think. I kept reassuring her she would love it and all I had to do was help her transfer from one safety line to the next so she could continue through it. She lost all her nerves very quickly until the last zip line, BUT she asked me to do the whole course again and went super fast through it, even the last zip line.

After the ropes course canopy was all done, Lexi’s first camping trip continued with us actually setting up camp at our respective sites. My sister’s family uses a pull-behind camper instead of tents most of the time, so we got two different campsites near each other. 

Unfortunately, for this post I will not include ANY photographs. That is because, for the first time in my teaching career, I did not have a traditional graduation ceremony to attend. This is sad for me because it was a special year this time, with added meaning. Each of the first two schools I taught at I only worked at for two years because I just wasn’t happy at either of them. It took my current job at the school I work at now (third time’s a charm!) before I felt like I fit in and was making a difference. Last year was the first graduating class that I had anything to do with the students when they began high school so it was a milestone for sure. Some of them I was directly responsible for making sure they finished strong and graduated. Others, I taught as ninth graders. I was proud of all of them. However, this year I graduated four seniors that came to me as freshmen on my caseload. It was my duty to make sure that these four young men got everything they needed to be successful, had good attendance, worked hard, and were prepared for life after high school. Despite the fact that I taught many others that are graduating this year (in fact, only one of these young men was ever in a class that I taught), these are the individuals that I am most thinking about as I write this message. I am extremely proud of them, I wish I could have seen them walk the stage, I wish I had the last two months of school to see them in the halls, I hope they are as prepared as I think they are, and I wish them the best. I want to say congratulations graduates to each of them, and to everyone else that has reached a milestone in 2020. Everyone that has completed high school, law school, medical school…their first, second, third, or fourth degree at college…they all deserve congratulations and applaud. They did it, they made it, they will always hold that accomplishment.

Although the weather has begun to improve and is warming up, the overnight temperatures and in the morning is still rather cool. It won’t be much longer before days will be warm enough the entire time to really enjoy, and then since this is north Georgia it will become very hot not long after that. We are still having a lot of storms lately, including a rash of tornados that came through the night of Easter Sunday. As far as we know it was the same system that began with a tornado in Louisiana and two tornados in Mississippi. When the storm system reached our area of north Georgia, there were several different tornados, some very large in size. One did minor damage 4 miles from our house, in Fort Oglethorpe, but the main destruction was in the East Brainerd region of Chattanooga. Evidently there were four separate tornados by the time it reached there, and the largest of them was a half mile wide. Add that to shelter-in-place orders due to COVID-19 and you can see why we take every opportunity we can to find some enjoyment. We had just bought our daughter some new rain boots and she was very eager to use them, wanting to spend hours jumping in puddles. It was supposed to rain all day last weekend and she was so excited. Unfortunately, it ended up raining overnight instead of all day so she did not get to jump during the rainfall. However, she demanded that we still go outside and jump in the puddles. She talked me into jumping like a fool with her, but before I did I wanted to have some fun taking pictures of her. You can see she really enjoyed herself, even though she got soaked!!

I know in my last post I talked already about how much it has rained and flooded soooooo much here in north Georgia, and how I was battling a case of spring fever since we only had one decent snow this winter. Well, this has turned in a very rainy spring indeed. The good news is that the temperature has mostly warmed up to a comfortable range. The bad news is (like most of the country) we are social distancing and trying to refrain from going out in public as much as possible, especially in places that may be crowded. Since the coronavirus began to pick up pace, and schools here closed, my daughter and I have been stuck in the house a whole lot. She was getting stir crazy before the school closure officially began. and the incessant rain has not helped us. We both have a difficult time staying inside all day, unlike my wife, and the rainy spring is causing us to be creative keeping ourselves entertained. The only getting out we have done has been for me to grocery shop, and for us to take walks to the duck pond in our neighborhood. It has also been difficult tending to my at home teacher responsibilities and making sure my daughter completes all of her learning activities each day. Thankfully, we did get a nice weekend day a few weeks ago that we got to take advantage of. My daughter and I took our dog, Lucy, to go hiking for the first time on an actual trail. She loved it, and we had a good time. I wish we could have better weather to enjoy the outdoors at this time when that is the only way to get out of the house and get any exercise or just take a break from the stuffy indoors. I know we are lucky here near Chattanooga that we are still able to go out at all. Since we live across the border in north Georgia, we are able to still go to some playgrounds, parks, and trails to engage in some physical activity. Even right near us in Chattanooga, they have closed all city parks, and I know in other areas of the country that have more cases than we do, people are not allowed to leave their house for non-essential reasons. Once again, the current state of things AND the weather make it impossible to offer portrait sessions at this time. Keep posted, and I will let you know as soon as we are able to set something up. In the meantime, enjoy these pictures and videos of Lexi and Lucy from the recent day hiking!!

Recent photo editing sessions of snowy pictures had me really missing true winter, something we rarely get anymore in north Georgia. The pictures, which will soon appear in my gallery, had me longing to do a post about winter snow. Then, we had snow for one day and everything I had been missing got out of my system because I blew off the day of responsibilities and played with my daughter as much as possible. Both before and after the snow day, we have received several days of rain and flooding. Schools and my full time job of teaching have been alternating between being closed and opening on a delay. We have had temperatures ranging from 25 – 65 degrees, and now I am just ready for it to stay spring and move into summer. I am not overly fond of when it stays miserably hot all the time, but still prefer that to vast temperature swings. Plus with warmer temperatures comes being outdoors. I went back into my archives and used some pictures from last summer on vacation at Fripp Island, SC because now I am yearning for warm long days, sunsets, outdoor activities, and extra time with my daughter that we will get during summer vacation from school and work. 

Stay tuned for an announcement about spring photo sessions as soon as the weather stabilizes, trees turn green, and flowers bloom. I am excited to offer full sessions and possibly mini-sessions as well, especially since I was unable to offer any special photography sessions between Christmas and Valentine’s Day due to the unreliable weather. Until then, enjoy a brief preview of what the spring and summer time can provide us.