In Loving Memory

It is with great sadness that I write this...

Early this morning (April 23, 2008)
my aunt lost her battle with cancer.
Her family was able to be with her
during the final 24 hours of her life.
She was alert and able to converse with them
and was very happy to have them there with her
during those precious final hours.
She is survived by her husband
& their three children.

We are so grateful that we were able
to spend some time with her one last time
at Er!c's cousin's wedding last summer.

Er!c

We Has a Peach!

We have successfully made it safely into mid-Spring without losing our peaches to frost! Last year we lost our entire crop of baby peaches (on our little Charlie Brown peach tree) to a cold snap that got down to 15 degrees (F). This year wasn't quite as cold (thanks to Global Warming?). .;)

Tonight we checked on our other fruit trees and have little baby pears, flowers on the apple tree (hopefully that's a good sign), and blueberries on one of our 3 blueberry bushes. We also have carrots & cabbage from grandmas growbox garden, and lots of promising buds on our many rose bushes...

We love Springtime.

Battlefield Bike Ride

On Sabbath we drove out to Red Clay State Park for our annual outdoor church service. Somehow we didn't get the memo on what time church was starting and arrived late. Oops! :)

After church we enjoyed a potluck lunch of "haystacks", provided to us by the church.

Then, since it was a beautiful day (especially compaired to yesterday's weather), we decided to take the bikes over to Chickamauga Battlefield & explore the park. Our total loop was right at 8 miles and consisted mostly of paved roads, but we also explored a few gravel roads and a couple grassy fields too.

Check out more photos of this trip
on The Todd View.

Back to Pensacola! (one week later)

This week I (Er!c) had to go back down to Pensacola, but this time it was for work. We were shooting some video footage at one of the newest and rather luxurious nursing facilities. Here are a few photos I took...

If I ever have to be in a nursing home, I want to go here!

Although the nursing facility we were working at was in North Pensacola, the hotel we were staying at was out on Pensacola Beach (map). Yes, our hotel was RIGHT on the beach. :)

Tuesday evening Mark & Kristin came out to our hotel and we walked around the touristy little boardwalk, out on a couple piers, and along a couple stretches of beach. We also discovered these little glowing things in the sand! (Here are more bioluminescent things).

Wednesday evening Bryan and I met up with Mark and Kristin and went to Tre Fratelli's where we sat at an outside table and enjoyed two veggie pizzas, then walked back through town to Mark's office where we picked up his car and drove back over the two bridges to Pensacola Beach.

Sitar Indian Cuisine

Today after church we joined some friends and tried out Sitar Indian Cuisine, one of the 3 Indian restaurants that we know of here in Chattanooga. We had tried this place out back when it was Shalimar Indian Restaurant and wasn't very impressed, but I think Sitar Indian Cuisine is under different management and thus much better now!

The lunch buffet had quite a good selection of vegetarian options, however the dishes of Naan and Pakora seemed to always be out. Perhaps it was because it was so delicious and would disappear as soon as they brought out more. .:) . They even had Samosas in the buffet line! Although we didn't order from the menu, they seem to have a large selection of items to suit just about anyone's appetite.

The prices were about the same as India Mahal ($7.95 each for the lunch buffet). I think The Curry Pot is still cheaper than it's competitors, and yet the food is equally as good.

• The best "bang for your buck" - The Curry Pot (map)
  
• Nice atmosphere & menu selection - Sitar Indian Cuisine (map)
• Good track record -- years of experience - India Mahal (map)
  

P.S. We recently went back to India Mahal and their selection was much better and the food was even tastier too! Isn't competition great!

Easter in Florida

So, I'm finally getting around to posting pictures of our trip to Florida last weekend. Due to some unfortunate scheduling issues we were unable to leave Chattanooga until around 10:00 Friday evening. 5 1/2 hours later we pulled into Mark & Kristin's driveway and let ourselves into the house where we promptly found our beds & fell asleep.

Sabbath after lunch we walked down to the neighborhood beach (a couple minutes walk from Mark & Kristin's house) and walked down the narrow strip of sand as far as we could go in each direction.

Then we all went over to Navarre Beach (a real beach) to watch the sun set. We splashed around in the water and took way too many pictures. :)

On Sunday, we had an Easter Egg hunt in the front yard after a late breakfast. Here are some photos from Pettibonia & The Todd View. Then we packed up the car and came home again.