The Dock

The main reason we came to Virginia to work this season is that my daughter the artist lives in Norfolk. She moved up here about eight years ago to go to graduate school and never left. She is pretty much a Virginian now, and probably won't leave there. She has visited us where ever we have been, but we decided to make it easy on her to come to see us. The place where we are living and working is only about 85 miles from her home. Here she is on a recent day trip to Kilmarnock in an antique store, hamming it up with a fake cake.

Like I said a few posts ago, she was an art teacher at a private school for children with learning disabilities for several years, but has decided to pursue her dream and work on marketing her own artwork. She entered her first juried art show and won Best of Show! We were very proud of that.


The second reason (well, it came in pretty close to being the first reason but I couldn't very well say to my daughter that eating crabs was more important than being close to her!!) we came to Virginia is the abundance of blue crabs, free for the taking, out of the river. All you have to do is put some chicken necks in your crab trap and go back the next morning and there they are. Steam them with some Old Bay seasoning, and you have the best dinner (or lunch or breakfast) you could ever want. And if for some reason you forgot to put the chicken necks in your trap, someone is always bringing you some already steamed. How could anyone NOT want to be near a place where they could have steamed crabs anytime they wanted them?


Finally, here is the real reason we came here:
Jim loves to fish.
Here he is "Sittin' On The Dock Of The Bay", fishing his heart out.
This campground is on Robinson's Creek, which goes into the Rapphannock River, which goes into the Chesapeake Bay. There are six or seven docks to fish from on the creek, canoes for rent for getting even closer to the fish, and a large freshwater lake on the property. He goes fishing on his lunch hour almost every day. Fishing is what keeps him happy. Oh, and I love fishing too!

Campground Worker

One of the reasons we live the way we do is so that we can go where ever we want to be and get to stay there for more than a week or two. We have been to several states in the six years we have been work campers. We spent two and a half years in south Texas, a winter season in Florida, and a couple of summers in the mountains of north Georgia. Last summer we worked at Stone Mountain Park in Stone Mountain, Georgia. I worked in the retail operations office, answering the telephones and monitoring the radios. My husband, Jim, was a maintenance worker in the campground. On weekends when we expected a lot of children to be camping there, one of his duties was to put out these "Slow Children" signs on the roads. I love this photo of him with his buddies.

One More Hibiscus

I don't know what I will do with my time when the flowers wither for the season. Maybe the trees will turn to a beautiful hue here, and give me something else to photograph. In the meantime, this hibiscus continues to enchant me every time I pass by. This particular blossom is larger than a dinner plate. The front is gorgeous, but I tend to look at flowers from a different angle. Every line of it is so graceful, so elegant. And look at those little green spikes on the stem! Ok, next time I will show you the dock here at the campground.

Pilates

The other day I was at work in the camp store, and in between customers I was stretching behind the counter. My co-workers asked me what I was doing, and so I was telling them how my legs hurt from standing all day if I didn't do some stretches. As I was talking about this and how I wished that I could find an exercice DVD that would be VERY low impact, a customer at the counter told me I should try one called Pilates for 50+ She said she does Pilates herself and that she had seen the one for older folks and had been thinking about getting it for her mother.

So, I went online and found it on Amazon.com. I ordered it today, so I will post again later and let you know how it works for me.

What Did I Wish For?

While I was out riding around the campground looking for a pink rose I had seen earlier in the week, I found this lovely flower instead. It was supporting itself in the rosebush. If I had not been looking for the rose, I would have missed this little treasure.

The existence of this little flower reminds me of the lifestyle my husband and I have made for ourselves. We have chosen to support ourselves by working in the campgrounds we want to visit, having been drawn there by the beauty of the surrounding area. We get a chance to stay longer, as if putting down roots if just for a little while, and explore an area more closely than if we were only able to stay for a week or two.

While we are there, we have the time to search for the everyday, the places where the locals eat, the sights they go to see, and the things they do for fun. And if what we find while we are looking is not exactly what we were looking for, the we change what we are looking for. You never know what treasure you may find just because you look for something else.

My Daughter the Artist

My daughter, Becca, was an art teacher at a private school for children with learning disabilities until this past spring, but has now decided to pursue her dreams and spend more time working on her own artwork.

She is the artist who produced the painting you see here. While I will let you form your own opinion of her work, I think she is pretty good. (yeah, I know, I am her mother)

She has this painting up for auction on ebay to benefit NOMHRF. 75% of the proceeds from the auction will go to the charity. If you like the painting or even if you like jazz and blues music, please bid on this auction, or send the link to your friends and acquaintances.

To see more of Becca's work, click here to go to her blog.

When I went to the creek to check my crab pot this afternoon, I took my camera along for the ride. This pink hibiscus was blooming at one of the permanent campsites. I love the way these flowers look from the back, so elegant and graceful.

Flowers are my my favorite photography subject, but I also take a lot of pictures of clouds and bugs. When I came home for lunch today, there was a praying mantis on my front door. I took a few shots of it, but none of them were good enough to put in my "keepers" file. Maybe he will pose for me again tomorrow.

Spencer in Georgia

Spencer is my second grandson. He is four years old and just started pre-school this year. Here he is on vacation in Daytona, Florida last February.

Sarah at the beauty shop

When Sarah came to visit last Christmas, we went to Aunt Becky's beauty salon and got a fabulous new hair-do. Sarah loved all the attention she got at the shop.

Michael in California

This is one of my favorite photos of Michael. We all met at Imperial Beach, California in the summer of 2004. Michael was fishing off the pier with his dad and they caught this lobster. We cooked it for dinner that night.

Hello from Fab Grandma

Wow, I am finally here, getting this blog started. I have been putting it off for far too long. Starting a blog has been on my list of things to do forever!

Where to start? First, let me introduce myself to you. I am Karen, the Fab Grandma. My three grandchildren all live very far away from me.

Michael, who it the oldest grandson at almost 10 years old, lives in England with his Dad, my son, Seth. Seth has been in the Air Force for more than 12 year now. Michael was born in San Antonio, Texas. He lived in Guam for about 2 years, then moved to England when he was 3 years old.

His sister, Sarah,who is 7, was born in Guam and lives in Washington State with her mother. We saw her last Christmas when she came to Georgia to spend the week with her other grandmother.

Spencer belongs to my youngest daughter, Emily. He is 4 years old and lives in Georgia.

It is because of my grandchildren that I learned to make quilts. I wanted to make something for them that no one else could. The first quilt I made was for Sarah, before she was born. Since then, I have made quite a few. I love each one of them and feel like they are a part of ME.