Drive-in Movie

For the past two years, I have heard countless tales about how awesome the Jesup Drive-in is.  The kids and I decided that we needed to check it out for ourselves.  The verdict is in- the Jesup Drive-in is the bomb.  This theater built in 1948 is the oldest operating drive-in in Georgia. From the car-hops to the black-and-white ads that run prior the movie, 1950s-era nostalgia is present in many aspects of the drive-in.  All of these things are great but they are not why I liked this place so much.  To begin with, the value is unbeatable.  All showings are double features, so for one low admission ($7 adult, $3 child) we got to see TWO newly released movies.  I spent $13 bucks total and we saw both Inside Out and Jurassic World.  While the price was my favorite part, the kids liked the playground.  The playground is right in front of the screen.  Kids are able to burn some energy while waiting on the movie to begin.  The playground even had a merry-go-round.  I have never really thought about this before, but the kids have never seen a merry-go-round as none of our local playgrounds have one.  They loved this and played on it more than any other piece of playground equipment.  The only draw-back is that the first movie can't begin until it's totally dark, so we didn't get home until after 1 a.m.  Poor Owen didn't make it through the second movie.  Even so, we all loved the drive-in and hope for many return trips.

Summer Waves

It has been soooo hot lately.  We have pretty much had to hide out indoors because of the sweltering weather.  Last week was exceptionally bad, so imagine how happy we were when my friends Anna and Krystial invited us to go to Summer Waves Waterpark with them.  A nice dip in the cool water is what was needed.  Olivia and Owen were excited to ride all of the slides, and they were equally as pleased to have other kids to play with (besides each other).  The slides that they rode the most were the two speed slides.  I don't know that they necessarily liked those the best, but those two slides never had much of a line- and they liked not having to wait.  We also enjoyed the lazy river and wave pool.  We were there pretty much all day and were super tired when we got home.  It was great to get out and spend time with friends.

Yep, This Happened

Well, we should have had Jerry spayed.  We didn't, and now we have four little fur balls running around.  The kids love the kittens to pieces and they want to keep them all.  We're not keeping any of them.  Once they're old enough we will find good homes for them.  Jerry is also going to be spayed so that we can avoid a repeat of this situation.  The kitties are here for the time being, though, and they have certainly made our lives more interesting.

An Evening with Taylor Swift

 I know I said recently that Garth Brooks was the best concert that I had ever been to.  At the time that was true, but I'm going to have to edit that comment now.  The best concert that I've been to is Taylor Swift's 1989 tour.  Brian gave me tickets to go see Tay Tay for my birthday back in December.  I like a lot of Taylor's songs and thought it'd be a good show, but I was not prepared for how awesome it really was.  Oh. My. Stars.  It was great.  We saw the show in Philly in a sold-out stadium with 50,000 fans.  Brian got us two tickets on the floor level- not far from the run-way platform.  Apparently Taylor is from Pennsylvania because she referred to this as her "home town concert" on several occasions.  She also said that she wanted to "surprise" the crowd so she brought out that band Echosmith in the middle of the concert and they sang that "Cool Kids" song (video below).  She also brought out Cara Delevingne and Mariska Hargitay to walk the run way during that "Style" song.  These were just a few of the things that made the concert great.  She also had great dancers, smoke, fireworkss, and a run-way platform that lifted up into the air and spun around.  Brian said that each performance was like watching a different music video.  It was really good.  The coolest thing of all, though, were the bracelets.  They gave each concert-goer a bracelet that was programmed to light up in time with the music.  It turned four different colors.  The colors matched the mood of the song.  I thought that this was one of the coolest things that I'd ever seen.  Both Brian and I enjoyed the concert immensely.

U.S. Naval Academy

On Thursday we had plans to visit Brandon in his new home (between D.C. and Baltimore).  He ended up having to take a conference call in the early afternoon, so we found ourselves with a few hours to kill before we could head to his house.  We didn't have enough time to fight the traffic of D.C., so Barb suggested that we go to Annapolis and tour the Naval Academy.  What struck me as we drove through Annapolis was how beautiful the city was.  We may need to go back one year and spend a little more time in the downtown area.  We reached the Naval Academy without incident.  Since this was a spur-of-the-moment trip, we did not have reservations for a guided tour and those were full.  We ended up doing a self-guided tour using the map given to us in the Visitor's Center.

 The first stop on the tour was the sports complex.  Olivia was impressed by the large pool.

Next up was Dahlgren Hall- a large space where various social event are held.

 We were not able to go into Bancroft Hall- the largest dormitory in the country, but we still took a picture of it.

 Our last stop was the chapel.  This was my favorite.  There were beautiful stained glass windows all around the chapel, and many depicted different scenes from the Bible.  What was neat was that all of the Bible scenes on the stained glass pertained to the sea (because this is the Naval Academy).  We saw windows of Noah, Moses parting the Red Sea, Jonah, Jesus walking on water, and so on.  I really never realized that there were that many "water" stories in the Bible- but there are.  I pointed out the trend to Olivia and she joined me in identifying the Bible story.  She did pretty good.  Her Sunday School teacher would be proud.  I for one enjoyed our little tour of the Naval Academy.  It is a beautiful campus.

Canopy Tour

 So, we decided to try a zip-line canopy tour while we were in West Virginia.  None of us had ever done this, and I was a little nervous that Olivia would chicken out- which would be bad because the payment was non-refundable and there would be no other non-participant present to "sit out" with her.  Before I booked the trip, I made both kids watch a video of exactly what we would be doing and I told them that if they said they were going to participate, then they HAD TO participate.  Both said that they were in, so we booked the tour and hoped for the best.  We arrived and learned that we were the only four participants on our particular tour- which was great.  The two guides harnessed us up and drove us out to the course- which consisted of 8 ziplines ranging from 200 to almost 800 feet in length.  The course also had several ladder climbs, two suspension bridges, and a 25 foot repel.  The guide asked who wanted to go first, Olivia volunteered and jumped off of the platform without hesitation.  Brian and I were a bit surprised that there was absolutely no fuss on her part.  Once she was off, Owen followed suit while Brian and I brought up the rear.  Some of the zips were higher than others, and some were faster than others.  Owen and Olivia had to go tandem on two of the longer ropes because their individual weight wouldn't carry them to the next platform.  We were out on the course for about two and a half hours.  We all agree that this was super fun and that we would go again in a heartbeat.

...And of course I took some video...

Harpers Ferry

We took a day trip to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia from Dover.  Harpers Ferry has an interesting history and it is located in an area where lots of outdoor activities are available.  We did not visit the battlefield, but we did go downtown and check out the historical sites- most of them relating to John Brown's raid. The buildings downtown are old and most of them are protected as national landmarks.

 We saw the spot where the National Armory used to stand, and we saw the old firehouse that John Brown used as his stronghold.

 The Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers meet up near the downtown area, so we were able to see the two rivers join together.

 There are several large hiking trails that pass through or near Harpers Ferry- including the Appalachian Trail.  We hiked a small portion of this trail.  The portion that we hiked crossed a footbridge and gave us nice views of the town.

Before leaving the downtown area we paid a visit to the John Brown Wax Museum.  This museum uses wax figures to educate visitors about John Brown's life.  It was informative and a little creepy.

Hanging with the Family

 We enjoyed spending time with our family while in Delaware.  We were there for a week, so we spent a lot of time with Poppy and Nana.  We were also able to visit with Uncle Brandon and meet Katy, his fiancee. In addition, we paid a visit to Uncle Mike and Aunt Connie (and took a little side trip to Byler's too =) ).  Family time is always the BEST part of the trip.

Killens Pond State Park

On our second full day in DE, we visited Killens Pond State Park.  This state park had a small-ish waterpark, so that was our first stop.  The water was pretty cold still, so the kids only stayed in it for about an hour.  The favorite activity of both Olivia and Owen was going over the floating bridge.

 Upon leaving the waterpark, we hiked a three mile trail around the pond.  The trail was relatively flat, so it made for an easy trip.  We saw some wildlife during our hike including frogs, a snake, and a turtle.  We had a pleasant day at this park.