Gem mining and all sorts of fun

I don’t have pictures of our Labor Day weekend trip.

I don’t know how to tell a story without pictures.

How can I tell you about the Great Smoky Mountains?

Can I paint you a picture with words of how the tree covered hills rolled out before us and left us in awe?

I don’t even know where to begin but I will give it a try anyway.

We took the trek across the beautiful state of North Carolina to a small town called Franklin, nestled in the hills of the Smoky Mountains. The entire state is pretty. But once we reached the mountains, it was a whole different kind of pretty. Different than the mountains we know and love out in California. I am constantly surprised by how God creatively decorated our world.

We were planning to meet up with our college friend Jami at the local Wal-Mart and follow her out to her Nana’s house. She gave me directions and I half way listened, foolishly confident that our GPS would find the way. But our little Australian GPS lady proceeded to take us on the scenic tour of the backwoods. “Now arriving at Wal-Mart on left,” she says. Uh-huh, sure. Look there’s a house. There’s a cute little country elementary school. Oh, and a picnic area. Definitely not Wal-Mart. Never trust the cute Australian lady trapped in the little gizmo.

We did finally meet up with Jami and her fiancée, Dale. JD ran straight to her and gave her a big hug. He told us several times on the way that he remembers Jami and wouldn’t be shy this time. He was right. He was not shy.

We drove up to her Nana’s house, which is also the home that Jami grew up in. I really enjoyed her Nana. Ninety plus years old and feisty. If only I could be so witty and positive when I’m in my 90’s (not that I’m particularly either right now in my 30’s).

We stayed in a cabin just up the road from her Nana’s house. Matt, ever the traveler, made himself comfortable and started saying “This is my house” right away. Poor kid must be very confused about where he lives with our move and all our traveling lately.

We basically had only one full day up there. The boys started the day by playing outside the cabin, filling the bug house with caterpillars. Moriah was quite upset to not be a part of that adventure. She stayed by the window, banging on it and calling out “Dada”, “Baba” and all other sorts of babbling.

After that we took a walk with Jami and Dale, learning about all the places and adventures Jami had growing up. That was so special to me! I’m a visual sort of person. Just hearing about her childhood is not as powerful as actually seeing and hearing together. What a fantastic place to grow up too! There are woods, streams, mud, mines, and plenty of assorted little creatures. The boys enjoyed playing in the stream, throwing rocks down it, and taking a little rest right in the middle. Nothing like playing in pure, fresh outdoor water.

Then we went to the Cherokee Ruby Mine that used to be owned by Jami’s family. This was a really fun adventure for me. I had never done anything like this. Again, I’m not exactly sure how to describe it for you. First Jami showed us several stones to let us know what we are looking for. There are rubies, sapphires, garnet, moonstones, rhodolite, rutile and sillimanite. Are you overwhelmed just reading that? I really was looking at them and wondering how I would know what is really a gem and what is just a rock. We were given screens and buckets of dirt. We took those over to the flume line, which has fresh water from the river running down it. After dumping in about a quarter of the dirt from the bucket, we lowered the screen into the water and washed all the dirt off. This was the best part for the kids. They loved to play in all the mud and feel the cool water. Even Moriah really enjoyed it, except for the mean 'ole Mommy taking away all the rocks she tried to eat. After the rocks were cleaned then we took the screens out of the water and sorted through all the rocks, looking for the precious gems. This was really hard! Jami had to help all of us out. But finally after about my fourth or fifth screen full, I picked out a little chunk all on my own, one of the rocks that looks like shiny pencil lead (rutile, maybe… I’m so clueless!). It really did feel exhilarating to find my very own gem.

And to finish the afternoon, after a little napping and movie watching, the boys went fishing in Jami’s Nana’s fish pond. Jami, Moriah and I scooted down the hill to Wal-Mart for some girl time while they were fishing. Guy bonding = fishing; Girl bonding = shopping; right? When we got back, JD told me they caught hundreds of fish and then in scuba sign language he told me about big, little, and medium fish. He is very cute using his scuba sign language.

What a great trip! We are so glad we decided to go. It was a looong drive (over 7 hours of drive-time, which with our many stops took closer to 10+ hours) but well worth it. We had quality time with Jami, learning more about her background and enjoying her Nana. We met her fiancee Dale, enjoying getting to know him and laughing with him. He has the best sense of humor. We saw more of our great state of North Carolina. And we built some great family memories. Can’t wait until February, when we can celebrate Jami and Dale’s wedding out in California.