Below and Above

We’ve finished planting the garden! We started last weekend and put the final seeds in the ground this afternoon. Over the years as I’ve seen how much healthier a garden is here in August than in Texas, I’ve learned to be much more patient about planting time. I would see so many garden pictures from Texas in March and April and be chomping at the bit to get started. But I’ve come to appreciate May—especially when I’m still harvesting tomatoes and peppers in October.

As I said earlier, we started most everything from seed this year—a first for us. I am still amazed at that process of germination and then multiplication, where one seed will produce—at least in terms of our cherry tomato plant—literally tens of thousands of seeds over the course of the summer.

There’s a lot of work going on in each little square foot (or partial square foot) where I have things planted. The relationship between the roots and the soil and all the micro organisms in the soil is pretty remarkable. And then there’s the energy produced in the cells through photosynthesis. All for a tomato or pepper or green bean, each of which contains the seeds to do it again next year. It’s fun to spend a lot of time looking down this time of year.

But last night we were busy looking up. As I’ve said before, other than visiting all the state parks in North Carolina, I don’t really have a bucket list. I’ve always thought seeing the northern lights would be cool, but I would never plan a trip just to see them. So it was special that they decided to make an appearance in western North Carolina last night.

We were in the middle of playing a game with company, when one of Jenna’s friends texted her to go outside. We walked out and could see that the whole sky was a deep red, but our view is rather limited with all the trees. So we packed up and drove down to the community center to get a better view.

The timed exposure shots I took (most between five and fifteen seconds) are both more revealing and less. The color is a little deeper in the pictures, but the weird movement and appearing and disappearing of the colors certainly doesn’t come through. We stood out in the field for about 45 minutes until most of the color had faded away and the big waves of color directly overhead had stopped dancing and coming and going. All in all a pretty enjoyable evening.

After tomorrow, I’m on vacation for a week as we prepare for the wedding. Dana and Rebekah are coming home from Williamsburg, Virginia tonight and tomorrow as they’ve been to Rebekah’s roommate’s wedding. Lauren had her end of year piano recital last night. And Jacob and Lauren’s kickstarted was fully funded this week. I’m looking forward to hearing the new album when it’s finished.

A week and a day left, and we get to celebrate a wedding.

Graduation

Rebekah finished up her college career last Wednesday, and we got to celebrate her graduation yesterday. The seven of us went over early to take some pictures up on the mountain and get Rebekah’s capstone project.

Then we had a wonderful lunch at Conga Latin Food—a Salvadorian restaurant in downtown Chattanooga.

Then to the convention center for graduation. The Commencement Ceremony was lots of fun. As they graduate by departments and Art was first alphabetically, Rebekah was the 8th name called. And just like that, school is over—at least for now—for all the Herrington girls. Jenna started kindergarten in the fall of 2002, so we’ve all been at this for 22 years.

And now to get ready for the wedding—two weeks!

Garrett and I finished cleaning out Scott’s house last Sunday. A lady from church spent most of the day Monday cleaning, and he started moving in on Tuesday. He’s rearranged some of the furniture that they kept and added some of his own. I haven’t been over there in several days, and I’m looking forward to seeing what he’s done sometime this week. This is the living room post clean out.

Jenna and I spent a good part of the afternoon in the garden. I’ll post some pictures soon.

Jacob and Lauren are playing a show tomorrow night in Brevard. They have seven days left on their kickstarter.

Rebekah is not the only one finished with school. I finished up teaching class on the 25th and finished grading stuff and sending things back to students and parents last Tuesday. In some capacity: public school, private school, or tutoring (one-on-one and offering classes), I’ve been teaching since 1992. There’s still a chance I might do some individual one-on-one tutoring in the future, but certainly in terms of teaching classes, it’s time to hang up that hat. Parts of it I will certainly miss, but I am not going to miss late nights preparing for class or grading essays.

If anyone needs any used math or science books … .

Rebekah’s Senior Art Show and Other Happenings

Yesterday afternoon, we (Dana and I, Jenna, Jacob and Lauren, and Garrett) all piled in the car and headed to Chattanooga for Rebekah’s Senior Art Show. The weather was not great—very foggy and rainy, so our picnic dinner took place inside one of the common areas in her dorm. But the art show was a blast. She has some talented classmates, but the best piece was hers (I’m probably just a little biased).

Here’s a description of her work:

And here a professor’s brief synopsis along with a synopsis of the other students’ work.

It was a very crowded room and lots of fun seeing what all her classmates had worked on all semester.

Here are a few of the pages (she did 22 paintings in all)—without the vellum overlays (they just didn’t lend themselves to photographs—at least not on my phone).

When Rebekah gets home we’ll hopefully be able to photograph everything with better light and with a better quality camera. If you come for the wedding, you’ll have to see it in person.

We’re a month and a day away from the wedding: Rebekah and Garrett’s wedding shower is this weekend after church; Rebekah graduates on May 4; Rebekah goes to her roommate’s wedding in Virginia on May 11; Jacob and Lauren’s kickstarter for the new album ends on May 13 (click on the link to read about it and help them fund it if you’d like); Garrett (who has already graduated) will walk on May 17; and the wedding is May 19. Lots of fun things over the next month!

Singletary Lake and Jones Lake

On the last day, we headed back south to a couple more state parks that were on Carolina Bays. More long-leaf pine and sand. Singletary Lake is set up to be a group meeting/camping area. Large cabins and a meeting hall, but not much else. Only a mile of trail, which we did fairly quickly, and if you’ve seen one Carolina Bay, you’ve seen the rest of them. But there was a nice pier to walk out on.

Carolina Jasmine

This might have been the most humorous thing we saw. Since this tree was claiming the first trail marker, they just put up another one. But you can tell that the tree is extra hungry and is going to take this one as well.

At Jones Lake there was a trail all the way around the lake and then a second trail on the far side to another Carolina Bay called Salters Lake. We did both. Thankfully, there was a sign which told us we were at the end of the trail at Salters Lake. Of course, there was also the lake.

Cinnamon Fern coming up in a burned over area.

Jones Lake

Salters Lake

There was a good bit of land that looked like this. I’m fairly sure this was all controlled burning and not a wild fire, but I’m not 100% sure.

We did seven miles on the last day bringing our total to 26 miles of trails, but at least another mile to and from parking lots. All in all, lots of fun.

Nothing could be quite as spectacular as the eclipse from 2017, but today’s partial was fun. And there was just enough thin cloud cover to make photos possible. None are great, but I only had my phone with me as Garrett and his friend Rudy and I were over at Scott’s doing some cleaning and sorting.

Carvers Creek x2 and Weymouth Woods

On day three we went to both access points of Carvers Creek and then to Weymouth Woods Nature Preserve.

The first access point to Carvers Creek was way too close to some major house building that was going on, and so we could hear machinery a good bit of the time. And due to some differing definitions of a loop trail and thus a map reading error, we walked a little more than we planned—almost six miles on our first of three stops.

This was a long leaf pine forest, and I find long leaf pine saplings a little humorous looking.

So here’s the sign that threw us off.

I’ve always thought of a loop trail as one that ends where it begins. But this loop trail was a horseshoe, not a closed circle. To get back to where we started was not 1.1 miles.

This is what a good portion of the park looked like.

Our next stop was the second access point to Carvers Creek State Park called Long Valley Farm. It’s the old summer home of James Rockefeller. The land, lake, and home were donated to the state, and the home is in pretty sad shape. Supposedly, they are going to restore it at some point. It’s a short 1.5 mile round trip from the visitor center to the house and lake.

The small lake was beautiful, populated by numerous cypress trees.

Our last stop of the day was Weymouth Woods Sandhills Nature Preserve. We rolled in right as a storm was rolling in.

The Sandhills are a thin strip running through North Carolina that separates the Piedmont and the Coastal Plains. There are, supposedly numerous red cockaded woodpeckers here—as there are in other long leaf pine forests in the SE, but alas we still didn’t see one. As we waited out the storm, the park ranger we visited with said the storm would likely send them all back to their nests for the rest of the day.

They actually hollow out a nest in the trunk of a pine tree, and then peck and peck around their hole to release pine sap which runs down the tree. This sticky mess keeps snakes from climbing up and into their holes to steal eggs. While we didn’t see any of the birds, we did get a close up view of their handy work.

After the storm we set out through what might have been my favorite place of the trip.

There was a small creek running through the park with some beaver activity. And since Raven Rock this was the first place with any elevation change to speak of. Nothing like here at home, but some up and down was nice. And there were mayflowers blooming.

All in all we did 9.9 miles this day—not all of it on purpose. And despite the rain, it was a very enjoyable day. So after day three we were up to 19 miles.

At home, we’ve been transplanting all the tomato and pepper seedlings into bigger pots. We’re about four weeks away from planting in the ground here. But seeing signs of life is fun.

Garrett and Rudy got off the trail on Good Friday after six weeks and 500 miles. They had a great time and seem no worse for wear after spending all that time in the woods, walking from Georgia to Virginia up and down mountains.

For all our Texas friends and family in the path of totality: I hope you have a cloud free day tomorrow, but if not, here’s a picture from our eclipse back in 2017.

Finally, Minerva says hi.

Lake Waccamaw & Lumber River

On day two we headed south with an early morning start at Lake Waccamaw. Lake Waccamaw is a Carolina Bay: a very shallow (no more than 12 feet deep), acidic, and usually oval-in-shape lake that puzzles scientists as to how exactly they formed.

There was a red bud in bloom at the visitor’s center and Carolina jasmine along the path. And here is where we got our first glimpse of all the white sand. We did three trails at Lake Waccamaw for a total of four miles.

We did not see an alligator.

The Red Bud

Carolina Jasmine

Our first taste of all the sand.

This is Lake Waccamaw. It is five and a half miles across with an average depth of just 7.5 feet.

Lake Waccamaw—the first of four Carolina Bays.

After lunch, we went to Lumber River. We basically had the place to ourselves. There was one other car in the parking lot. But maybe the locals knew something that we found out less than 1/2 a mile down the trail: the trail abruptly ends in the river. If there was a trail, it was under water.

The Lumber River is a blackwater river, which are mainly found in the Amazon basin and in the southeastern US. A blackwater river is a slow-moving river usually flowing through forested swamps or wetlands. The dark color comes from tannins from decaying leaves. The water is usually acidic. It was a beautiful, peaceful place, but we weren’t there very long and only walked about an mile. So that’s about five miles on the day, so just over nine for the trip.

Dana got several compliments on her hat. I got none on mine.

Cypress knot that looks like a man praying.

The end of the trail.

For dinner we tried a Central American restaurant. I had chicken with coleslaw and fried green bananas. Pretty tasty.

And the wedding this afternoon was lots of fun!

7, 27, 36, 44, and Raven Rock State Park

Dana and I got away last week for a DIY marriage retreat. Every other year, we try to attend a marriage conference or something along those lines. Nothing this year was close or affordable or something we hadn’t done before, so we found a resource from one of the pastors at Capitol Hill Baptist Church in DC and set out east to Fayetteville, NC. There are seven state parks within an hour drive, and so we added significantly to our list, almost doubling the number we’ve now visited. And with 15, we’re now a third of the way to visiting all the state parks in NC.

So now you know the first number. The second number is how many miles we walked over four days. Neither of us would have guessed we would cover that much ground, but let’s just say there’s a huge difference between walking in the coastal plains of North Carolina versus hiking in the mountains, which is where all the other state parks we’ve visited have been.

And since we were out in nature so much, we would stop occasionally and turn on Merlin (a really cool App that identifies bird song) and see what was out there. Over the four days, we heard 36 different species of birds—but considering most of the surroundings were 70 foot tall or greater long-leaf or loblolly pines, we didn’t actually see that many.

And without leaving the state, we saw 44 difference license plates, including Alaska and Hawaii. And now on to some pictures and descriptions.

On the way in on Wednesday we stopped at Raven Rock. We saw no ravens nor did the rock formation with that name along the Cape Fear River look like a raven, but supposedly ravens used to roost in the rock formation (pictures below). It was an enjoyable walk that included a lengthy set of stairs down to the Cape Fear River.

We did a couple of trails here: the Raven Rock Trail and the Little Creek Trail. A modest 4.1 miles for day 1.

Wednesday afternoon

O miles accomplished at this point.

This is appropriately named “Little Creek”

This is Raven Rock along the Cape Fear River. It’s supposedly the highest bluff in North Carolina east of the Piedmont. The tree with so many exposed roots was just as fascinating to me.

I thought going out east, we would see considerably more flowers. But there really was not a lot of things blooming. This is a yellow trout lily, which is new to me.

And this is some variety of spring beauty.

The Cape Fear River from up on the bluff.

That night we ate at a good Greek restaurant—maybe the best meal of the trip. Hard to beat day one. I’ll post about days two through four when I get another chance.

In other news: we got new gutters on the house this week. It’s been needed for quite some time. And this weekend, I get to perform a wedding for a young lady from church. The sad part of that is the guy she’s marrying lives in New York, so she is moving. Sarah has helped with music on Sunday mornings, singing with Jacob and Lauren often. She will be missed.

Finally, we have a pair of pileated woodpeckers in the neighborhood. This afternoon, the female was digging in the yard.

When the End Is Not the End

When Rebekah left Lake Forest Ranch at the end of last summer, it was, we thought, the end of a long relationship between the Herrington girls and Lake Forest Ranch. Turns out, it’s not quite over. Rebekah headed back to Mississippi this weekend to work a retreat and see some old friends. It was her first long trip in the new-to-her car.

And speaking of new-to-her cars: Jenna is now the proud owner of one of Scott Wallace’s old vehicles—his Ford Focus wagon.

On Wednesday, we closed on the loan to pay off Scott’s mortgage and have a little extra to repair the roof, which was completed on Friday. There are still a few things do be done with some trim and gutters, but it looks so much nicer. Now to finish going through all the contents on the inside. Lauren and I worked a good bit Friday afternoon, cleaning out a closet and a desk. We moved two pieces of furniture out, which Dana took to the Thrift store. I think Garrett will probably move in in early April, so that’s my deadline to get the house ready.

The daffodils are starting to come up, with a couple of early achievers starting things off. Other than the one really cold snap, it hasn’t been a particularly cold winter, and I’m curious if the tulips will come back. But our hellebores didn’t look too great after the hard freeze, and one of those is blooming despite it’s poor appearance. It has been warm enough that we haven’t burned a fire since some time in January. But yesterday never got very warm, and we’re going to have some cold nights, so the stove is up and running again after a long break.

I am hoping that 2024 sees the end of some responsibilities and tasks that were taking up too much time. Last month I relinquished my role as president of the county ministerial association. That one wasn’t a huge time commitment by any stretch, but it is one less thing to think about each month. In about ten weeks, I’ll hopefully teach my last class for high school kids. I think I might still do some one-on-one tutoring one morning a week if there are any takers, but the days of teaching a class with all of its preparation is coming to an end soon. Just five more chapters of chemistry; The Death of Ivan Ilych; Cry, the Beloved Country; and a few hundred years of world history left!

Dana was offered the job of co-manager of the Thrift store with a view of taking over when the current manager retired. But she turned it down, happy to be the assistant manager with no real desire to be “in charge.”

There’s been a little talk of a March hiking trip up to Mt. LeConte (#7 of the highest mountains east of the Mississippi). We had wanted to do it in the fall, but it didn’t work out. And speaking of hiking, Garrett and a friend are in the beginning stages of a six-week, 500 mile jaunt on the Appalachian Trail.

Making Plans for 2025 and Other Current Happenings

We have used our wood stove a little more than usual this year. That’s how we heat our house, so wood is a valuable commodity. And our wood stove is pretty finicky. The wood needs to be really dry—as in seasoned for at least a year and a half—for the stove to not struggle. And so we have a lot of wood stacked around the house.

I got some more delivered this past weekend. Four, what they call in NC, face cords. I believe that’s what we called a rick in Texas. While it is four foot high, eight foot long stack of wood, the wood is only two feet long instead of four (actually closer to 20–22 inches to fit the stove). But this wood needs to sit for awhile. So I’m hoping to not use this wood until the winter of ’25–’26. That seems like a long time from now.

School has started again; though, we didn’t get very far into the semester before we had to cancel a class. No snow, but a chance of icy roads this morning meant not getting out. It’s only January, and we’re already behind.

We had a wonderful visit, as usual, with the Baileys over the New Year’s holiday. Puzzles and games and some walks and visiting made for a wonderful weekend.

Rebekah has gone back to school—for the last time. And we paid our last tuition bill. We’ve been doing that since the fall of 2015. We’re very thankful for the inexpensive house we lived in for several years in Clarksville that allowed us to put a lot of money in 529s during those years. Three kids, 12 years of school, no debt.

Speaking of Rebekah, wedding plans are coming along. I think we’ll be ready.

We are now officially the owner of this house. It was part of an inheritance from my good friend, Scott. It needs a little work and still a lot of sorting of possessions, but we’re excited about the possibilities of its use in the future.

In church news, we have nominated a new guy to join our elder board. He and his wife have been a part of our church for several years, and it has been a joy to get to know them. They have been a blessing to all of us. It continues to be a joy to be a part of our little church. Our communities in this part of North Carolina are better because of the folks at Christ Community Church.

Pinwheel tutoring starts back up in a couple of weeks. I really enjoyed getting to know my student last semester, and I am looking forward to spending Mondays with him again this spring. Lauren does a great job directing that program.

Jenna continues working at the Rare Bird and enjoying lots of walks along Little Brasstown Creek and around the Folk School. In addition to Pinwheel, Lauren is teaching piano lessons. Jacob continues to clean chimneys and work on music. Garrett finished up his last semester of school in December, and is working part time at the Rare Bird. In about a month, he’s talking a long walk—about 500 miles of the Appalachian Trail, which should take him about six weeks. I’m hoping to catch up with him somewhere along the way and do a few—very few—miles with him. Rebekah is finishing up at Covenant, still working in the design lab, and working in the nursery at her church on Lookout Mountain. Dana is still enjoying the Thrift Store and keeping us all in line.

Minerva says hi.

December Happenings

Let’s back up to November before we get to December. One of the things I’ve been working on is adding a few more perennials to our property each year. A long-term goal is lining the bank along the road with daffodils. Last year I planted fifty. And this year, I made three more mounds and planted a 100. Hopefully they will come up this spring and join the others that dot the property.

Sometimes my plans for flowers don’t go quite as I expected. After the first round of sunflowers were pretty much finished, I planted some more seeds in the same location. I knew I would be cutting things close, weather-wise, and I was right. It cooled off much quicker than I hoped, and the sunflower stalks never got above a foot high. But right before Thanksgiving, I walked out one day and saw that several of them had bloomed anyway. These are the smallest sunflowers I’ve ‘ever seen. You can go back to the July 24 post to see them at full size.

We had all the kids for Thanksgiving and a family from church. It was a good time with lots of good food. And already that seems like a really long time ago. This past weekend, we made a fast trip to Texas for the memorial service for my Aunt Sheri, who passed away in September. We got to celebrate my mom’s birthday as a bonus. It was good to see family; we haven’t been in Texas in December since we moved.

Chris, Paul, John, me, and Robert

While I got to see some of my cousins, as you see in the picture above, the girls got to see two of their cousins down in Georgia the same weekend as Elizabeth was visiting Emily in Atlanta. The girls drove down Sunday afternoon after church.

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve enjoyed several holiday treats and get-togethers. Lauren had her Christmas recital for her piano students, and she and Jacob played a concert last night with a friend of theirs, Kevin Schlereth, at our church.

One of those get-togethers was bitter sweet. Last week, we had a good-bye celebration for a dear family from our church who are moving to Tennessee. The Avents have been a part of our church since 2011. John was a huge help in turning our foreclosure into a home, from painting to putting in a french drain to installing ceiling fans, and so much more. Rebekah was in their daughter Becca’s wedding, and Becca will return the favor in May. Several of us from church helped them load up their moving van today.

We’ve had quite an ordeal with our tree this year—thanks to a certain small pet. Jenna has written about that much more eloquently than I could, and you can read about that here. But in the meantime …

Minerva says hi.