Moving In

We moved in to our new place on Friday. That was an experience! The driver (of our moving truck) and I couldn't see eye-to-eye and evidently everyone knew evidenced by a conversation between the two movers and overheard by Clay:

Mover 1: I think that lady is going to kill him.

Mover 2: Yep. She's pretty mad at him.

First off he couldn't get his rig to the apartment building and had to go get a truck for "shuttling". And, it poured rain on Friday! Of course! Basically, the movers had to move us twice in one day; once from the rig to the shuttle (three trips) and from the shuttle to the apartment. It was the longest day EVER! Then he wanted me to do part of his work. Now, I don't mind helping but this how he asked me, "You can't be on the phone today. You have to do some paperwork so we can finished quicker." Umm, yeah. And, then, he wanted to argue with me over where to place furniture. Go figure!

But, we got in with minimal losses and spent Friday night unpacking, washing dishes and setting up house.

Our first night in the place.....comfort camping!

Ben had a blast playing in the boxes while we waited on the first shuttle of furniture.

Moving in the rain...YUCK!

Moving Day!

After the packers left, here is what our apartment looked like:
And, this is what it looks like in front of our building right now:The movers are here and loading us up! And, this is going FAST!

Getting There....

Thanks to a kind neighbor, my laptop is automatically connecting to a network and I have INTERNET!

The packers are here and we are about 1/3 of the way packed. After they finish we're off to run a few errands (drop off some things at my parents and grandparents) and take Maggie to my MIL's for the weekend.

I'll keep you posted!

Back In a Few Days

Well, it looks like this will most likely be my last post from our home in Boiling Springs. Tomorrow I turn in the cable and internet equipment to Charter.....I end my almost 10 year e-mail account! That is kind of sad!

But, the Time Warner guy is coming to the new place on Friday and, hopefully, by the end of the weekend we'll have new e-mail and Internet again! In the meantime, once I get down there, the community has wireless at the pool and clubhouse.....so I won't be totally back in the dark ages for long.

Have a great week and when you hear from us again, we'll be the newest residents of Columbia, SC!!!

Bye-Bye, Boiling Springs!

The boys and I took a load of goods down to the Salvation Army after lunch and then decided to take a trip around Boiling Springs......we started out at the old Confederate cemetary on HWY 9. (this is funny because its really small, overgrown and most people never even notice it!)

Then we drove on up to Lake Bowen, where it started raining while we were walking around.

My boys throwing rocks into the lake, right before it started raining!

When we got back down HWY 9, hot, we stopped at Sandy's Shaved Ice for a treat and took it with us to the literal Boiling Spring (at least it used to boil!).

Ben and I enjoyed our shaved ices at the spring.

More muck than spring, as you can see. Amazingly there is still life in there....we counted 5 little fishies swimming around!

Bye-Bye, Boiling Springs!

Our Last Full Week

This is our last full week here in Spartanburg. The moving company came this morning and as of right now they are pretty sure that they will pack us on Wednesday, load us on Thursday and move us in on Friday (just in time for our new Internet and cable to be hooked up!)

As you can imagine this week is crazy busy for us. With Ron traveling, the boys and I are working on the house. The moving company will pack virtually everything, but I'm still going through each room with two boxes -- Goodwill and Trash. So far, we've duped two boxes and three bags fo trash and we have two boxes for Goodwill. Tomorrow, we tackle the hard parts --- the boy's bedroom and closet and the office shelves. The last part is the utililty room and I can't do it without Ron's help.

After lunch the boys and I went to the Scout Shop for Clay to buy a couple of new things with his Eagle gift cards. Then we decided to "see some sites" around downtown. (I'm actually working on a project for next year about where I'm from and needed some photos and thought it would be good to do one last sightseeing trip.)

We visted with Daniel Morgan and walked around the new park around him.

The boys enjoying one of the many new statues.

We also drove by my old high school....Spartanburg High School.

And we stopped at my alma mater (for undergraduate and graduate)...Converse College.

Visiting with Emily.....Converse has put up these new statues that represent strong, important historical women. This one depicts Emily Dickinson and her contributions.

Bye-Bye, Spartanburg!!

The Wilbur Smith Company Picnic

The picnic was held at Saluda Shoals park. We ate, hiked, got wet and had a generally great time! The only downside was that the rain didn't hold off....as glad as we are to have rain, too bad it didn't wait until after 5!

Ben played horseshoes and met a new friend, Victor.

Ron, Clay and I hiked a short trail down to the lake before the rain really started. Then, Clay and I hiked back later with Ben in the rain.

One of the main focuses was FOOD!! There were hotdogs, BBQ pork, fried chicken, wonderful grilled veggie skewers, typical southern sides, cookies, sno cones and cotton candy!

The best part for Ben was the water park. It warmed up just enough that, even though it was raining, he was able to play in the water with his new friends.

Saturday Morning in Columbia

After sleeping in this morning, can you guess where we ate breakfast?!

Yep, Capital Cafe....can you guess what we ate?!

Nope! No, shrimp 'n grits today! But, we didn't give up the pumpkin cinammon rolls!

After breakfast we enjoyed a wonderful walk down Main Street. The weather was perfect! There was a rain cloud blowing in so it was cool and breezy. We admired some of the neat architecture on our way to the Art Museum. Here is one of those little known facts about me...I really wanted to be an Art History major. I took several classes and loved it, but wasn't sure if I could actually ever get a job and chickened out. We walked around the travelling exhibit which included several Picasso's, Chegal's, Matisse's and, my personal favorite, Mary Cassatt. I can't wait to go back and explore the permanent exhibit. I was very impressed with Ron! He had some unique insight into several pieces.

We also stumbled upon a very cool antique store that was more like a museum. This guy had memorabilia from Box Car Willie, James Brown, USC and tons of other things. We found a couple of prints that we'd eventually like to have of Carolina football from the '40s.

Friday Night in Columbia

After dinner and a quick hike through Five Points where we saw "the bride" and some beautiful greyhounds up for adoption, we drove out to the area where we are going to be living just to "check it out". We decided to stop at Wal-Mart (as if we have nothing better to do!) And, lo and behold, Clay sees one of his friends and fellow Scouts in the parking lot! Steven has been visiting his sister and her husband...talk about a small world!

On the way back out we discovered the "bull".....a kid's ride on of a mechanical bull. It was worth the 50 cents for Ben and Clay to ride!
We got back downtown and walked a few blocks to the Vista for ice cream at Marble Slab and then walked back by the State House to see it lit up at night. It was a wonderful, exciting, adventurous, and full day in Columbia.....needless to say, we all slept VERY WELL!

Ben rests for a second on the lion outside our hotel.

This was the view outside our hotel window/balcony.

Where in the World Are We?

Yup, here we are.....again. Back in Columbia. I'm beginning to feel like I live her. Oh wait, soon I will!!! We came down with Ron again today to spend the day (and night) --- another up at 5 and out at 6 morning--- for Ron's company picnic tomorrow.

We started our morning by having breakfast oustide, looking at the capital, with Ron at the Capital Cafe. And, yes, we had the sweet potato cinamon roll and shrimp 'n grits again!

After breakfast we walked around the state house grounds

and over into the cemetary of Trinity Episcopal, where 5 state governors and many other important SCarolinians are buried. (if you look very closely in the background, you'll notice a bagpiper playing...it was very surreal to be walking around and listening to the bagpipe music at the same time.)

As we headed down Main towards 277, we discovered a Roadway Inn about a block from Ron's company and we stopped to check the rates, as we were out on a mission to find a place to stay tonight. The rates were great and the place is older, but not a dump.....and, the desk guy let us check in....at 9:30 a.m.! After taking our stuff to the room, we headed out to Two Notch and visited Clay's school to enroll him in a summer school online math enrichment program and drop off some paperwork for their ALERT, a special Social Studies, program. Then, we drove around and found Spring Valley High.


When we got back downtown, we stopped at the City Market, a spring festival each Friday outside the Art Museum, before picking Ron up for lunch at Palmetto Pig (of course!). When we finished lunch we went up to Ron's office and met a couple of the people he works with, then headed out for a walk towards the Vista. After our walk, we loaded back up and headed to the museum. (We're members...we need to take advantage!) The boys had a blast!



We stopped at a bookstore for some Gamecock Gear Sales (I picked up a hat for $2 and Ben got a spring game shirt for $2), drove around Rosewood Drive and Devine and now we are in the room resting and waiting for Ron to get "home" from work. A little later we're heading down to 5 Points for dinner at the Salty Nut and then hang out for First Friday. (bands, the stores are open late, etc.)