Alabama Highlights

Now that we've been home for 2 weeks, I'm finally getting around to posting pictures of our trip to Alabama.  How does time go by so fast??

Elora and Papa exploring the garden.

 We spent about a week out at Mommom's farm.  And, I do mean "farm".  A couple of years ago, she bought a small, 10 acre farm with a house and a barn on it.  It was trashed and over grown, but she and her children have cleaned it up and made it into a truly lovely place.  Each of her 3 sons now has an RV or trailer on the property, and Mommom herself now lives in the house. 

Some of Mommom's produce.

 She has a very large garden that supplies them with all sorts of lovely yummies for the table, and a pen full of chickens to keep them in fresh eggs.

Elora and Gigi feeding the chickens.

Tiffany (cousin) collecting fresh eggs.

Chicken fun fact #1:  the bald ones are the hens most favored by the roosters.  The bigger the bald spot, the more "favored" the hen.

A lot of what we ate while we were there came right from the farm.  Like this delicious country breakfast.  My mouth is watering, just looking at this...

The first part of the visit was oppressively hot.  The sun was brutal...we kept Elora slathered in sunscreen (Kaylie stayed in the shade) but she still acquired a gorgeous tan.  

Elora and Uncle Jamie.

Of this non-rocking horse, Elora said "it's not working!"

Kaylie and I pretty much kept to the shade.

 Late in the day on the Fourth, we got an intense thunderstorm with high winds and hail that we worried would rain out Mommom's party.  But it quit raining by 6, and cooled things off enough to make the evening very nice.  It rained a little bit every day after that, which kept things much more moderate.  The party on the Fourth was another great success, despite the rain.  There were a ton of people there, including some party crashers that no one knew.  Mommom had 3 of her sisters there, so we made sure to get a picture of them together.

Nelda, Nita, Fran & Paula

We got to catch up with a lot of family and friends that we rarely get to see, and we had a great time doing it.  I'll let the photos talk.

Late nights.  (Dawn, me, and Staria.)

Must-have-coffee mornings.

Uncle Stan and Kaylie.

Aunt Sheila.

Fun with Gigi.

Fun with Aunts Carrie and Dawn.

Relaxing in the hammock.

Brandon's personality perfectly captured in just 4 photos.

Aunt Dawn and Kaylie

Jeremy and Casey.

Aunt Tammy and Uncle Todd

Papa!

Tony (one of Bran's childhood friends) and Sam (Carrie's college roomate) will be getting married next summer.

I have no idea what inspired that face...

Thomas.

Krystal and Thomas.  They took most of he pictures that I didn't take.

Like this one.

Paul and Krystal.

Matt

4 generations: Mommom, Staria, Brandon, and the girls.

Another set of 4 generations: Mommom, Sheila, Krystal and Thomas.

Aunt Mel, Staria, Jimmy, Mommom and Carrie.

Elora passed out next to her "uncle" John after a hard day of playing.

 Brandon, John, Tony, Jeremy and Matt are "The Guys".   They've all been friends since high school, and though various members of the group have moved here, there and yonder, they've all stayed close.  This was the first time all 5 of them (6, if you count Brandon's brother James, which they do) have all been together in years.  I'd wanted to get a shot of all of them together, but it just didn't happen.  Maybe next time.

Wow, that's a lot of pictures.  But then again, I started with about 2500.