Matt & Sue's 2008 year end update:
Our New Year started off cold and windy with the annual New Year's Hike at Hanging Rock State Park with the Piedmont Hiking and Outing Club. Sue added a new rule to her fair weather hiking criteria: It cannot be below 50 degrees and VERY windy.
In early 2008 our second cat, Eima, came to foster with us. She was rescued by a sister of a co-worker of Sue's, whose name is Amie and who Eima (Amie backwards) is named after. Eima took a while to settle in with Eze but eventually they worked it out and we decided she should stay.
Our spring consisted of lots of wildflower hikes and Matt hiking with the Hiking Club. In May we went up to Mt. LeConte in the Smokies, a challenging hike for Sue. You can see pictures in our travel section.
In July we spent 5 days on the east coast of Maine with our friends Joel and Caroline and had a wonderful time enjoying the cool (very hot to the locals) weather. July also found us with a new dog, Cotton. Our neighbor moved away and couldn't take him along. We've known Cotton since he was 6 weeks old and he's settled into his new life here quite well. Although the cats would still prefer he lived next door.
This fall we spent 12 days in Scotland with Matt's father and his companion Sandy. We spent much time driving through the country, visiting castles, and drinking Real Ale. Sue spent much of the fall attending fiber related events.
Thanksgiving week brought friends Andy, Leslie and children Julia and Annika Veit for a short visit. We enjoyed catching back up with them after 6 years.
We ended the year with a visit to Sue's parents in Florida. While there we used the last day of a multi-day Disney World pass we bought in 1999; it really was forever.
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The summer of 2005 has been a fairly slow one. Our big trips were in the spring, so we've done a few smaller weekend trips.
In September we went to Ocean City, NJ for a family get together to celebrate Matt's mom's 70th birthday. We had a rented house with 9 people in it. There was a full moon and hurricane Ophelia was way off shore. Walking along the beach at night with the huge waves and full moon was beautiful.
Labor Day weekend was a 3 day trip to the southern smokies. We stayed at a great place called the Blue Boar Inn on Lake Santeetlah. We ate too much wonderful food and walked around their forest grounds. We didn't make it onto the lake, but we'll be back. We also hiked through the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest and along the Cherohala Skyway. We saw a mother bear and two cubs cross the Skyway and were able to get some pictures of the cubs.
We went to West Virgina for a peach-picking weekend at our friend's orchard and came home with two boxes of peaches, a crate of apples, 12 pints of raspberries and a bag of plums. Lots of canning and freezing has been done since then.
Matt went on a 4 day backpacking trip in Great Smoky National Park
over 4th of July weekend with my friend Gary. We started at the
base of Rainbow Falls and hiked over Mt. LeConte to the AT. We
hiked along the AT until Low Gap, then down to Big Creek. We did
about 40 miles in 4 days.
Sue went to Cincinnati for a girl's weekend with 3 other friends.
We had Sue's parents in town for Memorial Day weekend.