Superhero Joe

So last night at dinner, Joe was telling me about his afternoon at the park with his friend, Matt. Like any other day they have gone to the neighborhood park, there were quite a few kids and parents there. However, unlike the other days, on this particular day, the parents and kids were standing around the storm drain under the little bridge in the middle of the park. Joe said that usually he and Matt 'mind their own business' and don't get in the middle of what people are doing, but he decided to ask one of the parents what was going on. She told Joe that one of the kids crawled into the drain and was stuck, afraid to come out because of spiders. The child had crawled into drain, only afterwards realizing that he had crawled into a space that was too small for an adult and where there were lots of spiders, which he didn't like, and now he couldn't move.

So what do you think happened?.....Joe jumped down into the stream bed and layed down on the ground so he could see the boy, about 7 years old, and started talking to him. He found out the boy was afraid of spiders and wouldn't come out. Joe talked to him about Spider Man and how cool he was, never letting on the fact that there were 5 huge daddy-long-leg spiders around him. Joe told us how he clapped his hands around him to make the boy believe he was killing all of the spiders so he could come out. I'm not sure what else he told him, but it was magic enough that he was able to coax the boy out of the very small space!!

Talk about not expecting to hear that over dinner! I can't even begin to say how proud I am of him! Of course his dad is, too, but as a mom....I still get teary thinking of how grateful that mother must have been. I gave him a big hug, and told him not only how proud I was of him, but hoped was really proud of himself, too. He said he was and said that he 'really tried not to be shy'. I'd say he was more than not shy....I'd say he was downright brave!!

New River Hideaway

Ken and I went to the mountains last weekend to check on the progress of the cabin, and have some get-away-time together. When we arrived, the temperature was around 40 degrees - pretty normal for this time of year. We got up Saturday morning to a partly cloudy day, but the forecast called for a high of 48 and a nice weekend.

Apparently that was at midnight, because within a couple hours of our morning coffee, the rain, sleet and eventually snow started and by noon it was 23 degrees! In just the short amount of time that we have been going up to Boone, we have gotten in tune with the weather signals in the mountains. There was an unmistakeable chill in the air Saturday morning (the same chill that brought snow on Easter last year when we were in Boone) that was a clear sign that snow was likely. So in our parkas-thank goodness we've learned to always pack them when we go-we sat in the cabin to formulate our decorating and moving strategy.

One thing about a log cabin, though, it is SOLID. Sixty mph winds and snow blowing sideways, and you can't hear any of it inside the cabin, nor does the cabin creek and move.



By Sunday, we had blue sky again, and a name for our new addition..... New River Hideaway. We sit within 100 yeards of the New River which winds through Ashe County and provides fishing, recreation and a beautiful water feature to the area.

We are in the countdown to completion....so stay tuned as we bring New River Hideaway online in the near future.