We started picking ripe tomatos over Memorial Day weekend! Yeah!
Lots of green beans and small squash and cucumbers.
The fridge is loaded with fresh fruit (a little cheesecake from the farmer's market) and my favorite chocolate milk from Johnston farm.
Mmmm....chocolate milk.
On Sunday, Shey wanted to race at Dauset, so I got up early to ride down to watch him. Elizabeth was racing, too. The ride was fun. Shey had his race times mixed up and he got there 10 minutes before the start. He barely made it to the start line, but had a pretty good race even without a warm-up or bottles.
Elizabeth rode strong.
Shey was looking good.
After the race Elizabeth and I waited for Shey to finish his work with the Cycle Youth kids. Then we headed out to the Blind Pig for some bbq.
Mr. Gammel, the Latin teacher at Alcovy High School, is the main reason our boys attended public high school in Georgia. Mr. Gammel changed our public school experience to a positive one and more than made up for all the short-comings that our family would wade through at the local high school.
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Well, Mr. Gammel is leaving our school and he will be sorely missed.
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Charles Gammel set the bar high. His students strive to reach the goals set for them and he grew the Latin club to the level of state-wide notoriety in only 6 years. Impressive to say the least.
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The students met at Tavas Greek Pizza House to bid Mr. Gammel farewell and wish him luck in his future endeavors. Jansen only had two days to make a gift for Mr. Gammel, so he pulled out the blacksmith's forge and worked straight through in his spare time to have it finished before the dinner.
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The previous post shows him working on the blade of the cable knife with the furnace. Here he is forming the handle from a block of poplar.
The blade. This is a knife made from a piece of cable. He wanted to leave an area where the strands of cable could be seen to add character to the blade.
Working on the handle.
Finishing the handle with teak oil.
Jansen gave Mr. Gammel a brick as a gift for Christmas this year, so he placed the knife in a cinder block this time. A cinder block is the gift that just keeps on giving..... Needless to say, the gift was much appreciated and all memories of the near decapitation by Jansen's trebuchet were promptly forgotten. :>)
Jansen and Mr. Gammel
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Thanks is not enough to express how much we appreciate all that Mr. Gammel has done for our community. Best of luck to you and your family on your next adventure!
We had a great 200 mile ride this past weekend in north Georgia.
Shey, Jansen and I left Friday evening to drive to Mulberry Gap. Jansen would stay the weekend to ride the area and Shey and I would be shuttled to the SC border to start our ride back to MG, following a route that Dave Muse created.
We got off to a good start when the temps were cool. Andy came along to ride with Shey.
Everywhere I looked the scenery was amazing. Green with mountains framing every view.
I had not really looked at the course or cue sheets, so I didn't realize the first 155 miles would be FS roads and paved roads. No singletrack, but still very pretty. Here is a road that was taken over by a runaway creek.
There was much climbing on the dirt and gravel roads and many of the roads ran right along side a creek or river, so the sound of the water was really cool.
I found out if you put your m&ms in the same bag as your bagel, you end up with a rainbow bagel......yum!
It started raining at 3:15 and the storms continued to follow me for the next 3 1/2 hours. When I got to Moccasin State Park I was invited to hang out by a camp fire while I waited for the lightening to move on. I LOVE camp fires, so I accepted the invitation and hung out for about 15 minutes before hitting the road again.
There were lots of creek and river crossings.
Even at night.....
I got to Helen before midnight, which was my goal. I bought some snacks and ate at Wendy's. My bike wasn't heavy enough to trigger the speaker at the drive-through, but the guy behind me pulled up so I could order. Then when I rode around to pick up my food, all the employees had their faces in the small window to see the lady riding her bike through the drive-through window. I ate under a tree and thoroughly enjoyed my fries.
Then I headed off for a nice, cool, night ride on the pavement. I stood up and hit this section at a pretty decent clip, so that I could make it to the 11 mile climb Shey had told me about. After the paved section, I turned onto a gravel road and crossed a couple creeks. I saw what looked like a camping area next to the water at one point and someone started flashing their light at me. I looked down at them again and they were still flashing their light. I got a little scared and was ready to head back to the closest house, when I heard Shey call my name. He climbed up the embankment and asked me to camp with them. I had planned to ride on, and told him that I wanted to keep riding so I could hit that 11 mile climb asap. He sounded confused and told me I had already hit that climb and the next one was shorter.....oh, ooops. I realized that I didn't have to be anywhere at a certain time, other than what I had planned for myself, so I camped with him and tried to warm him up, since his feet were freezing.
Shey made us a awesome camp fire the next morning and Andy slept in late. We all got a pretty late start and that meant we wouldn't get to MG until late evening....but as long as we get there before dinner, all is good!
(Andy forages for bugs to add protein to his diet.)
I stopped at the Iron Bridge Cafe and had an amazing grilled cheese sandwich. As I was eating I decided to cut out the last section that I had ridden two weeks ago. I was 8 hours down on ride time from stopping overnight, and I had really wanted to get back early enough to hang out with Jansen. So, I looked at a area map and decided to take a road that looked like it might turn into Rock Creek road. It was a really cool, twisty , turny road and it did indeed turn into the dirt road I was looking for. From there I hit the highway, which was very hot, with no shade and seemed like a very bad idea about 7 miles down the road, but then I hit the town square at Ellijay and took the super fun rolling highway out to MG. I had lots of energy left and hammered down the dirt road to where the food was. 190 miles total for me and I figured Shey would finish up within 2 or 3 hours and we could all eat together.
Jansen following the dog path.
Dinner was yummy, as usual. Gini is an amazing cook! We had Pork Tenderloin, sweet potatoes, peas, artisan bread, salad and vanilla ice cream with strawberries. MMMM-mmmmm!
Wes was staying at MG and helping Gini and Diane, so he helped with dinner and breakfast. Jansen said he had a lot of fun riding the singeltrack while we were gone and he was very impressed with Gini's brisket for dinner on Saturday. It's all about food, ya know!
MG has a lot of rescued dogs. Here is Sasha with her piece of wood......
Everett needed to work this weekend, so he stayed home and took care of the animals. He is still riding his bike to and from work, so he is staying in really good shape. When we walked in the house, he had created a man-cave for himself in the living room. Cool!
We are so lucky to live so close to the mountains and have so many great places to ride!
Well, Mother's Day weekend was pretty much perfect this year.
On Saturday morning Shey left early for a long road ride and E, J and I headed in to town to check out the latest super soakers and nerf guns. Nothing spectacular, so we left empty handed and dropped Everett off at the shop to work while Jansen and I drove on to meet some guys at IHP.
I knew Jafer would be there, but we weren't sure who else he was riding with. It turned out to be Michael Cummings and Todd Daprano! Cool! Miss those guys and we haven't seen Jafer in a few weeks, either. The weather was amazing! It started to sprinkle a cool light rain when we started riding and everything was green and awesome.
Thomas (local C Town Bikes rider and super nice guy), Jafer, Mike, Todd and Jansen.
I had fun snapping pics and video in the woods. It was a fun ride!
Shey sent me yellow roses at work this week. Beautiful!
Shey called and was locked out of the house, so Jansen and I headed home to save him. Shey gave me a gift of four tickets to watch A Prairie Home Companion, which is a show I love on NPR and they were recording it live at the Fox Theater in Atl. We picked up Everett and drove in to the show.
It was super cool and the musical guests were impressive. Sam Bush and Lera Lynn. Sam can play the mandolin like nobody's business and Lera was amazing! Of course the boys and I were totally jazzed to get to see the sound effects guy, Fred Newman, live!
After the performance, we hit Farmburger for some late dinner. Yum!! Shey was very impressed with their mustard.....he told me several times.....
On Sunday, Jansen cleaned up the kitchen and made me some yummy homemade sticky rolls with cream cheese icing. (he makes an awesome breakfast!) It rained a nice cool rain all day and we hung around and visited and told funny stories about the crazy things we have done together. I realize that is a normal day for the four of us, but I never take it for granted and I know I am one lucky Mom.
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Thanks to all three of you guys for making, not just my weekend, but my life so exciting and meaningful.
Saturday I dropped Jansen off for a practice AP test and rode from his school. 3 hours of bushwacking, gravel roads, dirt roads and rolling paved roads out to Monticello and back. Beautiful day and beautiful scenery. I got some great pictures on my phone, but it's a borrowed phone from a friend and I have no idea how to get the pictures off, so use your imagination.
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Sunday, Shey and I headed out early to Ellijay. We met Jason M. at Mulberry Gap and Diane shuttled us over to somewhere on the other side of the Stanley Gap trail. We would ride Dave Muse's route through Stanley Gap to Mulberry Gap. 63 miles or so and the weather was perfect!
I got off track almost immediately but corrected myself before getting off track again in the Stanley Gap area. An extra loop gave me some extra miles, but the trail was pretty amazing. I was using a track on my gps and it's really cool to be able to take time by myself to ride these areas that people have connected together, but it also adds that element of following the route and getting stressed when I get off course. I LOVE to wander! (Off route two more times before I finished this section.)
Climbing the road to the big blue sky!
Lunch of champions.
My lunch companion.
Amazing scenery everywhere I looked. I came really close to a bobcat that was busy catching something on an embankment as I rolled by. Needless to say, I did not get a picture as we scared the bejeezus out of each other.
Similar views all along the way.
Pinhoti Terminus.
Clear water.
The day was so clear I could see for miles.
After getting lost so early on, I slowed down quite a bit and constantly stopped to check my gps and que sheet. By the time I hit Potato Patch, I had almost reached what our total ride mileage was to be, even without doing Bear Creek, P1 and P2, so I headed down fs68 and that still put me back at MG hours after Shey and Jason finished. It was a great route and lots of fun.
Shey and I stopped at KSU and picked up Everett on the way home, so we got to catch up with everything he has been up to since his finals are over.
So, you were wise enough to realize that the whole, “But you’re not my mom” line doesn’t work and appreciation
does need to be shown to the one who makes sure your young ones turn out
prepared to take on this crazy world, right?
Here is a list of my favorite outdoor
mom items, that make me smile.Cycling, hiking, running, paddling or just hanging outside is what we
love to do, so giving a gift that compliments that lifestyle will move you up
the ladder of loved ones who ‘got it right’!
Cycling
apparel:
Does she have her latest club or team
kit?If not, head over to her LBS
and see what they have in stock.Surprise
her with a brand spanking new kit!
Does she have lots of cool, stretchy capris and loves to wear her favorite
skirts over and over?Then these bloomers
are perfect for under her favorite everyday clothing.
Are baggies more her style?My two favorites are made by Jett and
Endura.
These Jett shorts look awesome with my Faster Mustache jersey.I wear them commuting everywhere, but the
chamois is so awesome that I have no hesitation when picking them for long rides
to far away trails.http://jettmtb.com/
Bikepacking:There are several guys
who are making quality bikepacking gear for your bike.I am absolutely in love with my Pika and Gas
Tank by Revelatehttp://www.revelatedesigns.com/Eric makes quality, bomb-proof products and
is an all-around nice guy.
GPS:Garmin etrex 20
Backpack:Osprey Talon 22. I take this EVERYWHERE. This is by far the most comfortable backpack I have used. It's gets incredibly nasty after so much use and tons of sweaty rides, but comes out looking new from the washing machine.
Running watch:Garmin makes some great products for runners.
Sandals: Chacos.Tough and I can
throw them in the dishwasher every now and them to clean them.(top rack and probably against manufacturers
advice, but completely works for busy mom!)
Socks:Smartwool anything.I love these socks and they have saved me
from hotspots on my weekly runs for years.
T-shirts:Endurance Conspiracy (love these super soft shirts and we don't see them around our races), Twin
Six (great support for the cycling community and super cool shirts; see them all around the local races)
Helmet: Specialized
Life Preserver: Lotus Designs
Tents: Without a doubt, Mountain HardwearWe have two “room with a view” tents and have
used the heck out of them over the years.They are sturdy and easy to set-up.They are heavy for backpacking, so we split the weight, but it is worth
it to me to know I can depend on them in any weather.
Sleeping Bags and Pads:I love REI
brand sleeping bags and pads.I traded
all our other big name brands bags and pads for the REI brand because they have
performed so well in all our travels.
Beanie: Turtle Fur(alpaca
beanies)
Clothing: Anything Horny Toad .........Samba material .....oooh, so soft skirts and shirts.
Prana pants and skirts: Monarch and Moab pants are my favorite and they are so comfortable for hiking, traveling and putting up with all the dirt and rocks I throw at them! http://www.prana.com/
