Tennessee thoughts (and pictures too!)

We are home. I have avoided sitting down to type for many days. My brain is too full, my body too tired, the task of chronicling our many adventures daunting. Two weeks ago, we were beginning our last week in Knoxville, savoring our time, preparing to re-enter our normal life, saying goodbye to new friends who quickly became beloved. As the rain poured down outside our townhouse, and the wind through the trees sounded more like an ocean, I decided it was time to journal. My editing bandwidth felt limited, hence the delayed posting, but here were my thoughts from Tennessee:

Wild Ponies at Grayson Highlands State Park...amazing. Best hike ever.

1. Time goes so fast. One month seems limitless, we pack in so much and are still left with unchecked items. Daily life takes much of our time no matter how simply we live.
2. We have too much stuff and we don't need much stuff. I brought less this time than I did two years ago and it was still too much. I'm overall very happy with my packing, but it goes back to how fast time goes. I'm overly optimistic about what kind of projects I can get done. My life is simpler here, yet at the same time, it's not home and that in itself adds time and stress to my daily living.
3. When you adventure as a family, you can't expect a pristine experience. I was talking to my husband last night and the best word I could think of to describe our time was “messy.” Not a bad “messy” but the kind of messy like you've thrown a kaleidoscope of paint colors at random on a big canvas. The kind of messy that is exhilarating and joyful and fun, and yet you get paint in your eyes and cannot rid the flecks from your hair and eyebrows.
4. This trip was beautiful, so very beautiful.

Beauty is not about perfect, sinless moments. It is unrealistic and inauthentic to place such expectations on myself or my family. We are all sinners journeying together. We hope to glorify and honor God in the messiness...accepting and giving grace, accepting and giving forgiveness, listening to each other with a genuine heart to hear and understand each other's hearts.

I often think of what really defines beauty. It certainly doesn't feel beautiful when frustration boils over to sharp and snappish words aimed toward your three goofy and slightly whiny kids, trying to re-learn how to be in each other's space in the backseat of our rental car.

But in those same moments, interspersed with the irritation and sharp words, we find laughter and awe and delight.

Those same goofy kids decide to play “crack the egg” as we drive a road so “swavy” (Belle's word) that my husband was getting car sick even while driving. 

We jam to country songs, oldies (which sadly are songs that my husband and I grew up on), and other random findings on the radio. The kids even roll their eyes but they also dance with us.

We pass through miles upon miles of Christmas tree farms, windows rolled down to smell the evergreen scented air. Not to be left out, our fluffy pup of a dog sticks her head out of the car window, plastering her Muppet fur against her head and sending us into cascades of laughter. 

We drive four hours just to cross a couple of state borders, eat a Skeeter-dog, and visit three reservoirs, scaling the last one in the pitch black darkness. (I personally thought we may be arrested, but I digress.) We attempt to capture and inhale the splendor of West Virginia's rolling mountains, the trees creating a landscape canopy studded with autumn vibrancy like we've never seen before.

We discover wild ponies and wild turkeys, trudge through rainy, foggy, wind-swept highlands, and walk under Smoky mountain waterfalls. (We do not however get stuck in Cades Cove Loop again. Don't get me started on that fiasco...lesson learned.)

We develop definite opinions on where to get the best burgers (Cookout or Steak n' Shake) and shakes (Cookout hands down!).

Grotto Falls, Roaring Fork Motor Trail, Great Smoky Mountains

the aftermath of the hike...

We read books together on mountain tops, in parks and forest arboretums, along the river banks, and on South Carolina beaches. We listen to The Chronicles of Narnia, Reader's Theatre versions, over hundreds of driving miles (and I try not to fall asleep...when I drive, I must have music). I believe good literature is food for the heart and soul. And stories read together are so very valuable.

So many adventures have been messy, tainted by our weaknesses and failings and yet as we mesh through the swamp of yuck, we arrive in new places, richer places, where we laugh together, eat together, talk together, just be together. It's just life. A beautiful life, messy and complicated, but oh so worth it.

Hello, Eastern Tennessee!

We have been a bit busy as of late. We are spending one month in Tennessee for my husband's work, illustrating probably the number one reason I love homeschooling--adventure flexibility. That being said, it takes a whole lotta work to pack five people for a month with whatever can squeeze into our car. And I do mean squeeze. Clown cars have nothing on us. Needless to say, I was very tired before we left and I'm still tired now. I've tried to channel my inner Dory with the lines, "Just keep moving! Just keep moving!"

On top of my endless to-do lists, before leaving we encountered a bit of a mouse problem. We did not find said mouse before we left and are hoping we don't return to an odoriferous fragrance or a scene from Ratatouille. Shudder. We have a friend is generously checking on our house guest (hopefully just one)...very thankful for this! I figure God has a sense of humor and He was just sure I needed that extra push to get my basement clean-ish before we left as I know I would have put it off otherwise.

Anyway, we are all very excited to be in Tennessee a second time and generally consider it our family sabbatical. We are thankful that my husband's work allows us to do this and that because of homeschooling we have the flexibility to take this trip. For one month we step out of our normal life. We step away from house and home projects and upkeep. We step away from our weekly commitments and life pressure. We all lay aside our individual commitments and we go adventure as a family. Last time, it wasn't all perfect or ease or stress free, but so very very worth it.

Loved this sign at Zaxby's...where can I get one?

Just to clarify, I really love my life. I love our city, our community, our home, our neighbors...we are blessed. But being able to have a more simple existence for one month gives us an opportunity to take a bird's eye view on our life, a slower pace gifts us unhurried family moments. We are going to something, not running away. My husband still works during the week. I still have school to do. But the weekends are ours, the evenings are ours, and during the weekdays, Knoxville and the Great Smokies are our playground.

hiking at the University of Tennessee Arboretum

Belle found this little critter, I don't even know how..."eagle eyes" she says. It looks like a leaf from the top.

lablab bug

Apart from the somewhat horrifically long drive out here, we are settled in and getting situated. We're tired still. We're not in a groove and we're all a little grouchy at times. In spite of our grouchy moments, the weather is gorgeous, the leaves are frosted in magnificent autumn colors and are reaching their peak. Fall lasts longer here. We have already eaten too much Southern fare...yummy fried and are trying to eat better. We have picnicked on the banks of the Tennessee River at the Concord Park Cove (our favorite!), we have wandered the trails of the University of Tennessee Arboretum (another favorite), discovered the smallest green frog I've ever seen, and identified a new bug. In case you were wondering the lablab bug is an Asian transplant which really loves Kudzu vines (which are everywhere). They also like to hitchhike into our townhouse. Yesterday, we day-tripped through Virginia and West Virginia and visited three reservoirs (we didn't feel like we had driven enough recently...).

kudzu vines by our home...down the road they have attached themselves to power lines...taking over the world!

Cece's birthday was several days ago and she asked to stay around here and rest and do simple things. She sketched fashion creations, we played pool, we explored our complex...simple. She also wanted to swim in the Tennessee River like she did two years ago. No, it is not warm, but that doesn't stop my Guatemalan princess. We had a lovely beautiful evening celebrating.

I always pick thematic literature and here is our read-aloud list to date:

1. The Mandie Collection by Lois Gladys Leppard--love these books...we read three last time we were here and we will continue with them! (Christian/historical/mystery/North Carolina)

we play games and read our books in coffee shops...

2. Turn Homeward, Hannalee by Patricia Beatty (Historical/Civil War/Georgia)

3. Be Ever Hopeful, Hannalee by Patricia Beatty (sequel)

4. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain 

This is what I hope to do better while we here:

1. Get up earlier. I'm not what you would call a morning person especially if I have to wake up in darkness. Knoxville sits on the western edge of the eastern time zone. The sun rises at 8 a.m. and where I live that is never a reality. Surely I can get up at 7 and get an hour to read and write to start my day. I had a hard time with this last time and it seemed to get later and later. Carpe Diem!

2. Eat better. I found it challenging to not be in my normal kitchen without my normal grocery stores. Cooking began to feel quite difficult quite fast. Apart from the plethora or apples and muscadine grapes we bought from the stand near our home, we became a tad bit addicted to fast food. I was asked if I ate good food in Tennessee and what my favorite treats were. Hmmm. Grits? Fried pickles? Toe jam? Crushers (panini-pressed croissant breakfast sandwiches) and cinnamon rolls from our local coffee shop? Yes, most definitely the cinnamon rolls, way too many cinnamon rolls. I have a better handle on this and we WILL eat better! Our favorite apple stand is no longer there, so we'll keep searching.

3. Most importantly, I want to see God's sovereignty in his placement of our family into Eastern Tennessee, even though it is only for one month. I expected to see His hand in our family time two years ago during our first Tennessee stint, I didn't expect fruit outside of that and I was so very wrong.

In one month we made a sweet connection with an elderly woman in our apartment complex. To be honest, I was feeling self-conscious of my diverse children and wasn't sure how the South would treat us as a family. I would describe Ms. JoeAnn as a regal African-American woman. Our first day in Knoxville I nearly walked around her, but I didn't and I'm so thankful for the sweet conversations and relationship we had. We took her flowers the week we left and she cried. We wrote letters for a year and then lost touch. She moved or she passed on, but when we left, her parting words were, "I'll never forget you and I'll pray for you as long as I live."

There were others, so many sweet stories. I saw so clearly that every place we step we can impact the world for Christ. It starts with a heart to see every moment as a moment in God's world. It starts with a smile, a hello, a kind word, loving my kids, loving my husband, showing courtesy, taking time to listen...so many little insignificant nothings that create beautiful tapestries. This does not mean that we were proclaiming the name of Jesus from the rooftops, we were just living our life and God blessed it.

We have more relationships here now and we plan to take advantage of this time. The kids spent a joyful afternoon with our neighbors who live behind us. D has been writing to a friend he met here for the last two years and today we spent a sweet and lovely day with his family. Old-fashioned letters sparked a friendship and we all benefited from that effort today. We're not here just for ourselves. We tell ourselves and we tell our kids--every moment matters.

You'll be hearing more from us as we savor Eastern Tennessee! We have hoped and prayed that we would have second opportunity to do this. And we are thankful.