Day Trip to Savannah!

    We woke up this morning, looked out at the glorious day and decided not to break the on-going count of weekends *not* spent in N. Augusta...so we decided to hit the road. Last night, as I was waiting for Justin to get off work, I took a look at the map and calculated the time it would take to get to several locations from our house. The most reasonable location was Savannah coming in at only 2 and a half hours away.

    As soon as we set foot on River Street after finding a parking spot, Justin turned to me and asked me what I would like to eat for lunch. The words barely escaped Justin's lips when a man on the corner smoking a cigarette said, "Go to Tubby's! You'll love it." We were not really in the mood to make decisions anyway, so we said, "What the heck! Tubby's it is!"   

 

      After taking a while to make up my mind (a women's prerogative) I decided on a yummy crab cake sandwich, which I would totally order again! It's not everyday that you can get local seafood when living in North Augusta. A low-country girl needs her seafood fix quite regularly...and prefers it to be local!  :)

    We enjoyed being tourists and walking up and down River Street. In one of the store fronts Justin spotted a giant pumpkin. It reminded us of the pumpkin we saw in Franklin, NC last Fall, which we thought was huge. I'll let you compare them. 

    The city was full of historic charm, with old cobblestone streets with a still-active trolley,

   second floor doors that open into thin air,

lots of brick and stone architecture,

and city squares decorated with fountains.

     Savannah was absolutely beautiful and reminded me a lot of Charleston, SC. Both are gorgeous cities with Live Oaks draped in Spanish Moss, iron gates and fences, waterfront walkways, cobblestone, and rich in history. Both Savannah and Charleston once were their respective state's capitals and are still their major seaports. Even though I have never spent much time in Savannah, it felt familiar because it reminds me so much of Charleston.

         We have seen trees growing on top of bare rock at the top of a waterfall in Yosemite, but we are still always intrigued by plants growing in unexpected places. Of course we had to stop and admire these ferns that were growing out of the side of this brick wall.

     We love this building's unique combination of brick and stone. A lot of the stone used around the city is ballast rock brought over from England on ships bound for Savannah. These stones were added to less-than-full cargo ships to keep them stable on the journey overseas.

     

   

  

  

  

  

  Around the city we saw vendors selling pictures of letters that are found in everyday life. We thought this was a really neat idea, but instead of buying the pictures, we took it on as an activity to look for and take our own pictures of that spell our last name. We enjoyed using our imagination and creativity which was combined with a friendly competition of who could find the best letters! :)

   We had a fun, relaxing, spontaneous Saturday. Couldn't have been any better!

Finally, A Weekend of Rest

"A few days ago I walked along the edge of the lake and was treated to the crunch and rustle of leaves with each step I made. The acoustics of this season are different and all sounds, no matter how hushed, are as crisp as autumn air." - Eric Sloane

    This past weekend Justin and I met my parents and my brother in the mountains. They rented a house at Lake Junaluska and invited us to come along! It was a nice break from our normal mountain routine, considering we were not spending our time painting, nailing, gluing. Even though it was past the peak Fall leaves, the foliage was still beautiful.

       Of course you can't go to the mountains in the Fall without going to the apple orchard. When we arrived the aroma of apple turnovers captured Justin's attention more than the sight of heaps of apples. For only $1.75, Justin was in heaven!

    There were only a couple items on my agenda, one was to go to the apple orchard, the other to Mast General Store! So, after downing his turnover, we hopped in the car and headed towards Waynesville, NC.

  The leaves were the prettiest in Waynesville. As we walked downtown we couldn't help but stop and act like total tourists! The whole Parrott side of the family used to vacation at Lake Junaluska every summer. So this weekend brought back some great memories! It was good to spend the weekend with my family, also!

"I cannot endure to waste anything as precious as autumn sunshine by staying in the house. So I spend almost all the daylight hours in the open air. - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"The season for enjoying the fullness of life -- partaking of the harvest, sharing the harvest with others, and reinvesting and saving portions of the harvest for yet another season of growth."- Denis Waitley

"Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower."- Albert Camus

    When we made it to Mast General Store I was so excited! Everything about the store makes me smile: the squeaks in the floor, the rustic feel, and, I can't forget, the candy! Mast has so much more, but the only thing I usually ever purchase is candy! They have dozens of barrels filled with different types of candy, it is always a hard decision. They charge by the pound, so we picked out a variety of  items. Of course we intended only to get a pound, however we ended up going WAY over! From fake cigarettes and Pixie Stix to green apple bubble gum and sour gummy bears, everything was a must have! : )

    When we got back to the house we figured we needed to walk off a good bit of the candy we ate on the way home. Since Lake Junaluska has a 2.6 mile walking path that runs alongside the entire lake, that's where we went. From what I remembered, there were always a lot of ducks in certain areas of the lake...and they liked to be fed! As we approached the lake, we were greeted with several types of geese and duck breeds and they appeared to be hungry--and unafraid!  When you would stop feeding them, some would peck you and some just follow you. Either way, they let their presence be known!

   It was a fun and restful weekend. It was nice to be able to sit on the front porch and enjoy the view of the lake surrounded by the colorful mountains. I would recommend this place to anyone!

Back on track...

    After a brief hiatus due to our inability to mooch off of our neighbors wireless internet, we decided to bite the bullet and purchase internet of our own. Surprisingly, AT&T is remarkably easy to set up, I was able to do it all on my own..before Justin even got home from work! (He's going to be stoked!)

    Anyway, we are back. We do not have any cute pictures of new born babies for you to "ooh and awe" over, but we have to inform you that we have had a birth of our own...a birth of a KITCHEN! :)

   After all, I did create this blog to document the journey of remodeling a house, however I lost my focus a long time ago. But today, I will regain it. After months and months of remodeling the living room, two bathrooms, three bedrooms, several closets, and (the most work of all) a kitchen, we are finished. Finished to the extent that all of the crown molding is up, baseboards are nailed, puttied, and painted and the carport flooring is now a solid gray color instead of the various chipping red, green, and blue paint spots.

   We do need to make one more visit to move a few things out and clean up. Do you know how exciting this is? This started back when Justin was single. However, when I met him he had only completely finished the first bathroom. Now, 2 years later we have tackled the rest of the jobs I listed earlier together...We've had a lot of time invested in this baby...and it is finished! *Sigh of relief*

Today, I will focus on the kitchen!

   I am saddened by the fact that we do not have pictures of how awesomely awful the house looked before the remodel, but I do have a few that give hints. If you look closely to the picture above you will notice a "vintage" feel. 

            1. The green and white plastic marble countertop bar.

            2. The green stained trim around the window.

            3. The gloomy fake walnut cabinets.

Things you can't see from the picture:

           1. The hideous shade of yellow paint that adorned the walls before we painted it blue.

           2. The green and yellow speckled linoleum.

           3. The colony created by moths in the space between the ceiling and the cabinets that prevented any bread, flour, cereal, cayenne pepper to be stored anywhere but the fridge.

          

       4. The picture above shows the previous draw and shelf liner. I've never been a fan of floral patterns anyway, and this yellow and orange pattern is not about to change that.

   One of my favorite features is the random width White Oak flooring Justin made! 

  To modernize the kitchen, we painted the cabinets white, replaced the countertops,

 made new cabinet doors,

and added a light above the newly installed (white) sink!

      After the remodeling is all said and done, I can say I have learned a valuable lesson. I can trust Justin's judgement with decorating and remodeling ideas. I will admit, throughout the journey I would say something like, "are you sure?" or "that won't look good!" But, he was always right! :)

     At this point we are getting a little sentimental and are not really sure what we are going to end up doing with the house. We've had some great times and have poured a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into it our first few months of marriage. Finishing everything up in the Fall has been wonderful. The last few times we visited we have been able to see the leaves change and do Fall-ish things! We've really enjoyed Clayton..and the view from our front porch!

      Next time we go to the house I'll take more pictures to share of the living room and bathrooms! To take a trip around memory lane check out our living room remodel!  :)

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Okay. So I am aware that the most wonderful time of the year generally refers to Christmas. However, I am going to have to disagree. Fall is full of fun, like, pumpkin carving, pumpkin pie, and watching football.

 It's also about the smells.

The decorations and candy!

 Did I mention the Pumpkin pie?

 Oh, I love Fall.

Hope y'all are enjoying it as much as we are! :)

It's Low Tide!

Who's afraid of the big bad elephant? :)

I'm not going to tell stories, I was just as skeptical about pulling out a win over Alabama as Lee Corso was, but at the end of the day, Carolina fans are the ones smiling over our biggest win in school history and the 1st time we've ever beaten a #1 ranked opponent.

As Justin and I headed down to Columbia from Augusta yesterday, it seemed as if we were passed by more Alabama fans than USC.  I guess seeing the opposing fans inspired several quotes by Justin that were similar to this one: "Now Casie, they are a #1 team, I don't want to see that same temper I saw after the Auburn game..."

After sitting in traffic for an hour and only traveling 6 miles, we finally made it to our tailgating spot! :) My long lost bridesmaid, Hillary, met us for a little while to talk about hopes, expectations, and how badly we were going to get beat. Well, to be honest, I was the pessimist and Hillary predicted the biggest upset of the season. We laughed at her prediction and moved on.

Oh...did I mention it was GAMEDAY in Columbia? Gameday! Oh my, it made my day to know that ESPN was covering this game on our turf!

It was a sold-out crowd at Williams Brice! We used my grandma's season tickets and sat in the lower deck around others who have had their tickets as long as my grandma (44 consecutive years)! When I sit in these seats I am used to being the only one standing, cheering, and otherwise being a football fan. It was a completely different experience last night. Old men were dancing, twirling rags, jumping. Oh it was a sight.

The enthusiasm stayed the entire game. The only time it was quiet was on the snap. Carolina seemed to just do everything right (except for the play made by Garcia when we gave Alabama a safety.)

Justin kept telling me not to take a picture of the scoreboard until it was 0:00. He mentioned after the game that at half time (when we were up 21-9) he thought, "Casie's really going to be upset now when Alabama makes a come back!" :) I guess he knows me!

 When the game ended a roar sounded throughout the stadium. The loudest I have ever heard it. Everyone around us (except for the lone Alabama fan three seats down) was laughing, cheering, dancing, excited.

This picture was taken at least 15 minutes after the game. It was apparent no one wanted to leave. There were a lot of happy people in Columbia and we just weren't ready to stop celebrating!  

Final Score: 35-21. Good day!

Stress-Reducing Hobby!

Just thought I'd share some images from an all too neglected hobby-- baking cupcakes!!

I made these for my students! I do believe I am the best teacher ever! :)

These were made for my Mom's and Brother's birthday! (Justin helped decorate them!) Sadly, before the cupcakes even made it out of the door for their trip to Georgetown, the cupcake holder's handle broke and all of the icing smeared! :(

Justin and I made these for my Father-in-law's birthday! :) We consider cupcake making to be bonding time, now!  These cupcakes were HUGE! Please note the picture below:

The cupcake on the left is a normal sized cupcake. This just shows how humongous the cupcake on the left is! :)

My favorite part:

Buttercream Icing:

Yield: 3 cups

1 cup solid white vegetable shortening

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 tablespoons water

1 lb. powdered sugar (approx. 4 cups)

1 tablespoon meringue powder

(I do not have meringue powder so I make meringue first with 1 egg white, 1/4 tsp of cream of tarter, 1/6 cup of sugar, and a very small pinch of salt and then follow the below directions. )

Cream shortening, flavoring, and water. Add dry ingredients and mix on medium speed until all ingredients have been thoroughly mixed together. Blend an additional minute or so, until creamy.

If you need to thin the icing, just add a little bit of water at a time until you reach the consistency you like. If you have any questions, just ask!

Surviving a Rivalry.

This post brought to you by guest author Justin Tyson (my husband) :)

The second college football game of the season. If you're a diehard Georgia Bulldog or Carolina Gamecock, you know that the game will be a hard-fought battle. Regardless of the outcome, by the end of the game, your nerves will be frazzled and handfulls of your hair will be scattered about the room. Imagine, then, that you are a diehard Georgia Bulldog who happens to be married to a Carolina Gamecock (or vice versa).

For the first two years of our relationship, we braved the dangers and attended the annual clash between the Palmetto State Poultry and the Classic City Canines in their respective stadiums. Both times, the 'Dawgs wound up atop the bloody heap, and both times, we considered ourselves to be quite fortunate to be on speaking terms by the end of the weekend.

Now that we are married, however, the stakes are higher. We're talking about wedding gifts here, people. Why risk settling for dual custody of a red KitchenAid mixer and a fabulous set of Calphalon Cutlery over a silly game? This year, Casie and I knew better than to risk our marriage at a stress-inducing stadium, and instead planned a weekend getaway where we could relax and watch the game in the comfort of our own hotel room. We needed a something a little different. Something luxurious. Something exotic. Something like....Atlanta?

That's right, Atlanta. For country folks like us, Atlanta is about as far removed from what we know as "The South" as Madagascar. Of course, we had other reasons for choosing such a seemingly pedestrian locale for our getaway. For one thing, the price of a night's stay at a four-star hotel in Atlanta is comparable to that of a two-star hotel in a more rural tourist destination, like Boone, NC or Berea, KY (I know, I checked). To find the best deal on a hotel, I always turn to my favorite travel site: Hotwire.com.

The downside to Hotwire is that you don’t know, specifically, what hotel you’ll be staying at until you’ve already put down the cash (or credit card digits, more specifically). Casie and I have been very lucky when using this website – we used it to book two nights in San Francisco on our honeymoon earlier this year – so once again, we threw caution into the wind and plopped down $170 for two nights in a four-star hotel based on little more than a vague map and a few rave reviews. What a surprise when we found out that our room was on the 52nd (out of 72) floors of the famous “Peachtree Plaza” – the tallest hotel in the Western Hemisphere!

When we checked in on Friday night, we opened the door to our room and were immediately greeted by a panorama of city lights. It was Atlanta like I’ve never seen it before. It was beautiful. It was exactly what we needed.

Unfortunately, our camera died after snapping these two photos so we were unable to document the rest of our weekend (and too cheap to buy new batteries).

The following day was spent as lazily as possible. A day of sleeping in, eating in bed, and watching college football was exactly what we needed. I, of course, could have done without a 17-6 loss to team coached by Steve Spurrier, but in this relaxed environment, I was able to look at Casie without an heated pool of misplaced rage dripping from my ears within a couple of hours. It didn't hurt that immediately after the game she went down to the lobby and came back with a pack of Reeses, my favorite snack!

On Sunday, we decided to act like proper tourists and visit Zoo Atlanta. There are many attractions in Atlanta, of course, but what really set Zoo Atlanta apart is their ‘college student discount’. Nevermind the fact that neither of us are college students. We both have our old college IDs, which, as it turns out, are just as good. I won’t bore you with the details of our visit, except to confirm that yes, it would, indeed, be awesome to be a panda at a zoo. Who wouldn’t love to spend every day garnering fascinated attention by merely reclining in a hammock and munching on a never-ending supply of bamboo? Mmmm…bamboo.

Monday, unfortunately, brought us back to the real world, but I think Casie and I would both agree that next year’s UGA/USC game should involve a similar escape from the ordinary.

Absolutely wonderful...no matter how you look at it.

What a beautiful life we live. I came to the realization this morning on my drive to work that sometimes I'm not as thankful as I should be. Sometimes I overlook all of the blessings in my life just because I am stressed at work, have lots of bills to pay, and just plain tired.

Although Justin and I have seen our share of struggles over the past three and a half months, we are extremely blessed and I do not want to overlook that.

As the day went on I was reminded of how good I have it and how many wonderful people I have in my life.

I arrived at school and as I was signing in in the work room another new teacher said "Mrs. Tyson! I brought you a treat today!" Oh, I love treats! She said "It's granny made!" Oh, I do love granny made goodies even more! As I made my way back to my classroom after visiting the 6th grade refridgerator, which is where she stashed my yummy banana pudding, I was grinning from ear to ear. It is always nice to know someone is thinking of you, even in the small things! Mrs. Coyle is so precious!

The day went smoothly and the kiddos were well-behaved for the most part, which always makes my job a little easier. During 8th period I had a visitor. One of the special education classes in our school made cookies today and one of the students brought me one! A COOKIE with icing! I was so delighted.

Unfortunately I had to stay after school for car duty and to catch up on some paperwork. My phone died at some point and I couldn't call and tell Justin I was going to be late. Well, it didn't matter. When I got home my wonderful husband had dinner on the grill (yummy lemon peppered chicken, grilled squash, onions, and peppers) and yeast rolls in the oven. And to my surprise, in the middle of our newly refinished table were beautiful yellow Lillies. Today was awesome!

During dinner he informed me that I needed to pack my bags because we were taking a little trip this weekend...just to get away from the hustle and bustle of our busy schedule! Since we both work late most nights and are so busy with everything else on the weekend, we haven't had a lot time to ourselves recently. Gotta love my thoughtful husband!

What a wonderful life this is.

2 years and a lot of changes later....

Two years ago, Justin and I decided to make 17 nights of phone calls become a much anticipated face-to-face interaction. From our first date, or maybe even before, I guess we should have known that our relationship would be fun, but all too often bring unexpected occurrences. When we finally decided to meet, we were supposed to go to dinner at Applebee’s in Greenville, SC and then go bowling. It so happened that neither of the locations we had planned to visit were even in existence, much less open. So we came up with plan B, going to downtown Greenville, sitting by the waterfall and talking.

But let me back up… to explain why it took 17 nights of phone calls before Justin and I could actually have a first date.  A few days after we began our nightly ritual of Justin calling shortly after 9pm so we could capitalize on the ‘free nights and weekends’ minutes , Justin was caught in a Police trap and pulled over for crossing a train track when the red lights were flashing. Ordinarily this would have been just a minor traffic offense, but while he was pulled over the policeman discovered Justin was driving on a suspended license (unbeknownst to Justin). His license had been suspended due to an “unpaid” speeding ticket in a small town in Tennessee a year earlier. Justin had in fact mailed the money in but the record keeping in Tennessee must be worse than ours here in South Carolina (that’s for you, Trav) and it was never taken off of his record. For what felt like the longest time, we couldn’t meet due to a misunderstanding and the record keeping in Tennessee.

Nevertheless, back to our first date: A night of handholding and a good-bye kiss later, I was as giggly as a middle school girl- this comparison holds more weight to me now because I teach them and know just how excited they get when a boy looks their way. So yes, I was all smiles. But apparently I was not as sure as Justin was… for on his ride home he called his best friend, Mark. When asked how it went, Justin replied, “I’m gonna marry her.” Just what a wife wants to hear! No denying that the boy had good insight about that!

In the first few weekends of our relationship we had to tackle one of our biggest obstacles: being college football rivals. As everyone who knows me knows, I am a huge Gamecock fan! The same goes for Justin, however we couldn’t be lucky enough to be die hard for the same college football team, no. He’s a Georgia Bulldog all the way. Our extreme loyalties were shown to each other on our third date: UGA vs. USC at Williams-Brice Stadium. Justin was a very good UGA fan, but I guess he had no other choice considering we were sitting in the USC Student Section. We both knew that either way the game ended, one of us would have to show restraint from gloating and the other had to keep from pouting and not take it personally. This was a challenge for me because I always like to make excuses (like all Carolina fans) after a lose…I couldn’t this time because Justin had a come back for everything. Thankfully we got through it…and another season after that! One of the first changes I experienced in our relationship was for me to find UGA football tolerable.

Families were then met and quickly we began to take up as much of each other’s time as we could. Seeing each other every other Saturday soon became every Saturday and we were both discovering how hard life would be without each other.

Our first year of dating culminated with a road trip to Canada which ended in a proposal in Niagara Falls. Definitely spectacular.

It didn’t take long for us to “plan” out our future. We had to take into consideration that I had to work in SC upon graduation because of my scholarships. This didn’t seem like an issue since Clayton, GA is only 10 or so miles from the SC line. As time progressed and the Education budget cuts became more critical, we began to realize our original plan would have to be amended. Come to find out, Oconee County had taken some of the biggest budget cuts across the state of South Carolina. There were no jobs available, not even for Special Education teachers. So, with determination to be together, we started applying for jobs all across the state of South Carolina.

In April, Justin received a job offer from Bartlett Tree Experts in Augusta, but it wasn’t until the Tuesday before our wedding that I secured a job with Kennedy Middle School in Aiken. At this point there was no turning back. We were moving.

So, that Saturday, two became one and I became Mrs. Justin Tyson. We headed off on our honeymoon to Yosemite National Park for a week and tried not to think of all of the changes that lay ahead.

Upon our return, Justin was no longer single, living alone in a small town, working in a very good government job, or having to call me every night at 9pm. And for me, my last name was not the only thing that changed. I was no longer a college student living having to share a bathroom with two girls in Spartanburg, I would no longer be getting housing, school, and groceries paid for from my scholarships. No, I had to pay bills.

One of the bills we had to pay was the mortgage on Justin’s house. As soon as we realized we would be moving, we began working feverishly to fix it up to sell. We worked hard, but to our dismay, we failed to complete the job before moving.

Now that we are living in North Augusta the progress on the house has been slow. We have made several trips, but not as many as we would have liked. On one of the trips in late July, we packed as much stuff into Justin’s Dodge truck and headed home. We arrived late that night and agreed I would just unpack everything the next day. It turns out no unpacking would be necessary due to the fact that at 5:45am I looked out the window to see his truck engulfed in flames.

Another change: new car. After we spent three weeks waiting for insurance to make sure we did not commit arson and for them to send us our check, we were ready for a new car. We spent our time weighing our options and comparing the pro’s and con’s of getting another truck or getting a more fuel efficient vehicle. We compared prices online and when we received our check we had made up our mind and we were ready to make an offer. We were getting a Prius.

We now get 500 miles on a 10 gallon tank. I filled up with gas today and couldn’t help but smile as I got back in the car. This is the car Justin and I needed when we were living two hours apart.

The last few months of our lives have seen many changes, but we are happier than ever. We discuss daily how much better it is to have someone else to share in our happy times as well as our disasters. Through it all we have learned more about each other and our relationship has done nothing but grow.