Thursday, June 14, 2012

West Virginia...Mountain Momma!

Now I know exactally what John Denver what singing about when he bragged about West Virginia!!  

What an amazing trip!  Jamie, my son-in-law and my daughter Stephanie,  invited me to go meet Jamie's extended family in West Virginia for a long Memorial Day weekend.  Oh my goodness...Where his family lives is beautiful!  His Dad and Stepmom (Jimmy and Becky) live in the mountains of Charleston.  I had no idea how beautiful this area is.  You know it's funny that you can travel all over the world but if you have someone with you that knows the "back way" and all the local attractions it just gives the trip a whole different meaning!!   Keep in mind I lived in East Tennessee for years so I'm a wee bit partial to mountains, water falls, back roads and absolutely love standing atop a hill and seeing the flowing valleys.  Welp, all I can say is I felt as if I were back in East Tennessee and felt so very welcomed!  
You may remember from a previous post that Jimmy and Becky along with Jamie's Uncle Glen and Aunt Debbie went with us on our cruise last summer...they made me feel so welcomed from the moment we arrived!  

The drive there started late at night so we could let Miss Jersey sleep for the duration of it.  She did fabulous!  It was myself and Stephanie that began feeling the curves!!  yeck...lol!   As the sun began to rise I was in the front passenger seat and had the awesome chance to catch some amazing sunrise photos!  (yep....I was in my moment but looking through the viewfinder caught up with my belly!!)  

One of my favorite photos looks fuzzy but it's actually the fog and steam rising off the road while the sun looks like a hidden beach ball!  











All these pictures remind me of a song my Stepmom, Pam use to sing to us when we were kids, "Goodmorning, Goodmorning, Goodmorning it's time to rise and shine 
Goodmorning, Goodmorning, Goodmorning I hope you're feeling fine,
it's time to get up, get outta the bed, 
it's time to get up
you sleepyhead!"  
(I'm so thankful for my memories of her and all the ways she taught us!)

back to our trip:   
We had a magnificent family cookout!  Wow, when Becky cooks, Becky cooks and she won't let anyone help! I've never seen so many different dishes!  Rumor was she never shares a recipe...well friends, she does and I cooked up her Chicken Enchilada last night. YUM!! 
The kids laughed at me because I chose not to eat a hamburger or hotdog.  Seriously...why would I eat one of those with all these side dishes, salads and deserts in front of me to choose from?  Made perfect sense to me!  I can eat a hotdog any ole day!




























Isn't she adorable!  Feeding the ducks was fun but Stephanie had flashbacks of being chased at the age of 4 by a large flock of them.  It took her a few minutes to toss the food out and not throw it at them!!  lol

We took a day trip to New River Gorge and it is amazing to know that this was on finished in the late 70's.  What now takes a person 3 seconds to get across use to take a few as 35 minutes!  Progress at it's best!!  We also got the cd to listen to in the car.  Yep...we're old!!  I'm really glad Jamie got it as it gave a wonderful driving tour!









































 So from "Penguie" and myself, hope you enjoyed out photo journal through West Virginia!  






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