Last week of June- Rock Cliff

Gosh that hurts to type LAST WEEK OF JUNE. JUNE is my favorite month (I dont let no one mess up MY JUNE) and I so dread seeing it go. I know this is a long post ....but I just can't help it..... we been having such a fun time.





Lets see if I can remember what I have done for the past week. Now I know the advantage to everyday post. On Sunday Pat and I and the kids planned to go tubing and we had promised Chloe we would not go without her. Blake had spotted a high cliff on Saturday that he REALLY wanted to jump off of to the water, so we decided we would go check it out. I have seen many folks there before usually teen agers but had never scoped it out. This is at Stoney Point and close to where Rhonda built her last house. We called Chloe to get her headed this way and our plan was to leave at 11:00.



We checked out the depth of the water and determined it was over 70 feet most places. Then we looked for a place to tie the boat so there is no damage to pontoons. Its a real windy afternoon and Pat had to stay with pontoon to make sure it did not get too close to rocks.

















Kyle is scoping out the rock cliff from below.












Blake taking a closer look from the top of the rock cliff. He says it looks higher from here and was kinda skeered......but he sure wanted to jump.
















Chloe and Brooke read the rock wall and we make our plans to ummm mark our spot, lol.















Brooke and Chloe take a jump from the lower ledge. The water was GREAT.









Kyle and Chloe join Blake and they all do jump I took movie clips of the jumps and the only photo of the jump I have is the one of Chloe that I had errored on cause I forgot to set the camera back to movie, lol. Papaw would not let Brooke jump, she really wanted to, but he said no and I did not argue with him, lol.

































They all jumped several times and was quiet pleased with themselves.






























They have talked of this all week and can't wait til Chris, Tyler and Tanner come back. They want to get Ali and Hannah and Josh out here too.

On Monday, I went to Vicksburg and worked on Tuesday, then got Tanner and Tyler and we headed back to the lake. We had a nice drive but I was tired when we got here about 10 pm. I hit the door with bed in mind and had wild excited kids, a brother that needed me to call him with a putr problem and before I could make that call Sister Susan called needing me to watch her girls Wednesday morning.

I got up early Wednesday to make a walmart run before kids woke or Ali and Chloe got there at 9:00. I bought our ummm spray paint for the rock cliff marking. Papaw Pat is working so we have to wait til he can be around to go to the rock cliff and Chloe and Ali had to go for today but will be back tomorrow at 3:00 pm raring to go.

We did get a trip to the rock cliff. I carried my movie camera this time but only one 30 min dvd. Kyle and Blake hit the trail for the top, as another boat of people approach watching and scoping it out. Papaw still will not let Brooke and won't let Tanner either. Tyler has told us he is scared of heights and no one is pressuring him to go up. In fact he has informed us he came prepared to not jump cause he has on shorts and no swim suit. For some reason the cliff looked higher to Blake and Kyle and I did not think either of them was gonna jump. Of course Tanner had lots to say from below since Papaw would not let him,lol.

Tanner did talk Papaw into letting him go to the top and he wasted no time getting there.

Before the evening is over Brooke does climb to the top to see just how high it is.

Out of nowhere Tyler jumps up and heads to the top and takes Blake's life jacket and he jumps.(alpha male took over I guess) Blake then has no problem jumping once Tyler carries him a life jacket. Kyle wants to jump so bad but he just can't... why today ... no clue ... he has done this on Sunday.... Well Tanner wants to jump and he does.....Then Brooke heads up .. Poor Kyle he is there and wants to.... but he just can't, lol and he knows he will have to listen to these guys all night and now if Brooke jumps (a girl) he will really never fogive himself. I will say Kyle is not a WIMP! He has done this, lol but he just CAN'T today. He tries to make himself ... he gets ready and bless his heart (which is pounding rapidly) he just CAN'T. I did not get good pics or clips because I was taking movie lol but we wasted most of the battery and 30 min dvd trying to get up the courage to jump.

We made our trip today(Thursday) and it was quiet exciting...Just before we left UPS came with the new tubes I had ordered. We aired them and carried one which worked out good. We were really loaded had Susan, Chloe, Ali, and Josh to add the 7 of us.

We had some unexpected visitors soon after we got there and could not figure out what the deal was until later in the cliff jumping.(2 different boats of folks(teenagers) come up like they owned the place climbing up to jump. We just went on about our business. Kyle and Ali and Brooke had started the ummm grafiti work while the others were climbing to the top. Kyle had done his name over a name that was STEPHEN KING. He also made A COMMENT THAT HE HATED STEPHEN KING ETC. Then one of the guys climbed down the cliff did not jump and after a bit one of the girls asked where is Stephen? The other girl said "He left he was pissed they wrote on his name."....OOOPS we had no clue... But I did feel better about it when one of the girls says"Where is Cory?" and I knew that the name CORY had been written over the name MICHAEL since we were there on Sunday. Now I am not sure if Michael was in the 2nd boat or not... the two boats did not appear to be together or even hang out talking to each other. Well we just continued to jump and write names. Then STEPHEN seemed to be running his boat around the area like he was showing us he was mad or maybe showing out for the girls with him, either way we just minded our business. A man that lives in a house across the lake was yelling at the boy and telling him that there is a $5000.00 fine for that and he was gonna call the water patrol. Now Susan is the one heard that and she was not sure if it was for the grafiti or the boy going fast in a no wake area. Either way we gathered our kids and stuff including the spray paint cans and headed home. The man was sitting on his dock watching and maybe even had gotten our boat numbers or filmed us, lol. We are certain that before dark Kyles name BIG RIG was destroyed. We will have to make a trip tomorrow to see ....maybe just me by jetski, lol. I think we better just chill on the spot a few days and maybe go again when Whitney and Hannah can be with us. We really meant no harm and had I noticed I would have not let Kyle write over anyones name. I think everyone that wanted to got to jump, except for Brooke and she wanted too badly but just could not make herself... I think if we had not had to leave so quickly she would have....Maybe next time.

Can you believe Tyler asked me to cut his hair in back before we headed for the cliff.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!!!!!!!

HAPPY 53RD BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!!!!! This has been a GREAT Day! I slept in and then I got Birthday calls from Randy, Susan, Mom, Chris, Helen and Tracy. I go online cards from BJ and an old friend.





We all loaded for a pontoon ride and tubing. I decided this is the day that I will ride the tube. The kids thought this was neat, lol. The photographer needs a few lessons... but hey the camera did not break. It is rare someone gets my picture.





































AND can you believe what else he took a picture of.

Nope I took these.

Well the tube was fun but DANG that life jacket is a pain. Seems my neck stayed in a bind.

And you will never guess what they took a picture of!!!!

ARE YOU READY?

OK HERE GOES!!

CAN YOU GUESS ?????

YES, I CAN DO IT, TOO!!!!!

We all cleaned up and met Mom and Dad at RYANS to eat and then just had a movie watching night.

The rest of the week thru Friday June 22nd

We have had a good week, seems everytime I turn around we are going shopping for something. On Wednesday the kids talked me into taking them to the mall. We walked around and looked at stuff and each went off on our own for about an hour. We really did not buy anything but 1 book for Brooke. We did get a treat at Sonic which was Sonic Blast of choice. Then we took a ride by Mamaw Gins and visited with her and Hannah for a bit. We also carried Blake to Blooming Deals(a consignment shop) at Curry. He has been asking to go there for days... I had never been there either...was not quiet what I thought.. basically it was an over priced thrift store, lol. Brooke was not impressed with Blooming Deals or the Thrift Store on Monday.

On Thursday I was determined to get some chores done....seems I wake kids up if I do anything early and you all know my motto...If it don't get done before noon it don't get done. So I did work on the storage shed for a bit and at least get the refrigerator moved out of the front of the window and get some stuff out to get rid of. I will say sharing a storage building with a KEESEE is a challenge. Well, we have his side and my side... I am contemplating hanging a curtain between them, lol. Can you tell which one is mine and which one is his?

In the afternoon we went shopping... hitting 3 different grocery stores before walmart...stocking up on sale items. Blake is such a big help to me on the groceries that I do not even complain when he slips in little things like headphones... I tell ya the boy earns them. WE also made a trip to Blockbuster. We spent the rest of the evening at home doing some rearranging of TV's and then Marcia came with Emily and we went for a lil swim.

Friday, I was determined to not go shopping and spent the morning cleaning and doing laundry, I prepared Taco Dip and needed Shreaded cheese so I did go to Gateway for cheese but dang they had a GREAT sale on Powerade and Kyle had been asking for uncarbonated drinks...so I stocked up. All the kids were thrilled with me getting powerade.

Blake, Brooke and I went for a swim and just relaxed until Pat and Kyle got home. Brooke had been wanting shrimp .. so this was the night we had been planning on steamed shrimp. Kyle drove me to Foodworld and we got shrimp. After we ate shrimp we went on a late evening pontoon ride and tubing. Was really nice out and others thought so too.

Monday and Tuesday June 18th and 19th

I think we are all just tired or maybe water logged. I know I have been more tired than usual... I am thinking its just the heat and extra cooking and cleaning.
We really have not done anything the last 2 days spectacular, so I will just hit the highlights and I am sorry to say there are no pictures.
Monday started early, must have been 4:00 a.m for Pat and Kyle because when I got up at 4:30 they were almost finished packing lunches and waiting for Randy to pick them up. I cleaned on the kitchen a bit, unloading the dishwashers and just neating up while visiting with them. I went back to bed about 5:30 so I could feel like I had slept in, lol. Around 11:00 Blake, Brooke and I went to run some errands which included getting a new water filter for the refrigerator, going to the THRIFT store to find work jeans for Kyle, Walmart for various grocery items and Blockbuster for movies. Rumor had it that Tuesday would be 100% rain and we wanted to make sure we were prepared. When we got home we found Kyle and Pat were back. Marcia came at 5:00 with the kids to swim...this is a daily thing during Jacobs weight lifting exercise time. All the kids were quietest I have ever seen...I am not sure if they were tired or if Brody or Tanner being gone had them bored, lol. We had planned to watch a movie, so when company left we declared fend for self on supper and all settled in for movie time. Pat was in bed before 8:30 and I was not too far behind.

Tuesday we had a little rain and had hoped for a major flood, lol but NOPE only .25 inch so they said and I doubt we got that.It was a lazy day though and we just watched movies and chilled. Brooke did bake a cake, seems she thinks we need to bake everyday. We had afternoon visit from Mom and Hannah when they came to get Hannahs computer and then later a visit from Marcia and kids. Pat and Kyle were home early today and Kyle grilled hamburgers for us. DANG that could have been a picture, lol. Pat and the kids went tubing and on the jetski after Marcia left... I passed on this since I was in my pj's and just enjoyed some alone time... lol something I have not had much of. I have some cleaning I wanted to get done this week and so far I have just not got to it and no real excuse other than just been tired. Hopefully tomorrow will be the day to complete some chores. Tonight we will watch another movie before I crash. I hope to rearrange my off time to not go to Mississippi to work on Thursday and wait and go next week when Tanner and Tyler can come back with me. Brooke sure wants Tanner back out here.
So until my next post stay cool.

Fathers Day!!!!!

Since I am gonna be here most of the week I decided I would post every day.

Today is Fathers Day and I had all the fathers in the family over for a fresh veggie meal and Aunt Helen came, too. I think everyone enjoyed it. I cooked FRESH purple hull peas, new potatoes, fried squash, fried okra, fresh tomatoes, cucumber, green onion, banana pepper and canteloupe. Oh I also fixed a pork loin and Boston butt. We also had cornbread, banana pudding, peach cobbler, devils food cake, ice cream..... Sorry Tracy... but we did miss you being here. Brandon and Dustin we missed you as well......It was a very hot day here and I must say the cooking had the house heated up. Everyone seemed tired, I guess the heat and the busy weekend had the kids all tired out as well. Some of the fathers did get a nap. Some of us did got for a nice swim to cool off. Late in the evening Pat and I and Chris and his kids took the Pontoon out for tubing with the kids. We also made a stop at the island which was a lil different and nice change. We should do that again some time. Pictures are worth a thousand words.


Today we made a trip to the ISLAND and seems this may become a normal stop for us....it is just a huge rock and has sand on one end and in the middle...is shallow areas all around that are solid rock. This is the island close tomy friends lot and close to Little Dismal.

2nd week of June

I had a pleasant trip on Sunday back to Mississippi. I talked to myself along the way to get me prepared for a week of training. Monday was the normal performance exam of my crew and we passed which is normal for us. It is amazing how an offshift crew can perform as a team with no practice or working together from training cycle to training cycle.... I guess that says training does keep us tuned up, lol. Blake returned to the house from his Moms on Monday evening and he helped me get some things put away from his Dad's storage and helped me get some thing out for him and his Dad to take with them to Bama on Tuesday morning. Tuesday I got off a lil early so I headed to get my van serviced so that it would be ready for the travels ahead including the trip to Oklahoma in July to the Keesee reunion. Wednesday was a test after a 4 hour class that went well and then Thursday was another test with a bonus of playing with the new firetruck that had just been brought onsite. Training was successful and my weekactually provided me a rest before my next vacation days started, lol.

I arrived at the lake at about 8:30 p.m. on Thursday. Seems everyone was settled in for the movie time and maybe I had not even been missed.... Brooke and Blake presented me with a grocery list they had made. I spent Friday morning trying to catch up on some chores at the lake and waiting for the bedroom furniture that I had ordered to be delivered. My bedroom is a wreck and we have not gotten things put in drawers butI will have a couple days next week to do that while Pat is working. By the time the furniture was here and I got stuff relocated and got ready to hit the lake it started thundering and trying to storm so we waited and never got rain ... and never got a swim either. Susan and Chloe came to visit and we managed to get Chloe to stay and make brownies for us. Actually Brooke and Chloe made brownies and a cake too. The kids all played UNO which really brought back some memories.

I took a couple pictures of the bedroom furniture even though I do not have things straightened up yet.

Saturday was a busy day for me...it seemed I was in the kitchen all day, lol. It started with making pancakes for breakfast. I browned some cube steak and put it in the crockpot to simmer with gravy while we played all day and I would fix rice and biscuits to go with it after we finish playing on the lake for the day. I was escorted to the fresh produce store.. by Kyle, where I bought fresh purple hull peas, okra, squash, new potatoes, tomatoes, canteloupe, cucumber, banana pepper and green plums. This was all for the Sunday Fathers Day dinner for all the Fathers around here tomorrow. Late in the afternoon Mom and Dad came to visit with Hannah and Josh. Tom and Tootse also came with Nick and Dalton.

The kids all swam and played while the adults visited on the deck.

The kids all visited on the side porch after supper. We really had a nice day.

These flowers are in the circle drive and have bloomed out even with the drought.

Saturday, June 9th

Saturday was fun filled day . I catered to what Kyle wanted to do mostly, since he had been working mostly and had not been able to play much. First of all, we went to get the hair cut that he had been begging for all week. Then we went to wal mart to get stocked up on paper products and get medication for Kyle's poison ivy. Our next stop was at BLOCKBUSTER to get a few movies to watch at night. Then our last stop was JACK'S, Kyle had been wanting a Jack's hamburger since we do not have a Jack's in Mississippi. Brooke and I decided to do our shopping next week when we did not have any guys with us. We watched a LARRY THE CABLE GUY dvd while we ate our lunch then we set out for the outdoors.

Kyle took off on the jet ski for a bit while Brooke and I swam and sunned. Pat fixed the green converstion float and anchored it in the lake.

Late afternoon Randy and Glenda joined us and we went for a pontoon ride.

I had not been out on the lake on the weekends and forgot just how much traffic there could be lol and I also had forgot about the Saturday evening Bassboat race, lol. That is something everyone should experience at least once. Being in the middle of the lake and look up and about 30 bassboats coming at ya all racing to the one spot on the lake that has a bass......has to be just one for them to all be in such a hurry to see who can get there 1st. We had a very pleasant ride and visit but the men still talked work a little.

Brooke was our pontoon driver. Pat really enjoys having all these cheoffers.

I head home tomorrow and leave Brooke in charge of these guys. Chris and Blake will return on Tuesday and I should be back on Thursday night. I will be back on a weekly posting for a couple weeks then I may return to a daily post when I am on vacation again for 2 weeks.