Goin' to the chapel!

Recently, I traveled to Nashville, Tennessee, for the wedding of a relative. If a person knew me very well, they might have been surprised at how insistent I was on riding with someone else to the location, since I am used to getting around with ME behind the steering wheel! The reason I wanted to ride with someone else goes back to the last out-of-town wedding I attended. That wedding was for the daughter of long-time friends since college and was held in Texarkana at the First Methodist Church. I arrived at the church almost an hour early, wanting to have plenty of time to freshen up before alot of the other guests started arriving. After visiting the ladies' room, I took my seat in the sanctuary. In a few minutes, people started to come in, but I did not recognize anyone. Furthermore, everyone that came in had a definite Asian look, and none of them were speaking English. Then I saw an Asian woman come in with a young Asian girl dressed in a wedding gown. Since the bride I was expecting to see was born in Arkansas and had parents from Arkansas, I knew something was wrong. I got the invitation out of my purse, and took it up to someone who was preparing candles in the front of the church. I handed her the invitation, saying I was supposed to be at a wedding at the First Methodist Church in Texarkana at 2:00 PM, but none of the people here looked like who I was anticipating seeing. The candle lady studied the invitation briefly, and said, "You are at the First Methodist Church in Texarkana, Texas. This invitation is for the First Methodist Church in Texarkana, Arkansas. YIKES!!! Now what? As best she could, she told me how to get to the FMC on the Arkansas side of the town, and I raced over there as quickly as I could. Just moments before the bride walked down the aisle, I slipped into a pew in the back of the church---huffing and puffing and looking very much in disarray---not exactly the impression I wanted to leave on my old friends from college. So that is why for THIS expedition of "Goin' to the chapel", I wanted to ride with someone who knew their way around, so that I could sing "Goin' to the CORRECT chapel!" Miles of smiles! Tricia Turner (Photo disclaimer: Since I didn't have a signed model release form for the young couple in Nashville----and wasn't sure about how they would feel having their wedding photo on my website---I fuzzed out their images on purpose---one of the cool "special effects" you can do on the Picasa website!)

High Ropes Course

Ever since the first time my son put me into a climbing harness to try to make me into a rock climber, instead of just a "social ladder climber", I have been intrigued at the thought of getting a "view from the top" of whatever tall thing was in front of me. So it was with eager anticipation that I signed up for a "High Ropes and Zip Line" class when I attended Becoming an Outdoor Woman weekend earlier in the fall. The High Ropes course was under the auspices of the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension program, and was held at the Ferndale 4-H Center just north of Little Rock. (That is me with the red helmet in the photo collage above). There is a very thorough session on safety before you actually proceed to the tree tops, and participants have the option to turn back at any point they think the challenge is too much for them. However, I was intent on at least doing enough of the "high in the sky" obstacle course that would get me over to the Zip Line. I had seen TV shows of people doing Zip Lines in the Costa Rican Rainforest Canopy, and longed to try it for myself. Since a trip to Costa Rico is not currently on my travel agenda, I was happy to settle for the exhilaration provided by speeding down the line that took me from an elevated hill on the high ropes course, down to the bottom of the valley. What a rush! I would recommend this for anyone seeking a controlled-risk type of thrill ride! So, if you are interested in putting some excitement into your life, see if you can "elevate" yourself to a high ropes course; better yet, check out the weekly ELEVATE! activity at First Baptist Church in Mountain Home. Miles of smiles! Tricia Turner

Becoming an Outdoor Woman

I had the great experience last week to participate in a continent-wide program called "Becoming an Outdoor Woman", abbreviated as
"BOW". The program has been in operation for almost two decades, and consists of multi-day workshops that allow women to try their hand at a variety of outdoor activities in a controlled, non-threatening environment. I had attended these events in the past in other states (both a winter one and a summer one in Oregon; fall and spring programs in Missouri), but this was the first BOW that I had the opportunity to be a part of in Arkansas. It was held at the beautiful Ferndale 4-H Center near Little Rock, which has modern lodging and dining facilities, plus acres and acres of land suitable for a variety of outdoor activities. The half-day courses I took included stream ecology, high ropes, wild plants and their uses, plus outdoor survival. I evaluated each class as outstanding, not to mention great fun! If this sounds like something you would be interested in, just type it into your Internet search engine, and you can see the hundreds of adventures you have to choose from, in a variety of locations (almost every state has at least one annual BOW, plus many provinces in Canada offer them, including Newfoundland!). My BOW "resume" from other states includes snowmobiling, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, kayaking, archery, firearms, Dutch oven cooking, outdoor photography, nature crafts, outdoor journaling, bird watching, backpacking, canoeing, and hiking. So don't be trapped in your same old routine----get out there and explore God's great outdoors!!!

Tree of Life

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. Proverbs 13:12
The memory verse for week one of the First Place Bible study entitled "Renewing Hope" is stated above. One component of the First Place program is scripture memorization. The most important reason to memorize scripture is because God tells us to! The Bible said to "hide His word in your heart". I find it so interesting that now the scientific studies are telling us the importance of keeping our minds in good physical health by doing mental exercises such as cross-word puzzles, complex card games, and yes---memorization! In fact, several new products have appeared on the market with the intent of giving the user a "mental work-out" with the promise of delaying the signs of aging that are evidenced by diminished mental ability. Why not use something you probably already have in your home---a Bible! ---for this same purpose?! One thing that helps me with memorization is visualization, so I try to find a photograph I have taken to go along with the memory verse. (I took the photo for this verse last spring on the shores of Lake Taneycomo, in Branson, Missouri. ) Another aid to memorization is saying the verse out loud, in combination with certain body movements. That is called "kinetic learning". Kinetic learning has the added benefit of burning a few calories! I am hoping that the process of writing about the weekly verse in my blog will also help. So don't agonize---MEMORIZE!

The Portland Rose Festival

In 2007, The Portland Rose Festival (which takes place in Portland, Oregon each May/June) was voted "Best Festival in the Universe", or some such outstanding honor. Since I have not attended every single festival in the universe yet, I cannot say if the award is accurate . However, I did go with a group to the Rose Parade held annually in Pasadena, California, and would give it very high marks in the "beauty" category. That is the one seen nationally on television in conjunction with the Rose Bowl Football game. Likewise, there is the "Run for the Roses" (aka the Kentucky Derby) that is equally famous. Anyone who has ever been inside Churchill Downs in Kentucky can feel the history oozing out of its hallowed grounds. So although not as many people have heard of the big rose event in Oregon, it is one I can heartily recommend. The group I was with made their way to Portland via air travel, and all had no major problems in that department. Even though the group was diverse, there are so many activities associated with the Portland Rose Festival, that most anyone can find something to interest them. There is a night-time parade, with lots of floats lit up to shine in the dark, there is the big day-time parade with beautiful floats, although they are not as elaborate as the ones in Pasadena. A new dimension to the daytime parade this year was that spectators were not allowed to camp out the night before in the spot where they planned to watch the parade. I guess in the past, this had caused some heated turf battles (which they called the "Duct tape wars" because that was how spectators-to-be marked off their territory); A very nice feature of the parade was one of the methods of clean-up when it was over. This really impressed me because the year I attended the Pasadena event, it was shortly after 9/11, and all the large trash cans had been removed from the streets out of fear of terrorist bombs being secretly hidden in large trashcans. As a result, the amount of trash filling the streets at the conclusion of the Pasadena event was MASSIVE, because there was no place for the spectators to put their refuse. However, for the Portland event, volunteers went along the parade route before it started, giving spectators a white, plastic trash bag with the Rose Parade logo on it for them to bag up their trash into before they left. The result was a much tidier city than what I had seen at the Pasadena parade. Another nice feature of the Portland parade was that you could purchase tickets to watch the parade inside a big event center there. The parade came in through one end of the building and left through the other end of the building. Bleachers lined the insides of the building, keeping spectators dry. One DOES have to consider the strong possibility of rain in Portland in the spring; in fact, if you are used to using the sun to tell you which way is north, south, east, and west---I would suggest you take a compass with you to Portland, because the sun was in short supply during the time my group was there. Parades are just one part of the Portland Rose Festival; there is, of course, the big rose show, where ribbons are awarded for the outstanding rose for that year; there are foot races, costumed fun runs, art shows, special film debuts, children's activities, a carnival, a downtown "urban garden" show, and on and on. So if you go, try to spend a few days there enjoying all this lovely city has to offer!

Autumn Jammin' in the U.P.

When I first heard someone say the initials "U.P." , I thought they were just mispronouncing the word "yuppie". But the more I listened to them, the more I determined they were talking about a type of place, and not a type of people. (As I have noted in previous posts, I did not get to complete my seventh-grade geography class because the school closed early due to a bad flood. This catastropic  event, I am sure, accounts for my inadequate mastery of geographic locations decades later.) Finally, I had to ask the person just exactly where was "U.P"? The person was surprised at my ignorance, and told me that U.P. stood for Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Oh yeah, I remembered---that must be the part of the USA that borders northern Wisconsin. Years earlier, when I had been on a car trip to Wisconsin with my son, I had noticed that the land area above Wisconsin was a different color on the map, which I incorrectly assumed must be Canada. I thought it would be nice to drive the few extra miles to get there with my son, so he could say he had been to Canada. Imagine my surprise when I found out it was just another state! Not only that, it wasn't even connected by land to the state whose name it carried---weird, I thought. Anyway, when I recently had the opportunity to tour the entire area known as the "U.P.", I jumped at the opportunity!   I was with a group led by Fred Huffman, who is a dedicated promoter of Upper Peninsula Travel.  (For additional information on all this area has to offer, click on www.uptravel.com . The photographs I took (shown in the collage above) show that the leaves were just beginning to turn, and the temperatures were perfect. Because of my interest in culinary tourism, as well as faith-based travel, I was especially delighted to get to visit a tiny little retail store called "The Jam Pot Bakery" ( www.store.societystjohn.com ), in a rural area of the Keweenaw region of the U.P. It is operated by a group of monks that belong to The Society of St. John.  Some people may refer to the bread they bake as "heavenly bread", since it is made by Christian monks.  Therefore, I am using my recollections of this quaint little place, as the visual aid for one of my First Place 4 Health ( www.FirstPlace4Health.com ) memory verses.  The verse is John 6:33 and says, "For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."  The tiny building has become somewhat of a "required" tourist stop for folks traveling along M-26 highway, not only for the delicious products it sells, but also because it is adjacent to a scenic waterfall very close to the road, known as "Jacob's Falls". The jam that the little food factory is most famous for is that made from thimble berries. Thimble berries are the "gold card" of berry pickers, because of their value, scarcity, and seasonal availability. Naturally, this makes the jam produced from these berries quite pricey. So even though the building is tiny, the prices are not! However, the money goes to a good cause (supporting the ministry of the monks), and the products the Jam Pot sells taste delicious.
 So if you have the good fortune to be traveling in that gorgeous U.P. area of Michigan, surrounded by the gorgeous Lake Superior, try out the "heavenly bread" and thimble-berry-jam at The Jam Pot Bakery. Happy jammin'! Tricia

Balloons in the sky!

For several years, I have had an interest in those giant, often colorful, gas-filled contraptions that take people high in the sky without the help of a propeller or motor. It all started by a comment that a magazine editor made about me in regard to the first photographs and text I ever had published in a major magazine. It was a story I wrote about hot air ballooning, with photographs to go along with the article. The editor referred to me as a "photojournalist"! WOW! I like being called a photojournalist, and never forgot the comment or the article. So anytime I see passenger balloons in the sky---regardless of the type of gas lifting them up---I get warm and fuzzy feelings inside. I have had the opportunity to ride in several hot air balloons---twice at the big Hot Air Balloon Fiesta held annually in Albuquerque, New Mexico. One of the times, I had the good fortune to be in the Mickey Mouse balloon. The best part of that was the uncomplicated landing we made in a residential neighborhood, where all the little children were ecstatic to have Mickey land on their street! It was the biggest welcoming party I had ever experienced! The pilot of the Mickey balloon gave me a Mickey Mouse hot air balloon pin as a memento of the trip. The second year I rode at the annual Balloon Fiesta, my husband was with me in the balloon. I don't think the pilot of that balloon was as experienced as the Mickey pilot because that landing was not so un-complicated. The first touch-down, we came in too fast to the ground, and couldn't stop, so we went back up again. The second landing, was also too fast, so that we tipped over, dragged along the ground a while, and generally looked very un-graceful. We weren't injured, but my husband's Nikon camera was damaged in the incident, which was unfortunate, but repairable. A few years after that, I rode a helium-filled balloon similar to the one in the photo above, that used to be a tourist attraction in Branson, Missouri. (Both the balloon above, as well as the one at Branson, were tethered so that the occupants did not drift off into never-never land.) I didn't sign up for the ride at Niagara, as I wanted to spend my time next to and below the falls, as opposed to hundreds of feet above it. I had flown over Niagara Falls once where the pilot pointed it out below, but this time, I wanted to experience the falls up close and personal. And that I did---complete with the mandatory plastic raincoat that officials give you when you opt to walk along the stairs adjacent to the roaring water tumbling over the side of the cliff. It was a something I had been wanting to do for a long time, and an experience I would recommend for one and all!