handsful

Wanted to quickly add the pics from our “lost” vacation day…when Randy took the bigs to go white water rafting and I took the little to visit Patricia.  She has 6 children, 3 nearly grown men and 3 lovely ladies from China. 

Lainey, Willow, Piper, and Sage.  I tried, but this is the best shot of all 4 I could get!  Patricia did much better and posted pictures on her site http://www.littlecabininthewoods.typepad.com/.  She takes GORGEOUS pictures, I’d love to spend gobs of time learning from her.  Check out her post “Summertime” to see more from our day. 

Here is her youngest gal, Willow.  Even though Lainey and Willow are almost the same age, Lainey outweighs her by 10lbs!  She’s an adorable little thing!  Patricia and I had never met before, but we knew each other through our adoption agency’s Waiting Child program.  We were waiting for our referrals at the same time (her 3rd, my 1st adoption) and actually received our match calls on the same day!  Once we decided on Banner Elk/Boone for our vacation, I quickly emailed Patricia to plan our visit.  She was so gracious to let us hang out and play in her sweet log cabin.  Patricia is a very laid-back woman who loves life for the simple things…as a woman who struggles with “letting my hair down”, I can learn much from her. 

One of Lainey’s favorite things at Patricia’s house was her family of bunnies…a mama, dada, and 2 babies.  So soft!  They were hopping in and out of our laps and Lainey took it upon herself to re-arrange the bunnies cage.  I’m sure they appreciated her eye for style. 

While we were having our lazy visit in the woods, Randy and his crew were doing anything but being lazy! 

Excuse the digital picture OF a digital picture (these were taken by the group photographer and we were able to purchase them).  Here they are, gently floating down the rapids. 

Another run, and this time not so peaceful!  This is a section of the Watauga River where you can run the rapid, paddle to the shore, walk your raft back to the top, and ride again.  They did this several times.  The guide in front is hamming it up for the camera.  He was their favorite guide. 

I’m not sure what the end result of this run was, but it makes me kinda glad I spent that day in the woods :)  They loved every second of it.