So now the Christmas hullabaloo has died down, I can finally kick back and relax, no more driving to North Carolina (well, hopefully we will if you know what I mean), no more fretting over gifts, none of that.
Yes, we drove to North Carolina for the second time in 2 weeks, we must be mad, especially as we drove on Friday, the full 6 hour, 370 miles to Bynum (where Marchellina (my mum’s cousin) and her family stay) in non-stop pouring rain. Which got scary once we got off I-85, dark country roads ain’t where you want to be in that kind of weather. Thankfully we made it there in one piece and only saw traffic around the Charlotte/Concord area as last minute shoppers headed to Concord Mills so we arrived just in time for dinner. We crashed in bed shortly thereafter.
The next morning we were taken for a walk around Bynum, which is an old mill village on the banks of the Haw River, which is full of cool houses, all different shapes and sizes, and an old general store. The old textile mill is closed down, now a shell of the building remains, there is also a famous folk artist residing in Bynum by the name of Clyde Jones, he makes critters, lots and lots of critters. It’s a really quiet place, I think we saw a grand total one one single car driving by during our time there. After lunch we said our goodbys and headed off for the 130 mile drive to Jill and Ryan’s house in Huntersville.
Again we saw traffic in the Charlotte/Concord area, and again we arrived just in time for dinner, after dinner we walked around the little village community where Jill and Ryan live, as some people had to do some last minute shopping also, Robyn and I found our way to a GameStop where she played Zelda Fishing on the Nintendo Wii, she now wants one bad, so I guess when our local Best Buy gets them in stock, we’ll be first in line.
The following morning, Robyn’s mom busted out a racing set for everyone and anyone to play with, Jill and Ryan’s cat Leo played with it more than anyone as he was chasing the cars around. Later that afternoon I took a walk around the community, potentially spying future homes for us, but really, the whole place is really nice, I’m especially fond of the “easter egg houses” even though we have seen a larger place available.
We had Christmas Dinner that night as most of use would be leaving the following day for the long drives back to Georgia, we also did a “Secret Santa/White Elephant” gift exchange, the pets were included, an apparent annual tradition in this family. To round off the night we all played a couple of games of Pop Culture Cranium, lefties against righties (50% of us are left handed, that’s Jill, Ruth and me), needless to say the lefties layed the smackdown on the righties in the first game, the second one was much closer, decide by a single point in favour of the righties.
The gift opening was delayed til 10am as we were all a bit late in waking up and getting ready, I won’t bore you with the details but I think everyone was happy, I know Robyn was, thanks to my family and the excellent exchange rate she walked away with a Scooba to compliment our Roomba. Also thanks to my family I walked away with a 19″ widescreen monitor for my computer (mainly to watch TV via Media Center in bed, honest, seriously, who needs a 1440×900 resolution for everyday use?) and enough in Best Buy gift cards to buy a Wii when it becomes available.
Originally uploaded by FLC.