What We've Been Up To; January to March

New Year's Eve was spent with some of the same friends we celebrated Christmas with. We had a great time and really enjoyed our church family. What else happened in January? Ethan got to go help out with an overnight backpacking trip with the scouts. They saw one of the biggest trees on record in the state of Alabama...

 ...lots of neat waterfalls...

 ...and even got to sleep on a ledge (under the shadow of one cliff, on the edge of another). The boys thought Ethan was the bravest man to walk the earth because he slept under the stars without even a tent wall to keep him from getting wet from the dripping icicles or to prevent him from rolling off the cliff in his sleep (he did roll up in a tarp though so don't worry, he stayed warm and dry).

 In February we got to take part in the (symbolic) ground breaking for the new LDS church building being built here in town. We are so excited (even though we won't be here to see it) that there will be a building here. To not drive half an hour to church will be such a great blessing. The people in this area have been waiting for decades for this to happen, and now the time has finally come!

As you can see, the construction company has already started work, but went ahead and did our thing anyway. 

 Erik was just loving being outside hanging out with his Daddy.

The first shovels of dirt being turned over by our Stake President, our Branch President, and a former Bishop of our congregation. Plus a few little helpers. :)

 There was lots of excitement in the air, people were clapping and really celebrating this special moment. Erik thought that they were all clapping for him and was eating it up!

 The leaders did their best to make sure that everyone there got a chance to turn over a shovel of dirt, even Erik and I got a chance.

 So far March has been my favorite month this year because of what we did for Spring Break. Technically we didn't travel as far or see as many new things as last year, but we had something better. Kett and Cameron came all the way from New Mexico to visit us for most of the week. The first day or two of the week was torture, knowing they were coming ever closer, but that they wouldn't be here for a few days. At one point they called and asked our advice on whether to just push onward and get to our place sooner, or stay the night somewhere and see the historical sites along the way. It just about killed me to tell them to take the extra time to see the stuff along the road. I knew they may never pass this way again, but I wanted them to get here SO badly! We spent a lot of their time here just enjoying each other's company. We played games, watched movies, and talked and talked. Don't worry though, we also took them to see the local sights. Starting with (of course!) Dirt Cheap!

 We also HAD to take Kett and Cam out to Waverly. It's such a neat place. We've been there three times now, but we still love it. I do have to apologize before we get to the pictures though. I am sorry to admit that we're some of those people now. You know, the ones who pay to get into some really cool place and then spend the whole time ignoring the amazing stuff around them while trying to get their kid to pet the cat. Yeah, that's us now. We've got to get Erik around animals more so that it's not the event of a life time each time a dog slobbers on his face.

Erik and Ethan walking through the gardens. 

Yeah, so here you go. Notice all the great pictures of the mansion in this post? Okay now compare that number with the number of animal pictures. See what I mean?

Really though, this is just too darn cute to pass up! This dog was so good to let Erik pet it and hug it. 

"Itchy", the three legged cat. Pretty sure he only let Erik touch him because it was too much work to leave his comfy sunbeam. 

 After touring the mansion and gardens, we went over to the Waverly Ferry and had our picnic lunch. And in Erik's case a bit of a splash in the Tenn-Tom.

"Geronimo!!!!!!"

 

 We also spent some time over in Columbus seeing the various sights there. Well, the grown-ups saw the sights, Erik was a bit distracted...

 Kett and I have never seen a Krsipy Kreme shop in action. We've always heard about how you can watch them make the donuts right there in the shop. It's this great magical journey from sticky dough to heavenly doughnuts which all ends when the donuts travel through a mythical glaze waterfall like something out of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Or so we've heard. Apparently the thing only runs a few times a day and we weren't willing to sit around and wait for an hour to see some donuts get made. Oh well, I guess I'll have to go back one day. :)

 In addition to driving around town to see all the beautiful historical homes that Columbus has to offer, we also stopped by the historic Friendship Cemetery. There were lots of neat looking, and really old, head stones and the whole place had a lot of character to it.

The thing about the cemetery that was most interesting to us was the section that had been used for Civil War soldiers. We stood there and looked at the rows of headstones and suddenly the stories we've been taught all our lives actually felt real. We were all in a pretty contemplative move already and then we stumbled onto an area filled entirely with unknown soldiers. To stand there and visualize a man for each one of those stones, and then to think of all their loved ones who never knew what happened to them was very eye opening and sobering. These were someones' sons who they never got to kiss good night again. These were husbands to wives who sat at home and waited for them, not knowing if they were widows or not. The markers just went on and on, and these are just a drop in the bucket compared to all the graves around the country of others just like them. 

 Anyways, I'm done being all serious and depressing now. We made sure to take the other Mowers to our favorite play ground where we all did lots of spinning...

see this link for a video of our spinning fun!

And of course we couldn't forget a trip down to Noxubee. We were all hoping to see some alligators, but it just wasn't in the cards. Poor Cameron was pretty disappointed. Erik was okay with it all, he was able to find lots of interesting rocks to play with and that was all he cared about. 

Kett even found time to do her trademark dressing up of her nephew. He loved it!

 It was pretty depressing to have Kett and Cam leave. Our house seemed so empty without them. 

The only other thing worth mentioning that happened during the last couple months is that Ethan and I tackled a DIY project and made our own "floating" headboard, thanks to pinterest. It turned out to be a bit more costly than we anticipated, but we like the way it looks. We had some problems getting it up on the wall, turns out our wall is not flat, but slightly warped. This makes getting the boards to stay put a bit tricky, resulting in two or three nights where we've woken up to the clatter of 1x8's sliding down the wall by our heads. A little unsettling, but so far not dangerous. Honestly, I'm not sure if we love the result, but after the time, effort, and money it's going to stick around until we just can't stand the suspense of falling boards anymore.