Tucker's Prayer

In his bedtime prayer this evening, Tucker said, "I'm thankful for move".  Which I asked him what he meant afterwards.  He said that he is thankful that we moved to Georgia.

Rock City (in GA, Near Chattanooga, TN)

When we moved to Atlanta, we noticed quite a few people had bird houses that said, 'See Rock City'. So when we visited Chattanooga, we decided to see Rock City.  It is technically in GA, but just barely.  It is on a hill (or as they are called in Georgia, a mountain) that overlooks Chattanooga, TN.

It is a really cool area full of different rock formations, caves and tunnels.  We really enjoyed it and would like to go back someday (if for nothing else than the fudge and possibly one size larger in the t-shirt I bought).

It's tough to get a three year old to care about rocks, but Savannah even had a great time.

One of the passage ways was tighter than this one -- titled: Fat Man's Squeeze.

Chickamauga Civil War Battlefield

Near the border of Georgia and Tennessee is the Chickamauga Civil War Battlefield.  We didn't have exact plans on our way to TN, so we decided to stop and take a look.  Again, the government shutdown closed down the fields.  They went as far as putting up no parking signs all over the place -- I wonder how much it cost to put up a sign to discourage people from walking around in a field.  In any case, we found an area that didn't have no-parking signs and took advantage of it and walked around.

It was a really neat area.  After exploring, we came home and studied up on the Civil War some more.      All of the sites that seem to get the attention around here are battles where the South won.  Interesting...

The boys and I had a good discussion about the Civil War and war in general.  It's been good for them to get a glimpse into our nations history and actually be there.  One comment Tucker made: "(in a sad voice)  I really want Georgia to be part of the United States."

A prayer for the fallen (actually, I'm not sure what he was doing).

Chattanooga, TN with Grandma and Grandpa

While Grandma and Grandpa Aksland were in town, we decided to visit Tennessee.  No of us had been there before, so we took the two hour drive North and stopped in Chattanooga.  We walked around downtown, got some lunch and walked by the river.  There was a great view from the footbridge, which I think was one of the largest in North America.

We took a free shuttle from the area we parked to downtown.  The kids loved the bus ride.

They had some really fun things outside of the Tennessee Aquarium.

Tucker saw these beams and just had to lay down on top of them.  Amazing the things that kids think of.

Lessons Learned: Pine Trees

Lesson learned: large pine trees make lots of large pine needles.  We've spent hours with rakes and with the blower cleaning up.

Carson's Market Day Raffle

Throughout the school year, the students are able to accumulate school dollars.  Then they have a market day where each student has to hand make their own product, determine their marketing strategy and pricing and run their own little business.

Carson decided to hold a raffle for a bird house that he made.  We made some individually numbered raffle tickets on the computer and had them printed on glossy card-stock at OfficeMax.  They looked really good.

His business earned a lot of money.  THEN, they took all of the money aware from all students and they start over again.

Georgia State Capitol Building and Atlanta City Hall

For Carson's Cub Scouts, we needed to visit a government office.  So we decided to visit the Capitol Building of Georgia and the City Hall of Atlanta.  It was fun walking around with Grandma and Grandpa Aksland.  The kids haven't seen many homeless people in their lives.  Seeing so many in one place was interesting for them.  I'm not sure they understood.  As one of them woke up from his nap on a concrete bench, Savannah said loudly - 'Look, he's getting out of bed'.  Pretty big contrast between the beautiful buildings and the poverty immediately outside of it.

As we walked up to the doors of the Capitol, Savannah asked, 'Is this Grandma's house?'

Kennesaw Civil War Battlefield with the Grandparents

While Grandma & Grandpa Aksland were in town, we went to the Kennesaw Civil War Battlefield.  It was really weird to have it closed down due the to government shutdown.  They purposely made it as difficult as possible to look at a field, as though us looking at a field cost the government money.  In any case, we had a good time with Grandma and Grandpa and had a delicious dinner at Pappasito's with them afterwards.