UNG College Orientation

Maddie had her college orientation today, and I was there too - but so was someone else!

Nate was there too!  The two of them are seen here doing the "Hawk" gesture, a sort of official college hand gesture.  We learned that earlier today, pretty much the first thing covered in a long, long day.  It was a good day though.  We went to a few sessions - the parents and family went in one direction while the students spent time in another.  Maddie and Nate were in classes about navigating the first year, and then a more practical one about student IDs, parking and dining plans.  They also were in some other ones that pretty much covered ground the two had heard before with core classes and so on.  

There was a bit of swag here too.  I "won" a t-shirt, but I gave that one to Nate.  He and Maddie later got another college shirt too.  Plus they got some other items, including some cans of one of their favorite beverages.

Then came the walking tour.  Again, the parents were going at a different time - the students went at another time, and it was nice out there today.  

Here's our student guide after walking around with us for a bit, we made our way back to the Nesbitt building, which of course is hilarious.  Why?  

See the hat?  I'm Ms. Nesbitt!  But seriously, this is a really great piece of architecture on campus, both inside and out.  We spent a lot of our time here today, and I snapped a few photos during some of the breaks.

And then... it was time for lunch.  They had some nice food choices there for all of us, and we enjoyed that food.

There were other sessions afterwards, and a bit of a set-up with tables to visit that had different clubs and informative stations for the students to visit.  Maddie and Nate got a few more items, drinks, and those college t-shirts here.

It was a nice time, and Maddie's looking forward to this first semester.  Still a few steps to go, but school is starting soon!

I went off to work after this, and after that, it was time to head home.  I got my walking in, and I'm almost done on the treadmill with this virtual Mount Rushmore route.  What better way to finish off this walk by starting "North by Northwest."  I forgot how great this movie is.  

Back upstairs, it was time to listen to the Braves game tonight - it's not on BravesVision, but we're listening on the radio via the MLB channel.  Afterwards, it was time for reading, some prayers, and some sleep.

...Tomatoes and a Pepper

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We harvested a bit today, at least another tomato from the garden outside, but also a mammoth pepper from down there.  I think we're approaching time to harvest some of that lettuce from the hydroponic garden and make ourselves a salad.

We were writing today for our upcoming spy-themed series, and we had a fun idea to do a message that has a bit of a "Kim Possible" theme with the wording.  I'll have to share that one later, but it's been fun writing.  

Each day I've been getting pictures of Alaska on my phone - the reason is that Nana and Ye-Ye have been having an incredible vacation up there.  It's pretty much over, but the last week has been fun getting these images.  They've gotten to do just about everything they've wanted to do up there, and I'm so glad of that favor.

Our new Discworld book is "Soul Music," which means we'll be visiting with the characters DEATH and Susan Sto Helit for this novel, and then probably after this we'll revisit "Thief of Time" as well, hopefully finishing that in time for another reading of "Hogfather" too.  The Discworld is a fun place!  I've read these before, but these adventures with Susan will be new for Maddie (except for "Hogfather" of course).  She's an interesting character, as are all the others that populate the Discworld.  

Still walking on my virtual march towards Mount Rushmore.  We've taken to watching a fun vlogger online, one who visits all the places I wish I could visit across the country.  Many I have visited, and it's neat to see some of these locations again - it's all roadside America sort of stuff, largely, places you visit along the way to the iconic destinations.  Like Carhenge, for example.  You're really on your way to Badlands and Mount Rushmore and the Needles Canyon, but a recreation of Stonehenge created with cars in the middle of the prairie is just too hard for me to resist.  I've been there once, and it was a fun stop.  Tonight I was back there virtually with a visit, and then off to Keystone, South Dakota for a visit to a wax museum and then Mount Rushmore at the end there.  Fun walk, and I'm almost done with this one, about to earn another medal.

The Braves had a double header today, dropping the first game to the Mets, but winning the second one.  both games were tense, one-run difference games.  It'd be nice to have a game we won where they won by more than one run, as we've had a lot of these nail biters lately.  But a win is a win, and we'll take it!

Tonight after reading, we said our prayers of course.  Then it was time for some sleep!

... Puzzles and Megaladonut

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Maddie is closing out the summer just chilling - today she finished a puzzle with a nice summer beach theme to it.  It's Mickey and Minnie in Hawaii.  We have an ornament of this one.  This puzzle didn't take too long because it's only a mere 500 pieces.  Maddie is really quick with these puzzles!

We were working on our next series today, a return to SPY GAMES.  Should be fun!  Lots of writing, deadlines, etc.

It's Shark Week, and Mom got us some Megalodonut Coffee, a giant shark meets doughnuts themed coffees.  Really fun, and delicious.  That might be as far as we go to celebrate Shark Week, as we generally don't like shark movies, unless it's "Finding Nemo," of course.

Big storms rolled through tonight.  Loud here, but damaging elsewhere.   Jasper had a monument struck by lightning, bursting marble into exploding shattered remains.  There was a tornado up there too.

Tonight we finished "Unseen Academicals," which was fun.  The big soccer match is over, and there's a happy ending for all, we except Andy Shank, perhaps.   Now on to the next book!

We prayed,  and now time for rest!

...Pacific Rim

We went to eye doctor this morning to get Maddie better prescription.   She was thinking it was time, and with school around the corner it's a good idea.  

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We ate at Mellow Mushroomafter that  a nice meal together,  and quiet too.  I love the Alice in Wonderland framed mirror there at the entrance - the mushroom theme is always fun.  Anyway, it was a good meal as always.  Mom and I usually get the gluten-free PacificRim, while Maddie got wings.  Yummy!

Back to taekwondo tonight.  Quite a few fellow students were returning from Little Rock,  where there was a big national championship.   They had fun and there were some winners too.  The Edges moved up in rank themselves,  and it was fun for the students trying to remember Mrs. Edge's new rank before addressing her.

Quiet day.  Not feeling great.  We read tonight,  we prayed, and got some sleep.

The Cardiac Kids

We finished up out 2026 "At the Movies" series with KidPak today, and it went well - we did a new movie this morning, the recent Mario movie, and the message turned out well.  We had enough time to do a few games in there too, so we pulled out some classic games from the past, an animated race from an "At the Movies" with stunt racers that was a classic some years ago.

We had Princess Peach, Mario and Luigi out there greeting the kids, and it was just a nice time this morning at KidPak.  Here's a frog on the outside door, ready for a quiet nap this afternoon:

Maddie was with Nate's family, celebrating a big moment for them, so Mom and I went home and the thought was to watch a quiet Braves game and take a nap before anything else.

Then this happened.  This was an epic baseball game, and eleven-inning stress factory that just kept you on the edge of your seat for much of the game.  And the thing is, the Braves have been in a lot of these one-run contests lately, so there's a lot of tension to these games.  Fortunately, they've been coming out on top of late, but wow, it's no wonder the announcer has started calling the Atlanta Braves the "Cardiac Kids."

So after the game, we gathered our things, and we did something fun - we went to Camp Meeting.  There's a Union Grove Camp Meeting once a year up very close to where I used to live, and in fact I went to it over thirty years ago now.  I can still remember the songs we sang there, "It's Beginning to Rain" and others.  I have a lot of good memories of Camp Meeting, and our friend CJ from KidPak has been telling us to come back each year.

We're glad we said yes!  It was a really great service, a great time of fellowship and catching up with some old familiar faces.   We had a great time with some old songs and following that a great message from a guy we haven't heard before - or at least not before yesterday.  Yesterday, it just so happened that Mom heard a message from this same guy while down at another conference.  So it was quite the coincidence that he was there tonight.  And it was quite the coincidence that we saw many other Free Chapel people involved in worship or just there to enjoy the service.  It was great, and it went late - we got home pretty late, so much so that there wasn't time to read.  But we had a great day, that much is certain.  We said our prayers, and then it was off to sleep!

Stripers Double Header!

Today was a lot of fun!  We went to Gwinnett Field today to see not one but two Gwinnett Stripers games, one of them postponed from yesterday's big rain deluge.  Because it was a double-header, each game was only about seven innings long.  But check out this line-up on the Stripers:

This was for the first game.  We literally had two NL MVPs playing on a minor league team at the same time, plus Murphy and Kim.  And ironically, the same exact starting pitcher here for the Stripers was pitching for the Atlanta Braves when we went to go see them last weekend.  

It was Christmas in July, so there was lots of Christmas music playing today, and Christmas trees set up throughout the stadium, plus plenty of decorations too.  Santa was there for pictures, and in fact Maddie did her official photo with Santa here tonight at the ballpark and it turned out really well.  

Mom and I posed with the Grinch, meeting him for a while, and there was Chipper too - all decked out in a Santa suit.  Here's Chipper chasing around a giant cockroach through the stands and up where I was standing by:  

How fun it was to see Santa throw out the first pitch.  The national anthem was sung by a church from Gainesville that did really well.  And as for the games themselves, we had a superteam in that first contest, so the Stripers had a nice first game there.

We saw just about everyone get a hit, including Acuna and Kim, who got a two-RBI double.  In the second game we got to see Rowdy Tellez get a few RBIs, and Andrew McCutcheon get a home run.

There was a lot of action today, and two solid victories.  The second game didn't feature as many of those all-stars from the first game, but it was good to see some of our Braves players there, and watch them do really well.

It was a nice time there at the game.  We got a Christmas ornament tonight, because that seemed pretty appropriate, right?  There were all kinds of characters, like the Pink Pig from the Festival of Trees.  And there were a lot of people all dressed up in the audience wearing Santa outfits or dressing up as elves or whatever!  It was a lot of fun.  We had our wings and our Cracker Jacks, of course, and just had a great time at the ol' ball game.

Nate was there too, and he and Maddie got on the Jumbotron for a good extended dance sequence to "Last Christmas," and earlier on, Nate actually caught one of the t-shirts that was thrown into the audience, so he got himself a Stripers shirt!  I have one too, I'm wearing it now - Mom got me a hat and t-shirt for the Stripers.  Tonight's big souvenir is that Christmas ornament, which will look great hanging from the tree this year.

We sat and talked with this elf for a good bit this afternoon...

Of course, you can't see the player's faces in these - but they're pictures of Atlanta Braves players doing their rehab assignments - a pretty huge amount of talent on there tonight.

We got home safely, and yeah, we're tired.  We read a bit from our book, did some of our online puzzles, and then it was time for some sleep!