pretty summer soda

Rose French cream soda with cotton candy on top

Yes, it tasted as good as it looks! 

weekend picnic lunch

This weekend I had a few girlfriends over for a picnic lunch. Unfortunately, it ended up raining really heavy the night before, so it was too wet out for an actual picnic, but we improvised and I set up the sunroom for a faux picnic. I made some cute food and drink items...



... and a few of the elements inspired a couple of other "mini shoots". More photos coming soon. Hope you're having a lovely weekend!

Helen 5- The bear park

This is the last post of photos from our day trip to Helen. If you know me, you know how much I love animals. I support wild animals in captivity for rehabilitaiton, preservation, or learning purposes, but believe wild animals should not be kept in cages. With that being said, I had mixed feelings about this place. It felt like a very mid-century, roadside attraction kind of place. The bears were in small concrete areas, and while they looked clean, they didn't feel like the right environment for those bears to be. This place was like no other I'd ever been to. The bear areas were very open and close to the onlookers. The tops were open, no glass or fencing. Visitors could buy a basket of food and throw the food pieces to the bears. While I loved seeing the bears, I could not go back and support the place after seeing the bears living quarters.

walking towards the entrance

There were also some rooms and cages with various reptiles in them, the one above and below were both rooms you could go in to and be up close and personal with them.

Baby bears...

This guy was funny, he kept wrestling with his own arm

Ferris wheel ride at sunset

I've never uploaded a video on here before, so here's my first one. I shot going around on the Ferris wheel at the carnival the other night. It's not edited... and if you listen (which I don't necessarily suggest doing), you can hear a small part of our conversation about how rides make me feel now, versus when I was little and loved them). 

the corner carnival

down the street and around the corner...

...across from "the big chicken" stands a little carnival. 

It appears about every couple months, and I love to stop, even if just for a few minutes.

Helen 4- on the way

Sticking with my completely out of order posts from our trip to Helen, here's the photos from our drive on the way up there. One of our first stops was this flea market, where this truck caught our eyes, and I came a fraction of a crumb away from bringing it home with us, for real. 

Then as we were going down the highway, saw a place off to the side that had a bunch of huge vintage roadside statues. Of course I made Skip pull off and turn around. 

This guy was my favorite...

inside the place was a bunch of arcade games, but nobody around 

then in the attached building, we found an amazing collection of vintage pin-ball games, slot machines, juke boxes, etc. 

[enter time in Helen itself]

Then we headed home as the sun was getting low, and stopped at another flea market

Next time we go back, tubing will definitely be on our "to do" list!

I have one more post from our day trip to Helen coming... 

It's the bear park. You really don't want to miss those!

Helen 3- down Main Street

Helen 2- Anna Ruby Falls

Once again, I'm not going in order of actual events, but we stopped by Anna Ruby Falls in the early evening before we headed out of Helen. The weather was perfect for a little trek in the forest to see the falls.





Skip spotted this tree growing on a rock on our way out. I think it looks like some kind of animal or dinosaur perched on the edge of a cliff. 

Still to come from our trip to Helen.. some shots of Helen itself, the bear park, and the road trip to and from! 

Helen 1- Heidi Motel

This past weekend we were in desperate need of a break and took a day trip to Helen, GA. We packed a lot into one day, and I took a ton of photos, so I'll be breaking up the photos into multiple posts. I'm skipping ahead a little here for my 1st post... soon after arriving in Helen we took a walk down main street. We stumbled upon this place, the Heidi Motel. It was obviously not open, possibly because of the "road closed" sign at the end of the drive way, but it looked interesting and so we went up the hill anyways.

sign from the road

view from the bottom of the hill/driveway

on the way up the driveway... 

it reminds me of one of those creepy trees outside of a haunted house

the main section of the building with motel rooms, parking spaces covered in vines

the walkways throughout were also covered in vines

The building I'm assuming was some kind of honeymoon suite, or the owners living quarters? Complete with windmill.

This place was gorgeous, but very strange. There were no posted "no trespassing" signs, "closed" or "for sale" signs. It had obviously been vacant for quite some time, and some of the doors and windows were wide open. There were still some TVs in some of the rooms, and other random things. It felt very odd, a little creepy even though it was bright and sunny out, and kind of sad. We had a great time looking around this place and I can only imagine some of the stories this place holds.

UPDATE: This place has since been renovated and has reopened as an operating motel.