While March may have roared in with rain and snow, it has yielded to a mild and dry spring as it exits quietly. The middle and end of this month have flown by with some of the most fun that we’ve had so far this year. Who thought that a family with two injured adults could stay so busy?
We celebrated Saint Patty’s day early this year with a quick trip to our favorite stand by, Rock City –or in this case, Shamrock City. Green currently holds rank as Ian’s most favorite color. I think brand awareness has quite a bit to do with this. Thanks John Deere. So of course Shamrock City completely satisfies Ian’s green obsession with the green waterfall, green kettle-corn, and green shamrock beads given out. The absolute best part of our Rock City visit was spending it with Amy and Charlie! We got to see Charlie right before his big birthday. I can’t believe he is a big five-year-old now!
From Rock City, we slid on through the month and made it to a Saturday dinner with some of 
our favorite cousins, the Ziegler! Brent grilled the most amazing steaks, and Karen provided us with a beautiful salad with so many sides that I think I’m still full. They didn’t warn me in time that Emily was going to make a mouth-watering strawberry strudel that I had to eat despite coming close to exploding. They also didn’t warn us that we had walked into an active war zone. After arming a four-year-old with a Nerf gun and foam bullets, Emily explained that there was a closet dedicated to this sport, and the entire family participated in battle, cousins not exempt. As the acting field journalist, I managed to catch quite a bit of friendly fire, but I’m pretty sure Brinn spent the evening without thinking about his sore elbow at all. And Ian slept the entire drive home to Cookeville and well into the next morning. Thanks guys! We were happy to sleep in on Sunday!
Last weekend the Muddy River Festival took place on Spring Creek, our home creek that runs just a few miles past our house. A local festival meant lots of boaters around our parts! While the surgeon has told Brinn he could begin doing some light paddling, Brinn was ready to get back on the water. Terry rolled into town Thursday night, so he and Brinn were able to take Ian out for his first ducky trip down Clear Creek, then Ian was off to his Nana’s to spend the weekend on the sailboat. Ian also managed to get in a trip to the aquarium in Gatlinburg, and quite a bit of time at a park on the lake. I’d like to think that he missed his parents, but largely he was too busy having fun with his Nana to spend any time talking on the phone with us. After the departure of Ian, we spent Saturday hanging out with good friends around the creek, Brinn ran Spring 
Creek with a giant group of our friends, then many of those friends made their way back to our house for a very informal, loosely planned dinner. It was chaotic and disorganized, two conditions that typically make me insane, but actually we had the most amazing time. Wes and Rachel sautéed peppers, mushrooms, and onions in a ton of butter with Worcestershire to go on our sandwiches while Racheal and Wayne brought fresh deli rolls and so many chips (I may have eaten half a bag of black pepper chips by myself). I’d left a crockpot going all day while we were at the creek so we had warm shredded Italian Drip Beef to pack into the rolls and smoother with cheese. Alanna made three calorie loaded desserts, and darn if they weren’t all delicious! The last I’d heard, Todd had decided not to come to the festival, but then he magically showed up in the living room behind me. We ate in shifts as people arrived, and I’m pretty sure I ate with each new person that walked through the door. I’m sensing a theme with my food intake every weekend.
As the festival wound down, Brinn and I found ourselves faced with half of a Sunday with no child. While compulsion encouraged us to go pick up Ian early, we trespassed on Nana’s patience a little longer, and we went to lunch together to a restaurant with no children’s menu! Amazing how much fun two adults can have doing nothing but eating and talking when all they have to worry about is eating and talking. We look forward to be able revisit the Bull and Thistle again soon, and hopefully when one of our friends is playing there with his band.
Before March has totally disappeared for good, Ian managed to add a little more variety to our lives by bringing home two ducklings from Tractor Supply. Brinn swears that he had left Ian looking at the ducks while he went to find an item he needed to purchase. When he came back, Ian had talked someone into boxing up two of the baby birds for him to take to the front register. Angie, are you reading this? I suspect you may have had a hand in this adoption scheme 😉 So now Ian has two baby ducks he’s caring for…in my living room. I feel like we just got his last batch of chicks out of the living room, but now the heat lamp and water trough is back. Ian’s a little older and a little more careful this time around, so now he has birds that run to him instead of away from him. He’s been enjoying taking the ducks outside for walks and watching them waddle across the yard to catch up with him. Unfortunately Ian woke us up at 5:00 AM this morning to inform us that he’d been up to check on his babies and they were doing good. To be honest, at 5:00 AM I would not have been upset if they were not well.
So here’s hoping for an April that’s just as busy with friends and family, but maybe with fewer avians.
As winter considers belching one more cold front before spring officially rolls in next week, the Kisers are healing up and almost ready to resume our normal lives. For the past four months, we’ve been tiptoeing around our usual activities as health issues interrupted our regularly scheduled broadcasts. The first issue occurred back in November with my car accident. What we initially thought to be extreme soreness showed up on an MRI to in fact be a bulged disc in my neck. So while it’s been a pain in the neck (pun fully intended there), it has been a relief to actually have a diagnosis so we could chart a plan of treatment. While I’ve been rehabbing my weak neck muscles to better support my poorly functioning disc, Brinn has had his own fun with nerve surgery. After carpal tunnel and ulnar nerve surgery, he’s joined me for my tri-weekly physical therapy sessions. We’re just such a sweet couple that we enjoy sharing everything, even our physical therapist.
In the meantime, we’ve found a few different ways to entertain ourselves over the last few months. Aside from feeding Reggie and her minions (can you believe that she still wants to eat everyday, even though I’m not riding??), we’ve been able to enjoy a few meals with our MSR family.
halfway through his semester in gymnastics at the Little Gym, and still faithfully chasing his chickens around the yard everyday. Black Chicken still remains a very nice (not black) rooster and let’s Ian catch him without spurring him, but here lately even the hens have been letting Ian catch them. I’m not sure if they’ve just given up, or if they’re not as nervous as they used to be. Either way, everyone is laying and no one is flogging, so we’ve not had any fresh soup stock in a while.
Last week, we decided to load up on Wednesday to go see some of our friends for the evening and check out MTSU to see what their weekly roll practice is all about. Holy moly! This place was awesome! I mean, yeah, it was cool to hang out with our friends and other boaters, but the slide! Their pool has a giant water slide that the lifeguards turned on for Ian. Then Brinn and Wes took turns standing at the bottom to catch Ian every time he came flying off the end. I think this does still count as developing kayaking skills because Brinn worked on river signals with Ian to 
communicate, and Ian couldn’t start down the slide until he used his signals to verify that his catcher was in place. Parents take note, this may be the best pre-dinner activity on the planet for children. After leaving campus, we joined the group for a quick dinner at one of their local haunts. Ian brought his blanket inside, curled up on one bench of the booth beside our table, and promptly slept through the entire meal. Brinn and I had an entire meal with our grown-up friends to enjoy doing nothing but eating and gabbing. I’m pretty sure we’ll be attempting to repeat this scenario soon. Despite Ian’s obsessive fascination with the slide, we also had other entertainment in place at the pool, including watching Sarah climb inside Ian’s teenie tiny Fun1 kayak and squirt it around the pool (suggested weight range 30-80 pounds; Sarah’s weight? Probably around 110 pounds). Even Todd took a go at the kiddie kayak.
In another news, Ian also spent an entire week of sleeping on the floor. Blanket forts not being elaborate enough for the experienced outdoorsman, Ian kept half the living room tied up with a tent for a full week-long. Mogwai and Chaco were not thrilled with the sleeping arrangements of this indoor adventure, as Ian insisted that they join him in his tent every evening. Finally the nights grew cold enough again that we needed to resume using the wood stove, so the fabric sleeping shelter needed to safely return to the closet. Thankfully Ian has not asked to pull it back out again over the last two weeks.
Prayer can be a really hard concept to teach to adults, let alone children. Ian’s been asking some tough questions lately. Particularly at Christmas, when he asked why he couldn’t see God in the nativity scene set up in the lobby at his preschool. When I tried to explain that he could see God in the form of baby Jesus, I got the side eye. Obviously I didn’t do an adequate job attempting to explain the holy trinity to my four-year-old. But heck, the trinity is a tough idea for me to wrap my head around. Luckily we’ve asked Whitney, one of the pastors at our church, to give it a go explaining this idea to Ian. You know, since it’s kind of his job to teach this stuff.
After church ended, we bundled up and took off to Standing Stone State Park do a little hiking through the snow. The snow swirled around us while the trees swayed in the wind as we set out to climb down the mountain through the safety zone. About halfway into our descent, I told Ian that he could let Mogwai go for a little while as Mogwai was ready to stretch his legs out a bit more than Ian can manage. For about a quarter of a mile, Mogwai stayed right with us, and would run up into the trees and back to us as dogs delight in doing. And then a squirrel ran across Mogwai’s path.
more signs of the wild hogs that have invaded this area. Trees were coated in red clay as high as three-foot up, and roots exposed in the side of the hill. Pigs cause such destruction to the landscape. We made it to the creek at the bottom of the mountain, then decided to turn around and head back up the trail to see if Mogwai might retrace his steps and run into us.
It was at this point that our little family started snapping at each other. Brinn stressed over Mogwai, and snapped at me for letting him go. Our legs were burning from the incline and our lungs gulped air from our lack of conditioning. We all guzzled water from the nalgene bottle we carried. Ian wanted to help find Mogwai and started yelling for him, which irritated Brinn who was trying to whistle and listen for Mog. Chaco became fed up with all of us and barked at us, or squirrels, or the wind for all we know. Then Ian moved into doom and gloom mode. He complained and carried on that something happened to his puppy dog. A hog got him. A hunter shot him. He’s lost forever in the woods. Eventually between Brinn’s snapping and Ian’s commiserating, I finally lost my patience.
“Baby, complaining will do absolutely nothing to help your doggie right now. If you want to be productive, the only way you can help is to pray that Jesus will bring your puppy-dog back to you. “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength” (Psalms 8:2). And in that instance, my four-year-old shamed us by doing the one thing that his parents should have shown him and led by example. Ian stopped in the middle of the trail and he prayed. “Dear Jesus. Please bring Mogwai back to me.”
Now when we ask Ian if he would like to say the blessing at meal times, he usually asks us if he can pray his favorite prayer. It has nothing to do with thanking God for his food, but everything to do with thanking him for bringing that goofy dog back to us a month ago. If you ask Ian if he wants to pray, he will gladly say yes, then launch into his favorite prayer: “Jesus, thank you for bringing Mogwai back to me.”
Communication issues about and between Badger and Ian abounded this last Sunday. The first instance occurred around mid-morning. Brinn was one-week post op on his arm, and still not feeling too well, so we made the lazy decision to skip church (for like the third Sunday in a row) and hang around the house all day. I’d settled into that perfect stride in a new book –you know, where you’ve made it past getting to know all the characters, and now you’re really into the story. In other words, I was in the perfect place to not really pay attention to Ian or what he was up to.
And really, I am okay with that. We’ve been so fortunate to have a kind, sweet boy who enjoys many of our other hobbies, especially paddling. But from the moment I knew I was pregnant, I dreamed of having a kid I could share my passion for horses with. Brinn and I weren’t particularly sold on the idea of taking maternity pix, but because a good friend of ours was available to do them for us, we did. And even then, at Ian’s first photo session, I had Reggie involved. By the time Ian could walk, we had him out helping me feed. Once he could sit unsupported, I needed to have him up on Reggie with me. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that Badger’s rotten pony incident was not one of the best moments to date of my life as a parent.
Brinn’s carpal tunnel and nerve damage to his elbow has worsened recently, so his surgeon has scheduled surgery for next Thursday. Two weeks out from surgery, Brinn started brining pork loins and preparing to smoke a feast so I called in the cavalry. As soon as I shared with our boating buddies that Brinn wanted to have a party before he goes under the knife, they immediately moved into action. You may think your friends are cool, but Brinn’s friends show up at the house with little notice bringing boats and whiskey.
wrapped duck jalapeno poppers (talk about the ultimate man food) while Terry went stir crazy. Brinn owes Terry big for his restless energy –it got all of his gear packed correctly for a Saturday trip. From there they decided they needed to make fire, because apparently the one already going in the wood stove was not enough. Out came the diesel can and a pile of unsplit logs in the back yard. Truth be told, it really was about time that we burned the Christmas tree.
As darkness descended, our guests of varying sizes arrived. We ended up with a houseful of five kids ranging in ages from two to I think eight or nine-years-old. This absolutely made Ian’s night. Jc brought Ian a hand-me-down battery-powered four-wheeler, which is exactly what Ian has been planning to save up for. I’m still not sure Ian has recovered from the shock of seeing the beautiful red four-wheeler arrive. Jc, you have no idea how happy you’ve made a little boy. Between the four wheeler, Ian’s tractor, and his gator, we had seats for almost every kid to cruse around the yard while parents migrated from the food in the kitchen to the chairs around the fire. While nothing can replace the sereneness of sitting around a campfire in the woods on the second night of a weekend camping trip, we came close to replicating this feel. We had good company, good food, good drinks, and conversation inevitably flowed about paddling, parenting, and even softball injuries to the knee.
me to have more so that my little one could have someone else to play with. Tom brought his son T-Rex, who is not nearly so little anymore, Jc and Crystal bought their sweet children, and Ben and JoAnna’s E has no idea that she’s only two and considerably smaller than Jc and Crystal’s bigger kids. E kept right up with the older kids all evening with no regard for the cold. I’m fairly certain that Ian fell sound asleep within minutes of the last child’s departure. Even better: he slept past 6:30 AM the next morning! Most of my close friends know from first person experience that I’m not a kid person. Mainly because I don’t know how to interact with kids or what to do with them (except with Ian –he has me extremely well-trained). But these kids are all awesome and did a great job entertaining themselves.
Terry, Ben, JoAnna, Jc, Crystal, and Tom probably have no idea how much gratitude I have for their willingness to leave home after dark and make the long drive to our little corner in Putnam county, but they all make Brinn smile, and that means the absolute world to me. This upcoming surgery has some risks that go along with it, and Brinn has understandably been worried and stressing over it.A night to chill by the fire with good friends is exactly what he needed, and these sweet people delivered in a way I will always appreciate.
for the guys to run lower Crooked Fork had to be scrapped, so instead they turned their focus to the Obed. In contrast with Friday’s debacle of forgotten gear and chasing water levels, Saturday actually managed to run rather smoothly. Ian and I dropped Brinn and Terry off at the Devil’s Breakfast Table by 10:30 AM and made our way to Nemo by driving up on the area in Catoosa. As shameful as it may be for a home-grown to admit, driving the area makes me so nervous. I don’t remember all the twisty gravel roads, and could end up in Oakdale just as easily as Wartburg. Fortunately we ran into some very kind TWRA agents who were more than happy to point us in the right direction. Having family in the area is a huge benefit when it comes to setting shuttle, and when Ian and I arrived at Nemo my dad was waiting for us. We left my truck at the bridge and my dad drove Ian and I to Grandma’s so we could spend the day with family without having to worry about trying to get back to Nemo to pick the guys up when they came off the water.
As soon as Ian and I rolled into Grandma’s house, he immediately asked her to make him some popcorn. Now my grandm
a is not exactly the cookie baking kind of grandma who gives out hugs and tells her grandchildren that they can do no wrong, but she is a great cheerleader for us to achieve great things and does make the absolute best popcorn in the world. I don’t believe that she has ever in her life bought microwave popcorn.Some of my fondest childhood memories involve that popcorn, and eating it still takes me back to those early years. After indulging Ian’s popcorn request, Grandma introduced Ian to a new part of her house this weekend: the attic. This new series of small rooms full of outgrown toys from my cousins over the years had Ian enthralled, so my dad and I slipped out for a quiet hike down to the creek.
While Brinn didn’t get to paddle Crooked Fork, I at least go
t to enjoy
Brinn and Terry didn’t have nearly the excitement out on the water that they did back on the 2nd, but the quite tranquility and splendor of the river gorge seemed to leave quite an impression. It ended up not being quite a dry haired day as Brinn managed to go for a roll on one of the more awkward rapids with multiple diagonal current lines. Apparently Terry didn’t even laugh at him when it happened. Or take a picture of it. What kind of friend is that? While the majority of their run was made up of class IIs and small class IIIs, the two did manage to do quite a bit of scouting for future family outings. As they identified several promising campsites, we hope to be able to turn this run into an over-nighter with the raft and kids later this spring once all medical issues are behind us. Here’s a glimpse into their trip:
We horse people easily perplex the rest of the world. We take the horses, a former source of transportation, and transport them around the country and pay other people to look at them and tell us which ones are the prettiest. We spend gobs of money to pretty our horses up, and kill ourselves with the amount of time we put into prepping our horses for the show pen. And at the end of it all, we may get to take home a $0.50 ribbon for our troubles. Despite the obvious neurosis we must suffer to partake in this crazy scheme, I can’t imagine a better way to have spent 3/4 of my life. I blew off senior prom and high school graduation for horse shows, and missed plenty of parties and trips in order to wake up at 3:0 A.M. to throw my pretty pony in the trailer and drive across the state. After showing for 20 years, I’ve discovered that there are quite a few products that show riders just can’t live without.
The first, and most important of these products is the show bow. Take yourself back to the 1990’s. Vests and tuxedo shirts with rosette ties adorned the majority of women at every AQHA, APHA, ApHC, and 4-H show across the country.With this carefully constructed wardrobe, one couldn’t have a sloppy ponytail detracting from the shiny threads adorning these vests. What could a girl possibly do with her giant wod of hair? Enter the show bow! At one time the show bow was so readily available in any tack store and catalogue that riders could easily match their hair helmet to the color of her chaps. R.I.P. show bow.
jumper has its roots in the hunt field. Riders still today dress in the same attire that fox hunters have worn for the chase for more than a century. Horses in the hunter ring should emulate those on a hunt –they should be quiet and easy to ride with nice ground covering gates and a careful, scopey jump. Not only do riders still dress traditionally for hunters, but they also use very similar tack. Western pleasure horses have their roots on cattle drives in the old west. Cows never run fast, so WP horses have no need to run fast either. And the saddle is so handy. Cowboys need a horn to tie a rope off on in case they have a need to tie something. Now I’ve not had an occasion to tie something to my horse in the show pen, but the need may arise, so I’m glad I still have the option available. And don’t forget the shiny silver trim. Like a fish, I’m attracted to all things shiny. Every shiny saddle satisfies the 12 year old girl still in me who loves all things that glitter.Who cares if the saddle has to live in a cushioned case and stay in a temperature controlled environment? A fancy schmancy saddle that can only be used a few dozen times a year is well worth the investment.
While we’re discussing shiny tack, let’s discuss the beloved Chicago screw. It’s so much more efficient than an awkward buckle. Who wants a clunky buckle that’s stitched firmly into the leather of a headstall? Better to have a screw that can collect corrosion, requires a screwdriver for every time you want to change out your bit, and can work its way loose as your horse chews the bit. That’s really only a problem when the screw pops out while you’re riding, and even then it’s only a problem if your horse decides to spit out the bit.But hey, you’ll look really good right up until you’re riding a horse with no bit or reins.
rses. Have you ever showed one? It’s rough trying to keep up with a world of bays and chestnuts. Brown horses hide dust and scuffs so efficiently. It’s like they came camoflaged for the show ring. Grey horses, on the other hand, show every speck of dust that accumulates on their meticulously groomed hides. Oh, and they also have suicidal tendencies, so if you allow these crazy beasts any turn out at all, they will manage to scar their expensive selves up. And don’t forget the explosive diarreah that occurs on the trailer ride and again seconds before your 
gate call. It’s hard being grey horse girl living in a bay horse world. But two important products exist to help combat these pesky problems. Shapley’s touch-up paint formulated specifically for horses has hid many a boo-boo on Ghost and Bear over the years. It’s important that you buy both the grey and white paints so that you can combine for an exact match of your horse’s hair tone. Hopefully you can minimize the amount of touch-up paint needed 
by keeping your delicate dust magnet covered from head to tail right up until the time they you begin competing. A Sleazy Sleepwear Hood is an essential item for keeping your grey clean as long as possible. And as a bonus, you can look really obnoxious in the schooling ring of bays and chestnuts while you hop around on your purple and blue steed.
bottle: Absorbine Show-Sheen. This stuff can polish and shine a coarse haired donkey. On a regularly groomed show horse, it’ll turn their coat into greased lightning. Don’t believe me? Obviously you’re not one of the geniuses who shined your horse up diligently for halter and showmanship, then realized what a mistake you’d made once you tried to keep your saddle in place later in the day. There’s nothing quite like having your girth and pommel riding around on a slip and slide. There’s always the option of not using Show-Sheen, but I’m just not sure that it would feel like a show without the aroma of Aborbine products wafting from my stalls.
2016, I’m not going to lie. Things have been rough. While we absolutely have so many wonderful blessings to focus on, sometimes it still gets a bit frustrating as we deal with all of the negatives thrown at us in a short time period. Brinn has taken the hardest brunt of these burdens as he’s been caring for me, coordinating my medical appointments and sorting out payment issues with insurance agents, driving me around, taking Ian to the doctor for a sinus infection, running his shop during deer season, and trying to finish the home improvement projects we started back in early November. Meanwhile, he’s developed nerve damage in his elbow, and has continued to put surgery off while dealing with my descent into disrepair.
When Terry got in touch with us to ask about paddling through the New Year Holiday, our crazy group of friends immediately sprang to action and started checking local river levels and monitored the weather forecasts. The group finally settled on a New Year’s Eve run down Clear Creek on my favorite section of Tennessee white-water. Unfortunately my injuries and doctor orders prevented me from being able to join in, but it did provide an opportunity for Brinn to get out and have some fun. I think I actually forgot to mention anything about Terry coming into town to Brinn until Wednesday night or Thursday. When he found out that a friend/accomplished paddler would be in route to Tennessee on Friday, he quickly began shifting his paddling goals to enjoying bigger runs.
weekend of paddling activity. We struggled a bit to get the guys out on the water, Saturday. I’m not sure “hot mess” even comes close to describing the state of Kiser family right now. Despite a whole host of set backs on Saturday morning including poor navigation (yep, that one’s on me), forgotten GoPro (gotta pin that one all on Brinn), late start (darn cell phone reception), we did indeed finally find the take-out and were able to drop off cars at bottom and then made our way back to the put-in so the guys could get in some H2O therapy. Last on and last off of the river for the day, I think they were able enjoy themselves as they had moderate flows of 1’6″.
Daddy’s is not a run I have ever aspired to work up to. The consequences seem too severe for my limited paddling abilities and my slow reaction time. Thus I cannot narrate the run to you first hand, but will try to piece together some description based on reports from the guys. The last time Brinn ran Daddy’s Creek he managed to flip going into Rocking Chair, roll up then snap an AT paddle, flip again, and find himself being washed into a boulder pile, and finally swim. Then he proceeded to lose a hand paddle on down. Saturday proved to be redemptive run for Brinn as the entire group managed to have a dry 
hair day. The run allows for a good warmup with straightforward class II and III rapids that eventually build into solid class IVs. Paddlers ease their way down through boulders the size of houses! Another point of interest along this run are the cabins scattered along the river banks with no obvious road access. The creek eventually takes boaters into the Catoosa Wildlife Management Area where they can choose to take out at the Devil’s Breakfast Table, or continue on down to the junction with the Obed River. My tired guys opted to take out at the DBT and drive home with no shoes since I managed to drive off with them after I dropped them off at the put-in.
Unfortunately the New Year dawned a bit dryer than the old year ended. Water levels dropped across the region and the rain hadn’t yet found us. After nursing some beat up joints, the guys seemed content to spend a day resting and recovering while closely monitoring the radar. Except Brinn and Terry seem to be cut from the sam
e cloth, and neither does particularly well with resting. So after a morning of driving out to visually check water levels for runs that do not have an online gauge (and enlisting the help of cousins to send us images of a bony Crooked Fork), they changed their plans from “sitting at the house” (I should have known they would never actually commit to a day of no activity) to hiking on a reconnaissance trip to lineup a potential run of massive waterfalls for the next day. After complete dismissal from the park ranger, the guys changed their tactics to legal research and spent the remainder of the day educating themselves on federal and state waterway laws. They seem to have different ideas than the ranger for what constitutes a navigable waterway.
Our next morning started a bit slowly, but our wonderful cousin (and currently favorite of Brinn), Emily deferred her pancake breakfast to run back to the waterfall down the road from her home to send more pictures of the water level for Brinn and Terry to evaluate. Now Emily must truly love us, because not much comes between this girl and a pancake. Except maybe a donut, but that’s a different story. After examining Emily’s photos, the decision to go for it was hastily agreed upon, and we threw boats and gear in the back of the truck in record time and hit the interstate for home.
Crooked Fork Creek flows right through my grandma’s backyard, and on down to Potter’s Falls, which is just a few miles away from some of our favorite people: Karen, Brent, and Emily. Karen and my mom are cousins, and Karen managed to marry someone who is just as cool and nice as she. So of course their apple didn’t fall far from some pretty awesome trees. The Ziegler family joined us at Potter’s to watch the guys come under the bridge and over the falls not once but twice. Then they invited us back to their house for one of my favorites, a hot chili dinner with grilled cheeses. How many boaters can boast a family who has dinner waiting less than 10 minutes away from the take-out?
For years I used trail riding as a form of conditioning to keep my show horses fit. As my horses all lived at Grandma’s house, I frequently used the trail in her backyard as a warmup for most of my workouts for Reggie. This trail follows right along Crooked Fork Creek, and I’ve also hiked down the creek bed many hot summer days with my brother looking for holes to cool off in, so I’m fairly familiar with this section of Crooked Fork. But like Daddy’s Creek, this is another run that’s considerably over my head when there’s water on it, so I’ll have to default again to Brinn and Terry to provide descriptions of the rapids themselves.
Laymance falls. Unfortunately the falls were not runnable as a tree has lodged itself right in the best line to take over the drop, so the many boaters who were on the water Monday were forced to hike around. Below Laymance, the pace really picks up on this run and the rapids become tighter with bigger consequences. A few times Brinn felt his boat get pulled back towards grabby holes and had to actively paddle through most each feature to punch through and over.
After a long trip for a just few short miles of whitewater involving repeated scouting sessions, the guys finally made it down to Potter’s Falls where we’d all been waiting. Once again, the tired boaters exited their boats to walk down and evaluate the lines they had to choose from. They developed a plan, and Terry led the way over the drop. And what a perfect line it was! Watching talented boaters run big water reminds me a lot of watching the top riders at big shows. My mom always likes to say that good riding is invisible riding, so you have to watch closely for subtle cues to see 
how the good riders quietly guide their horses over demanding jump courses or through technical dressage moves. Good boaters do so much of their movement inside their cockpits with their legs and core, so it’s hard to spot it if you’re a spectator. Nonetheless, spectating has helped me see just how far I have to go as a boater if I ever hope to go beyond class III’s. So many different movements to coordinate! Boof stroke, ear dip, lean forward, lean back, high brace, low brace, scull stroke, draw stroke, rudder stroke, c to c roll, sweep roll, and then of course through it all, dodge the rocks or use the rocks? Lean in to the rock, but never upstream unless you’re pulling into an eddy. It’s highly doubtful that I’ll ever become a steep creeker like these two, but I certainly do admire the skill and athleticism they possess to carry them over flood stage falls.
While Terry achieved textbook perfection with his first descent over the drop, Brinn’s was a bit gnarlier. He managed to insult his already aggravated elbow up above the falls, and it decided to hold a grudge. Halfway over the falls, he completely lost feeling in his hand and dropped the paddle on that side. Rather than hold it with one hand and risk getting smacked in the face with it (or worse, break another paddle!), he decided to throw it. But not without a surprised little yelp sneaking out first.
descent over Potter’s. They’re exhausted and in pain, but apparently that’s not quite where they wanted to end their day, so they carried their boats back up the trail to the bridge and hopped in for another ride over the edge. This time, using some advice from Terry, Brinn was able to drastically improve his technique, and his elbow and hand even cooperated. Terry, however, didn’t have quite the same experience. He managed to smack the side of his head against the only rock at the bottom of the drop. But he didn’t even whine about it. I’d still be carrying on about that hit. But maybe that’s why I shouldn’t be running steep creeks?
No man can step on the same river twice, because it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man. Perhaps boaters should be researching the sayings of Heraclitus, because he is exactly right. Each river and creek you run is a completely different run at different levels. The drops are taller with low water, and the holes are bigger with higher water. Floods rearrange the rocks and river bed and leave wood jammed along the way. The men change as well. Brinn is not the same person he was 15 years ago when he dropped over Potter’s last, nor the person he was 10 years ago when he ran Daddy’s Creek. He’s older and more beat up, but he’s also wiser with more discernment now. Despite the changing river and men, one variable remains unchanged –the river still draws a fantastic community of fellow paddlers to provide fellowship and friendship. I may be the person standing on the bank for most of this season, but I am still looking forward to enjoying a role in this great community. Thanks for the memories and the future adventures, fellow boaters!
Almost all of the best moments we had last year involved spending time with our dear friends, new and old. There were some great accomplishments at work, some great progress with Brinn’s business, and of course Ian has many huge achievements over the last year. Ian learned to mount and trot on Badger; he stepped it up onto new rivers and has begun paddling his own kayak around on very small features close to home. He’s also started learning about electrical currents and how to work an electrical snap kit. He can spell his name like a champ, and is obsessed with remote control operated toys. Over this last year were privileged to meet great paddling friends like Wes, Rachel, Jc, Rick, Spicer, Wayne, Racheal, and Terry. We had plenty of adventures with these new friends and with old ones as well.
claim 2016 as the worst year ever if they wish.
Christmas was mostly a quiet affair this year. We never did get a chance to make it to Rock City to see the lights, nor have we yet made our round visiting friends and family in the Cleveland/Ocoee area. We did manage to squeeze in a cinnamon roll baking session with the boys for our traditional Christmas breakfast with the boys at Mustard Seed Ranch. We also made it out for some Christmas shopping trips and a few Christmas parties this year. On Christmas day, aside from visiting the boys, we spent the rest of 
Christmas as home with Brinn’s parents in the morning, and my dad in the afternoon. Ian probably had his best Christmas yet. He is still overwhelmed with the amount of toys he received, and often has trouble deciding which to focus on first. His favorite gift probably was his new John Deere Gator, as he’s been asking for a Gator for months, and had begun saving his chore money to buy one himself at some point. He didn’t even wait for Grandpoppa to get out of the truck before he’d already scaled up the back and jumped into the truck bed to admire the coveted green Gator with a bed that dumps.
From Christmas, we moved onto birthday festivities for me, including a tasty trip to Joe’s Crabshack. FYI, the lobster pot pie is no longer on the menu 😦 After Joe’s it was on to the Music City Bowl in Nashville to see the Vols as they begin to even up the score against Nebraska. Nebraska last beat TN in 1999 in the Fiesta Bowl with a final score of 31-21.Before that was the Orange Bowl in 1997 with a dreadful score of 42-17. It’s nice to see the tide turning as TN finally has one up against the Cornhuskers. Give us one more matchup so we can finally be even. One after that and we can take the lead on this series.
If you happen to remember my posts from two years ago, Ian went through a short phase when he loved to get Reggie out and take short rides around the field on her. Despite Reggie’s stellar performances as a lead-liner, her size just made me too nervous. Letting Ian ride her required one adult at Reggie’s head, and another walking alongside Ian and holding on to him just in case the worst should happen. This required two adults to be present for every ride, and I still worried that somehow Ian may hit the ground from such a height. So we bought two Shetland ponies who had spent portions of their lives abroad.
Every now and then he would ask to play with the ponies, but more often he didn’t. When I would get the ponies out, Ian would always come pet them and maybe even lead one around for a little bit, but that was the extent of his interest. I had resigned myself to the fact that my kid doesn’t really care for horses, and that’s okay. Riding doesn’t have to be his thing. It’s my thing. Ian doesn’t have to share all of my hobbies. But then things changed. To start with, we lost the grey pony late this summer. In August he took a negative turn, and didn’t come out of it. Given his sudden change in coat texture and thickness, I’m guessing Cushing’s was the culprit.
thing that Aldi frequently run sales for the big bag of carrots (sometimes as low as $0.50 per bag!) because we’re running through them! Often during his walks with Badger, Ian will decide that Badger is hungry and needs to take a break to eat some carrots. This may be why Badger now comes so willingly to the gate every time he sees a human walk out the back door.
a treat unless she works for it. She gets a little too full of herself, otherwise. When I want an excuse to give her a carrot, I typically just get her to bend from side to side and to her chest to do her “carrot stretches.” Ian’s been watching Reggie’s carrot yoga, and has decided Badger should do this everyday as well. Earlier this week I caught him cranking his pony’s head around with a carrot. We had to have a little chat about not using the halter to deepen Badger’s stretching.
that he made this decision on his own and didn’t wait for any help. Usually during his Badger time, I put Reggie in her small pen so that her big hooves are not a concern for a little boy. Yesterday Ian slipped out to the field on his own without telling Brinn what he was up to. I got a call at work later to explain the whole story. After a while, Brinn heard Ian yelling outside. Because Ian has become Mr. Bossy Britches, we’ve been trying to work with him on not yelling and expecting his parents to come to his beck and call. So Brinn ignored the yells…until he heard Ian say “Hey Daddy, look at me!” At this time Brinn flew out the back door fearing the worst. He found Ian sitting astride Badger…with no helmet, or shoes, bridle, or even a halter. I’m pretty sure this pony is trying single-handedly to reverse the naughty reputation that most ponies have worked hard to establish.
dger will be in my field. He’s putting in a lot of overtime to count towards his retirement. I fully intend for the pony to be buried beside Reggie.
Small town charm is an idealized concept most often associated with places like Mayberry or Stars Hollow. Places we all wish we could visit, but they just simply don’t exist. While the most charming small towns may be fictional, Cookeville still has quite a bit of small charm to it, and last Friday even felt quite a bit like Stars Hollow might during one of Taylor Doose’s crazy town events. Of all the town events Cookeville hosts, none are quite as magical as Cooking on the Square.
Cooking on the Square does just what its title implies: folks come out to the court house square and they cook! This event serves as a fundraiser for Habitat for Humanity and manages to pull our entire community together as we all prepare, serve, and enjoy! The premise is simple: cook teams prepare giant pots of gumbo and/or soups and set up around the court house square to serve patrons.
a menu, and got to work. What a learning experience it was! We had a wonderful time cooking together and serving our black bean and sausage soup as well as green chili stew. When the next year rolled around, Mandy was back in the office full time and I was available to man a booth for A&B Taxidermy instead. Brinn and I decided that venison stew would make complete sense for a taxidermy shop to serve, and my grandmother decided to help us and volunteered to make her broccoli cheese soup. Kind of ironic for the taxidermy shop to serve one of the few vegetarian dishes at a food event, but it really worked for us!
third year for representing A&B Taxidermy. Unfortunately Grandma was traveling out of state and unable to attend for her 3rd year, but she left me with her giant soup pot and a handwritten recipe to follow. She also gave me plenty of phone advice on my way to the grocery store to pick up all of the ingredients. I’m not going to say my soup is as good as Grandma’s, but I will say that many people came back for seconds and thirds!
ng by to see if we might have just a smidge left. Then we ran out of the venison stew just 30 minutes after that! This year we cooked 12 pounds of deer meat to go in that stew! I added 10
Even though I should’ve quit eating about 4 bowls earlier than I did, it was so much fun to try a little bit of everything. The Cajun potato soup with andouille sausage put a nice spicy twist on a longtime favorite of mine; the many gumbos were all hearty with a variety of spice levels; and the chicken tortilla soup gave me a nice break from the many Cajun dishes. One stand served nothing but buttery, garlicky sauteed shrimp. Typically there is a line wrapped all the way around an intersection for these shrimp, but for once we managed to walk by with no line, and man, we surely took advantage. Of all the great choices though, my favorite is still the shrimp and grits. I may have gone back to the shrimp and grits tent three times over the course of the afternoon…
This year Cooking on the Square celebrated its 20th birthday by shattering its previous records. The event raised an outstanding $69,284 and had an estimated 2,900 to 3,000 attendance. We learned at the cook team dinner and meeting that it takes roughly $90,000 to build a Habitat house. This one event was just shy of buildi
ng a home with its proceeds! CotS’s most recent Facebook post shared that the proceeds from CotS would be going towards building a home for a father and his daughter and would be ready by spring 2017 for them to move in. This is ministry folks. It just doesn’t get much better. A community of volunteers came together with their different skill sets, be it pottery, organizing, cooking, selling tickets, or even eating; and together we are all helping local families achieve the dream of home ownership.
Appreciate the Adventure 