Sweet Carolina!!!

This is where we stayed.

Mike, Kira, and I took a trip to South Carolina last week. I want to tell you I LOVE South Carolina. Sweet Carolina!!! We had a blast. Mike's aunt and uncle are renovating a historic/plantation home there which they let us stay in. (It wasn't haunted, thankfully.) We spent most of our time in historic Charleston. The houses were amazing and the weather was perfect. Here's where we went:

1. Fort Sumter (where the Civil War began)
2. The Battery (a park with artillery from the Civil War)
3. Middleton Plantation (Middleton was a signer of the Declaration of Independence)
4. Isle of Palms - the Beach
5. U.S.S. Yorktown (an air craft carrier from WWII)
6. Clagmore Submarine (a sub from WWII)
7. Biltmore Mansion (or should I say castle) in North Carolina
8. Cumberland Falls outside of Corbin, Kentucky

Mike's aunt and uncle's home was built in 1890.

I think Kira enjoyed the trip as much as we did!

Mike and Kira on the boat to Fort Sumter.

Kira's livin' it up!

Outside of Fort Sumter

Fort Sumter

Mike frolicking at the battery.

View of the ocean from the battery

Beautiful Grounds at Middleton Plantation

Little Kira with the flooded rice fields in the background

Butterfly ponds at the Middleton Plantation

The plantation was so green!

The thinking man

Yep, I milked my first cow!

Our sweet baby girl was the best traveler.

Kira loved my beach chair. She hogged it the whole time.

The Isle of Palms had warm water and sweet sand.

The U.S.S. Yorktown

They said that 10,000 chocolate chip cookies fed the crew of 3,500 for one day. This is the recipe to make 10,000 cookies. Insane!

This Clagmore sub had such tight living quarters. I never could have lived on it. I barely fit through it taking the tour.

These are the cots on the U.S.S. Yorktown. There are 4 cots in each vertical row. Once again, I just couldn't have done it!

There was a dental area on the air craft carrier. There were 4 operatories, x-ray room, and a dental lab.

Mike loved looking at the planes. His dream when he was little was to be a jet pilot. That dream was shattered when he realized he was color blind. I think I prefer the color blind dentist to the risk taking jet pilot.

This is the Biltmore mansion. It is the biggest home I have ever seen. It measures 4 acres inside the house. The tour took us 4 hours!

One of the green areas at the Biltmore.

The grounds of the Biltmore Castle!

Check out the view!!

Some of the gardens at the Biltmore.

Cumberland Falls - One of only two waterfalls in the world with a moonbow.

Cumberland Falls

Time to Talk Derby

Hoping we have picked the winning horses!

So our neighbors, friends, and gamers, the Shep-dawgs had a last hurrah, the Derby Party. We had a great time watching the Derby and trying to pick the winning horses. My niece and sister also watched the Derby on TV in Vegas. Sadly enough, my 8-year-old niece's winning horse pick was Eight Belles. She was so happy that Eight Belles got second. Then she asked her mom what euthanized meant. When she found out that Eight Belles was laid out to pasture, she burst into tears. My sister called to tell me about it, and I could hear my niece wailing in the background. It was so sad. That filly ran her heart out!

Mikey and I

Me, Janelle, Chelsea, Heather, and Tessa

Jamie and the Xan Man