Happy Beyond : In the Pines ~ Our Mountain Adventure!

♫ In the pines, in the pines
Where the sun never shines
And we shiver when the cold wind blows
Who who hoo hoo hoo, who who hoo hoo hoo ♫
~ Bill Monroe Song ~

We spent a few days in the
North Georgia/North Carolina Mountains!
It rained EVERYDAY, but we made the most of it!

The neighbor told us as soon as we arrived that they had seen a BEAR on the property!!
We were scared of SHARKS in Daytona
and now we were on high alert for BEARS while in the mountains!
I guess it's true ~ Sharks live in the ocean and Bears live in the mountains!

Someone may or may not have been scared to go to sleep because of the BEARS!

The old Georgia State Flag was flying outside the cabin.
It's a tradition for us to put it up while we are staying at the cabin.
We are Southern & Proud!

First things first....where's the BBQ?

We ate BBQ at one of our favorite restaurants in North Georgia... "Oinkers!"
It was really good, but the BEST BBQ is still "Fresh Air BBQ!"
I've been in a Food Fight with my brother Jason and we've been texting photos back and forth with who's having the best meal. I may have won this battle, but the war rages on!

We checked out a few flea markets and cute shops! Van found a Wii game...he was pretty excited to find a great deal. They both made souvenir pennies and had fun looking at all the odd & unusual finds inside the mountain shops. We didn't buy a lot, but enjoyed "window" shopping!

We stopped at the Railroad Museum, but didn't pay to go inside.
We just looked around at the stuff outside!
Yep, we were cheap and tried not to spend too much money on our vacation.

My cell phone didn't work in the Mountains and the cabin didn't have a phone!
Cozy cabin family time, huh?
I really didn't like that we didn't have a phone at all ~ made me feel unsafe in a way.

We were able to watch some Redbox movies because the cabin had a DVD player and a TV. However, when we checked out the local Goodwill we found brand new board games for 50 cents each!! We played Beat the Parents, Would You Rather...?, and Sorry! I've linked them up ~ so if you click on the names you'll find them on Amazon. They cost a little more online! It was fun to find the games so cheap! The Goodwill up there in NC was AWESOME...Emily even found a new pair of Hello Kitty sandals for $1.00!

Family game time was really FUN!

The kids laughed so hard and really enjoyed playing all of the games,

but they liked the game "Would You Rather...?" the best.

Hailey wasn't too interested in the board games, but was on her phone a lot!
She must have Verizon instead of Sprint!

The kids LOVE gem mining, so we made a stop at Jackson Hole where they shared the ultimate bucket of dirt! They really enjoyed looking for treasure and found some good ones! The store told them the names of the stones they found and bagged them up for them.

We saw some pretty flowers too!
It was always raining on and off everyday so you can see rain drops on some of the flowers.
Aren't they pretty?

My Dad nicknamed me the "Tin Man" from the Wizard of Oz ~ ya know, cause I have no heart <3
I should have bought it, huh?

We always enjoy hiking to waterfalls and we went to our favorites once again!
We thought we could do this on July 4th and catch the fireworks in town at night.
I'm pretty sure everyone up there had the same idea because it was crowded.

Hailey and I tried to take a selfie.
I love how she stuck out her tongue!!

Here's a look at Dry Falls!
You can walk under the waterfall and keep "dry!"

The waterfall drops 80 feet!

We had to have lunch at my childhood Dairy Queen! It has the biggest tree in the front!

This is the DQ my grandfather took me to for a treat after I found the truck keys that were LOST in a field! We had to search on our hands and knees for those things!

The kids loved the big tree and the food too!

Fireworks! Fun, right?

Hailey did NOT like them!

Same as last year at Stone Mountain! ~ She SCREAMED!

We moved into the car and watched the fireworks after Hailey started screaming, but before they went off the kids enjoyed trying to catch lightning bugs! Trey and I had to show them how to catch them.

I finally found the lotion on Pinterest that everyone says keeps the mosquitoes away!
Did it work? Well, I'm not sure because I didn't see any mosquitoes while we were at the cabin.

The baby may not have liked fireworks, but she LOVED playing with a small flashlight!
One small flashlight may or may not have mysteriously ended up back home!
At least she didn't throw it in the trash can which is a new game she has started to play!

I have been to Cherokee, NC many times!
Growing up I learned all about how we have Cherokee roots in our family.
As you might notice in photos...I didn't get my skin color from that side of my family!
I went to Pow-Pows and learned a lot about history from my Dad.
Here's a picture of me & my brother Jason with Chief Henry.
Hey Jason, do you remember when you lost a game of Tic-Tac-Toe to a
CHICKEN in Cherokee ~ that was a funny day!

Here's a picture of my old moccasins and a beaded ponytail holder. It's funny how your memory can be fuzzy on some things but so clear on other things. It's strange what we can and can't remember!
I do remember wearing both of these items as a child.

Here are our kids making their own Cherokee memories...

Looks like Daddy is trying to feed the baby to the bear!

Hailey got a little drum (she made me buy it!). Could YOU say "no" to her?
You couldn't take the thing away from her without her screaming!
It was so cute watching her hum along to the music playing in the shops ~ her inner Indian was coming out!