Oostanaula River Paddle Trip

Getting ready

Derek leads the way

Adam enjoys the ride with Aunt Agatha and Uncle Paul

We scrambled up the embankment, on one of our breaks, to see this beautiful farm

Adam shows off some of the mussels he found

The head guide found this stick for Adam along the river bank and informed Adam that the bark had been chewed off by a beaver

Me, Helen, and Derek

You can't see this very well, but Adam loved riding in Uncle Paul's big truck down to the river to load up Paul's canoe after the trip

Adam and Derek show off some nice mussels that one of the other paddlers gave them

Helen's brother, Paul, and his wife, Agatha, invited us to join them on a paddling trip down the Oostanaula River. The trip was sponsored by the Coose River Basin Iniative. Paul and Agatha have their own canoe and have done a number of trips, but this is the first one we've done with them. We don't have our own canoe, but the group provided one for us.

We met Paul and Agatha for lunch at Wendy's in Calhoun before heading to the river, which was a few miles away. It was quite a haul for us eastern suburban residents. The weather was beautiful and we all enjoyed learning about the river, especially the role that mussels play in keeping the river clean. We stopped at various places along the way to look for mussels. Usually, we stopped at these partial dam like structures that were built during the Civil War era in order to divert water and make normally shallow areas deep enough for steamboats to traverse.

After the trip, it took a while to straighten out our backs and then we all went to Pizza Hut for dinner. The boys must not have heard us planning with Paul and Agatha to meet them at the Pizza Hut, because when we pulled into parking lot and Paul and Agatha were there, the boys got so excited that Paul and Agatha had also stopped at Pizza Hut. They rushed out of our van to inform Paul and Agatha of the serendipitous situation.

All in all it was a fun day and I was only mildly disappointed that I missed the big showdown between the Colts and the Patriots.

Halloween

Derek unveils his costume to Nini

Aunt Laine and Derek have some snacks before the parade

Uncle Mike, Lindsay, and Aunt Chris

Aunt Helen gets a kiss

Another cute shot of Lindsay

Adam and Derek incognito

And now...unmasked

Adam and Ryan discuss some pre-parade logistics

Nini dressed for the occassion

Laine, Derek, and Jason head up for the start of the parade

Mike, Chris, and Lindsay on their way to the parade

Our neighbors, Sandra and Pete. Pete's costume is probably not politically correct these days, but I thought it was pretty funny given that we actually have a multifamily Mexican household in our neighborhood.

Meeting up with some others on the way to the parade

Adam and Ryan man the pirate ship float

Derek's friend, Becca

Our neighbors - Mr Scott, Carlton, Madeline, and Margaret Ann

Derek and his teacher this year, Ms Sutton, who happens to live in our neigborhood. Derek just adores her.

Me hamming it up behind Chris and Lindsay

The fire trucks arrive to lead the parade

Becca's tail

The parade winds through the neighborhood

Helen helps out with the post parade refreshments

Derek and his crew

Ryan and Adam are off to trick-or-treat

Adam is captivated by the graveyard display at one of the houses

The last glimpse of Derek before he took off. He loved that we allowed him to run off with his friends this year.

The pirate ship at night

Visting while waiting for trick-or-treaters. Lindsay did a great job handing out candy.

Derek checks out his haul

Halloween is a big deal in our neighborhood. There's a parade with fire trucks leading the way, followed by a pizza party before the kids head out for trick-or-treating. What great memories for the kids!

Pumpkin Carving

Getting ready to "ghost" the neighbors

Aunt Laine lends her artistic talents

My mom finishes up some of my brother Jason's lasagna

Me and my pumpkin

Jason helps the boys

Derek didn't quite make it to the end

Adam meticulously adds decorations

Adam shows off the finished pumpkins

Jason gets some help with his fantasy football lineup

Sorry for being so far behind on my blogging, but here's some pre-Halloween updates.

The first picture is of me and the boys about to "ghost" our neighbors. Ghosting involves knocking on a neighbor's door and leaving some candy and note telling the neighbor that they've been "ghosted" and then running away before they come to the door. The boys were bugging us to ghost all that week, but we kept getting thwarted for various reasons. One night we were all set to go and it started pouring rain. The boys still wanted to go, but we put them off another night, which they were not too happy about.

The rest of the pictures are from our annual family pumpkin carving at my brother Jason's house. We were looking forward to my sister, Katie, and her new boyfriend coming up from Louisiana for Halloween week, but Katie got sick at the last minute and couldn't make the trip. Jason made some yummy lasagna and because Katie didn't come there was plenty for us to take home. Derek and Adam had been running on an adrenaline high all week. We could tell before we headed over to Jason's house that Derek was overstimulated and, sure enough, he was asleep on the sofa before the night was over. He gets so excited about things that, by the time the event has arrived, he's too tired to enjoy it.

Quick Halloween Fix

I haven't been able to find the time to do my own Halloween post, but thankfully, Chris, my sister-in-law has done some nice posts that include our neighborhood Halloween parade: post1 and post2.