My Sister, My Best Friend.....

"To the outside world we all grow old.  But not to brothers and sisters.  We know each other as we always were.  We know each other's hearts.  We share private family jokes.  We remember family feuds and secrets, family griefs and joys.  We live outside the touch of time."                                                                                                                   ~Clara Ortega

Almost two months ago already, i had the most wonderful opportunity to see my sister.  It had been over 3 1/2 years since i had seen her and thanks to the grace of Mum and Ray getting married (he he) there was reason enough to spend the hundreds of dollars that plane tickets are these days and she came here to Tennessee.  Weddings are joyous occasions enough on their own accord, but this was like 1,000,000 Christmases combined!  

I LOVE my dear sister, all of her....her faults and shortcomings, and her wisdom, love and maturity.  I have to say that this visit was worthy of being a "significant moment" in my life as we were able to work through some things from years ago and i was able to reach a deeper level of understanding and love as i had not yet experienced.  Louise was patient and kind and through our temporary difficulty she NEVER was willing to give up on me, no matter how childish (or scary) i behaved.  I laugh a little to myself now at how no matter how old you are siblings really can  bring out the child in you like no one else can.  ;-)  Regardless through the pain we persevered  ;-) and grew closer together and for that i am truly thankful of the Lord.  

I understand myself in a completely different way than i did before and i have to say at 32 years old, i didn't know that my sister could have the power to do that to me.  I am grateful to you, Louise, for all the times you were there for me through all those hard years.  I know and acknowledge you were there and know that things would have been a lot more miserable if i hadn't had you.  You are my gift from God and always will be.  :-)

So the other day i was going through some old journals looking for first hand stories to tell my children.  They LOVE to hear the stories from my childhood and now that they are getting older and can understand more things i thought i'd skim through my journals and see if there was anything they might enjoy me reading to them.  Well i came across another notebook that happened to be my writing notebook that was part of my English class from my first year of middle school (6th grade).  We were sometimes randomly given a topic to write about and i was struck with the entry on October 10th 1991.  I was 11 years old at the time.  This is what it says:

"The person that means a lot to me in my life is my sister.  She means a lot to me because when ever I'm sad or I'm in a bad mood or something like that she always cheers me up and makes me laugh.  If me and my sister were alone we could laugh forever.  My sister loves to do drama and act, she has been in a few plays.  And we always talk about old times and things.  And we always borrow clothes and stuff like that and we always fight about things."  

Louise, you are my sister, my best friend. AND i still feel that if were were left alone together we could laugh forever.   :-)

When sisters stand shoulder to shoulder, 

who stands a chance against us? 

~Pam Brown

A sister is a little bit of childhood that can never be lost.  

~Marion C. Garretty

  My high school graduation

 Dancing to Michael Jackson's Thriller.  :-)

 My HS graduation

Family Vacation to Falls Creek Falls.....

Our family loves to camp and unfortunately in the last few years our opportunities to camp have been limited. This year we decided to set a date a couple months ahead of time and make sure that no matter what happened it was on the calendar and we'd just have to say to no everything else.  Well we did, and it was fantastic.  Over the last three years we have been heavily stocking up on camping gear etc., and so it was all the more fun this time as we were fully prepared for everything and as far as camping goes we really did have everything we needed.  We even were blessed with a couple of niceties this year that a couple of friends bestowed upon us in the form of a cot for me (yes after having 4 kids via c-section i am kind like the princess and the pea) and a hammock which everyone got good use out of.  Special thanks to the Baurs and the Boyles for that.  :-)

 A few years ago (maybe about 3?) we went up to Falls Creek Falls on the suggestion of a good friend for a day hike and absolutely loved it.  It is a 20,000 acre state park and has several water falls and hiking trails. It has a variety of camp grounds from ones equipt for RVs to walking-in ones.  We were fortunate enough to find a cheap site with tons of room (which was more rare) for our three tents.  We had the advantage of arriving Friday morning before everyone else and this made a huge difference as come Friday night the place was packed even though there are literally hundreds of camp sites there.

Saturday morning Mum and Ray joined us for an overnight stay and we were all thrilled.  Saturday and even Sunday we hiked around the various water fall sites and I was amazed at how beautiful everything was.  I have taken as you will see below MANY pictures and you know, it just doesn't do it justice for the real thing.  We hope to make camping at this time of year an annual event and seen as the park is so huge we may even go there again next year and have another wonderful but unique experience. The rest of the story i will let the pictures tell.  :-)

On the road to go camping....

yep, we packed enough stuff for 4 days.  :-)

We're here!

Getting a S'mores stick ready....lovin the outfit Edy.  ;-)

Foil dinners for the first night.  :-)  The kids said they had never tasted anything so good.  It's amazing how everything tastes better when you're out in the wilderness isn't it?  :-)

Sarah took a lot of the pics that i am in and she had a bit 

of a trigger finger. She was cracking us up!   :-)

OK, so there are a few #'d photos below (up to 7 i believe) that i am trying to choose our family portrait from.  Any votes would be appreciated in the comments section below.  Thanks!  

This one above is #1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

#7

 LOVE this Man of Mine!  xxxx

Mum and Ray

 Falls Creek Falls

Looking straight up you can see that this tree 

is growing right out of the rocks.  So amazing!

Edy catching a crawfish.

 John's MANwich for breakfast Sunday morning  :-)

 I couldn't resist!  He he!

Mom, it's too bright!

The suspension bridge we had to cross.  Mollie Moo (my mother's Newfoundland) wasn't too pleased about this.  Have you ever had to shove a 115 lbs dog across a bridge like this, well i have!  

Poor Mollie!

 Piney Creek Falls

 Some good ole whiffle ball!  

John Raymond & Nicola Jayne  <3 font="font">