Rosehill Plantaion

We love US History and had the chance to take a great field trip to The Rosehill Plantation back in September.  It was the home of the Gist family.  One of the coolest facts we heard while we were there was that one of the family's nephews was named States Right Gist.  Only in SC!...and maybe in Georgia. :)

William Henry Gist (this plantations owner) was the Governor of South Carolina at the time Lincoln was elected.  He said, "The only alternative left, in my judgement, is the secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union." One of his last duties as Governor was in fact signing SC's secession papers, so he is known as the "Secession Governor".

                            There was a copy of the signed secession document in the home.

 Many of the items in the home were owned my the Gist family, who moved away, but later generations have gifted the heirlooms back. The bed never left the home due to its size. It is called Rosehill because it used to have many gardens full of roses. There is still a rose bush on the property that was there in the 1800's!

 The handrail of the stairs is original to the house. Many of the paintings were painted of the family and are among the items brought back to the home. A collector from somewhere out west outbid SC's historic society when they were trying to buy one of the paintings. The collector took there information and after having it in his home for a little over a year, he gifted it to the house and said that is were it belonged.

The quilt and two pictures were created by Mrs Gist when she lived in the home. The big fireplace was in the kitchen that was in a building behind the home. It was there for two reasons: 1. To keep the house cool, and 2. To keep the slaves separate from the family. We learned that it isn't politically correct to say "slaves" any more. The tour guide (who was great) kept saying "enslaved people" and any time she asked a question and someone said slave she would then say, "yes, an enslaved person..."  We thought it was kind of interesting...and unnecessary.  We obviously under stand that slaves were people-equal in every way.  They didn't think that back in the 1800's but we do know...so why change it to enslaved people? What do you think?

One more thing...We got to see a real pianoforte. I got a little Jane Austen-y when I saw it!

Geeks Unite!

My geeks are so spoiled!  Aaron and Jake both collect comic books about Star Wars. They love them!  I don't get it-but good for them! They would love to collect others, but like any thing you collect, it can get pricey, so they stick with one comic each (and then every now and then special ones that come out..there are a lot of special Star Wars comics coming out right now, as you can imagine). They just happen to the be the heirs to a large collection of old comics. Manfred Martin (Jeremy's dad. In case someone is reading this in five generations and doesn't know who Jeremy is: he married Aaron's sister Ranee. Jeremy is our brother-in-law) had two sons, but neither of them shared his passion for comic books...at all. Fast forward a few decades and Manfred heard Jake talking about comics and he decided it was time to pass his on to someone who would enjoy them. Then he heard Aaron liked them too.  These pictures represent the third batch of comics Manfred has given to my guys!!  It was fun watching them speak geek together and watch three generations have so much in common. 

I guess it is true: It is all about who you know.

The Greatest Generation

Homeschooling rocks!  My friend called me up (a few weeks ago...because you know I only blog after I have an overwhelming amount of things to blog about) one Wednesday morning (I just remembered it was the end of September because Aaron had the week off but he was at the fixer upper house) and told me that there was a caravan of WWII vehicles coming through town and they were stopping at the mall for lunch.  We declared an impromptu field trip and were off!  We made posters because this was put on by Veterans and we wanted to thank them.  We actually had people come up and ask if they could take our pictures. They said we must be homeschoolers and said we were lucky to be there to witness this. We wholeheartedly agreed and enjoyed the parade as they went by with a police escort.

It was so awesome!  Jake got some dog tags and we got to spend a few minutes with a WWII Veteran, Bill Kreider, and Jake took a picture with him. We felt so blessed to be able to shake his hand and thank him for what he did for our country. The Veteran's nephew was there and he said we were making history by spending time with a true living national treasure. It was a wonderful experience that, because of the age of our WWII Veterans, is getting harder to have. Mr. Krieder was riding a motorcycle that was like the one he road in the war as a MP. He, even in his late 80's was riding it hundreds of miles! It was so amazing to hear them tell us that the reason for them traveling through Spartanburg was because they were recreating the trip that some of our soldiers made during WWII to test the equipment they would be using. This is another memory for the books! This was an opportunity of a life time that we couldn't have had if Jake was in public school.  We are the lucky ones!

Star Wars Fever

The world is in the middle of Star Wars fever. Our home is always in a state of Star Wars fever so this is nothing new for us.

This is a collage of Aaron's birthday.  He always says he doesn't want any presents but that is just no fun! We got him some but didn't wrap them so that kind of makes them not presents...He was very happy to receive a life size cut out of Boba Fett.  Aaron (and Jake) is and always has been a huge Star Wars fan. Most of his t-shirts are Star Wars (or super hero's) as you can see from his Yoda shirt.  This was not planned. This is every day at our house. He also got a Star Wars book and the book that I can't remember the name of right now...but it is about J.R.R Tolkien (one of Aaron's favorites) and C.S. Lewis (one of my favorite's) friendship. I can't wait to read it!...I swear Aaron did want it. :)

Aaron and Jake were super excited for the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens preview. They DVR'd and stayed up late to watch it's premier during Monday night footballs halftime (which was taking place on the West coast).

I am not what you would call a super fan...at all, but I have to say I am excited to see this movie! 

Aaron and Jake already have their tickets to see it opening night (which is really the night before because our theater shows the movies the day before...and I don't mean at midnight-they just show it the day before).  This is the moment that they purchased them.  I am not going with them opening night.  They have already said they are going to go see it in the theater multiple times so I will let them enjoy it the first night and catch it with them later. 

This is big people.  This is big.

The Beach

It has been a long hot summer and we didn't really take any trips.  We were talking about that a few weeks ago with Mom and we decided we should take a quick beach trip.  Last year when the older Powell kiddos were visiting we went to Long Beach Resort in Myrtle Beach and was a really nice place and it was well priced.  Mom looked it up and found out that this past week was already considered off season so we booked it!  Forty eight hours at the beach was just what we needed!  I of course took a ton of pictures...Here are about half a ton!

We stopped for lunch at Cracker Barrel on the way-a road trip must.  Jake decided to get hot chocolate...in summer! Hahaha!

(I uploaded these pictures and started this post way back when we went to the beach...which was the Wednesday before Labor Day...Better late than never right? And it goes with out saying that I am not rereading or editing...)

He also used his debit card for the first time and bought a slinky.  Bringing back the childhood memories!

Jake did some school on the way.  He missed two days of school the week of his birthday because he was sick and Aaron is taking the last week of September off so we had to get some work done on the trip there and back!

This was the view from our balcony!

Aunt Sheila approved!

First picture on the beach!!!

And a couple of us-ies (think selfies but us)!

I took a break after a little while to take a few pictures of Nee and Jake catching waves (and because my eyes were burning from the combination of salt water and sunscreen). Aunt Sheila was on shark duty...and there were sharks. We got called out by the lifeguard because he saw at least two breach the water.

I am no scientist, but I can tell you exactly why there has been so many shark attacks this summer: BECAUSE THE FISH ARE EVERY WHERE!!!  I have never been to the beach and seen so many schools of fish, so LARGE, so close. Their ripples were EVERY where around us ALL THE TIME....and then you would see a bunch of them jump out of the water ten feet away...and there is a good chance they were jumping to get away from a shark.  It was pretty creepy!!!

The wind was so strong it you didn't even have to throw or kick the ball...it went when it wanted to!  Mom and I watched Jake and Aunt Sheila chase it a reallllllllyyyyy lonnnnngggg way one time because the wind just kept taking it.  It was pretty funny.

Mom was going to take Aunt Sheila and me but we wanted it with the beach behind us not the hotel. So we just turned around and Mom snapped the picture...As I am typing it, it doesn't seem that funny but it was!  I guess you had to be there!  We will have to see if we laugh about it in 20 years.

We had a good time watching a big storm roll in.

The people on the beach must not have seen it coming...

This picture doesn't even do it justice.  It was clear and bright to the right and to the left there were ominous clouds and darkness.

We decided to eat lunch on the deck and do a little storm watching.

The wind was crazy!!!  I think this must be how trump does his hair. Blow it all forward and then you just flop it back.

Jake was leaning into the wind and it was holding him up!

This is the "during" the storm....

...and this is the after! Too much rain too quickly!

We too some time to relax during the storm.

And then we headed to Friendly's (we never knew there was one in SC!!! A new tradition has been born when we go to the beach!)

It was a nice quick trip! Two nights is just about right for the beach.

On the way out of town we stopped by what we were told is a local restaurant that was worth stopping for lunch. We can now check it off our list...but we probably won't go back. Kind of pricey for just so-so food.  It looks better than it was...

After some school, Jake enjoyed a movie...I am not sure what else happened because I fell asleep.  Gotta love a road trip!