Rural Entertainment: The Fireman's Fair

Ya'll know by now I love local rural events... they are nothing like the big splashy Mardi Gras, Jazz Fest and French Quarter parties I grew up with in New Orleans - instead they are personal, down home, small crowds, nothing fancy, and people are just happy to see the other people who all live the same hidden mountain & farming lifestyle. They don't try to put on a show, they just are themselves. (I mean this even for our local wrestling matches, even if the guys do sport a few sequins!)
So Yesterday right around the bend from the Luck Cabin was the Spring Creek Fireman's Fair, I had gotten a flyer in the mail 2 weeks ago that made it hard to resist attending (see pic above) - seeing that Smokey The Bear was going to be there, they were going to play Bingo, have live music plus live Firemen....I HAD to see.

The first live band rocked the stage, i mean as much as they could rock out without scaring the other locals (aka slow and country).... they kinda rocked it Johnny Cash style, with the Beatles song "Act Naturally" thrown in the mix. And you best believe I danced - in fact a old, smelly drunk man found me (he said he lived "down yonder") and we were the only two people who cut a rug on that green grassy area in front the stage, while a crowd of maybe seven people watched & clapped.

Since me and the drunkard became BFF's, he also taught me how to play HorseShoes! I had never played before, but basically you are throwing heavy ass horse shoes like 40 feet into/across the air in order to hit a tiny metal pole sticking out the ground, in a pile of sand. I hit it once... out of about 30 tosses. :)

My awesome neighbor (remember the one who saved me in the night when I first got my donkey JuJu?) was diggin' into the atmosphere - as we watched the M.A.M.A helicopter fly in. The helicopter landing pad serves two purposes in our rural nook, and that is to bust people growing pot & for when we call 911. Yeah, we are so freakin' rural they can't even get us to a hospital in time before we'd die so they just fly this bad boy in and save us. (see pic above).

There was plenty food & drink --- including fried apple pie, hot dogs, hamburgers.... none of which I can eat since I have Celiac Sprue and shall never be able to partake.
There was also a silent auction. Well. There was a really odd assortment of things for auction, my favorite being this set up below.....

Faux Wiener Dog in a Baby Bed.

I had no idea why they had numbers spray painted on the ground in a circle either, till my neighbor explained this was for the Cake Walk.

I can't eat cake, but I can walk - so i joined in. Basically it's like musical chairs and each person stands on the big ole' number on the ground, they start up the music and everyone gets walkin' in circles (i was getting dizzy) till the music stops. Then they pick a number out of a hat... the kid who picked it picked his own number (little psychic!) and won a cake (go ahead and eat it little kid, cause i can't anyway)!

My Drunkard BFF took this picture of me and smokey the bear. Drunk people don't always get the main attraction in the picture, ya know. But you can tell SMokey The Bear reallllly was there, right?

I thought "Sparky The Fire Dog" was gonna be a real dog, but it was just a dude in a costume. He was not real, like Smokey The Bear. ;)

The BIG main attraction that it seemed so many had prepared for was the Lawnmower Race!! For real, a woman standing next to me during the race told me her son had spent weeks on getting his lawnmower ready for the race, by putting in a go-cart motor... and in fact he had fixed his lawnmower to race a few years back.

Right at the beggining one guy's lawnmower BLEW into smoke, another's broke down had to be pulled off, one older man road slowly on his, while just a few guys were blowing past everyone, nearly tipping over trying to come in first place.

Decorated with Hooters Stickers, numbers, southern flags, cow bells....

I was rooting for the grey Lawnmower, cause i was standing next to his Mama, but he didn't win.......

The Fireman's Fair though was a total WIN!

PS- I never did find tha' Bingo game? Where was it at?

Xoxoxo

Rare Native Orchid: Pink Lady's Slipper

I knew when I saw this flower next to a creek behind my cabin it was something awesome... it has a presence that would have made Georgia O'Keeffe swoon with sexy flower delight! After some investigating, like asking peeps on facebook and calling friends to describe my find - " it's a pink flower on a tall stem that looks super sexual, almost like a guy's nutsack") I soon found out this was a rare endangered orchid, native to the Appalachian mountains & surrounding states.

Coooool! I have found a Pink Lady's Slipper (also known as the "moccasin flower", cause somebody thought it looked like a shoe because they couldn't admit what it really looks like)!
"The plant has two wide basal leaves that stay horizontal and a single stalk growing to about a foot high bearing the pink flower. Transplanting from the wild is strongly discouraged because of the rarity of the plant and the almost nil chances of success. New plants are difficult to start because of the need for symbiotic fungi in supping nutrients to the seed. It takes years for the new plant to develop leaves for supplying its own energy. " - briartech.com

In other words... LOOK but do NOT touch this pretty flower! Even if ya like to normally touch things that look similar to this. ;)
XoxoxoXXX

Tiny Wildflowers

Everything micro tiny is cute! Here are some pics of little bitty wildflowers around my cabin... I know that the first one is the purple violet (and I have been told they are edible?) - if anyone knows the names of the rest of the wittle ones below please let me know! I'd love to learn about them. :)

BTW- tell me which ones are your favorite!?!

Xoxo

Western North Carolina Trillium (Part 2)

More types of trillium! I am surrounded by them and I like it.
Up top is a bright clean white colored flower, with big rounded petals that overlap one another.

This next one is the same as the violet and white ones I wrote about before, but this one is shaded pink, with micro dots coming out from the center.
And this last plant (below) almost resembles the variegated looking trillium, but lacks the three leaf pattern.... what do you think about this last plant? Trillium or not trillium? And if not, what is it?

Go HERE for more info!

xoxox

Sitting By the Creek Side

There are just some days where you find your own heart, and feel as though the beauty is suddenly ten times as amazing as it even was before. It helps that the weather is warm, jus' like Spring time should be.

Here is what my heart tells me today:
Look for the light in everything and everyone - intuition is there to separate fact from fiction, it is there to stop all the details from taking over our lives, and leave us free to feel love for all that is. AKA- the bigger picture is the better picture. (Hope that wasn't too deep or corny... here's some pictures & a song instead of more words...)


XoXo

Chicken Feet At My Front Door

Those are for protection. I am sure they are already working.

xoxo

Fog (or clouds?)

For some reason the fog here in Luck is way more creepy then anywhere else I have lived in Western North Carolina... something about the deep wilderness in combo with not being able to see very far around you. I was spooked walking around alone in it. Definitely a good setting for bigfoot, a bear, or a ghost to come walking out of the white.
XoXo

Help Me ID this Tree

(This post is for Bort - my favorite tree guy...)

I was walking in the woods here around the Luck Cabin when I happened upon this big barked tree. What I noticed first was the unusual tree knot in the bark, at the bottom of the trunk. It looked like a big button that you could press, and open up a portal to another world - the kind with unicorns, glitter falling from the sky and tiny people... tinier than me... (see pic below.)The bark of this tree goes upward in large vertical caverns, creating deep shadows in the crevices. I don't know what kind of tree this is- and was wondering if anyone can help me identify the type of tree by looking at the bark? Each kind of tree has it's own thumbprint of bark, just like their individual shaped leaves... :)
XoXo

Hello Hot Springs (my trip there...)

I made it, I'm alive!

I am living in the wild remote rural middle of nowhere... (just like before in Big Sandy Mush) but now in a tiny area called Luck (ya know right below Trust) in Hot Springs North Carolina.

The trip was made partly by car (thanks Bort for driving me, and Thanks Gretta for the car to use!)... and I made some good miles by electric bike too. We took the parts in the car VERY slow, 20 MPH or under and when we got to the top of Doggit Mountain, I decided to ride my bike down a few miles, so I wouldn't have to feel car sick anymore. It was SO exciting.Doggit Mountain is basically a steep climb, and steep drop with nothing but switch back roads to wind around, trees, rocks, and what looks like hardly any people living around there. The air immediately got colder, and fresher, in a way I am not sure I have ever breathed before. It made me feel happy. :)
But I was tired from packing all my things and loading boxes to be moved, I kinda felt like I wanted to poke my own eyes out, or fall asleep. So I thought about my Mimi, who just passed away - I thought about how she would have cheered me on, how she was with me in spirit and would always be my angelic cheerleader in my heart... just as i was missing her and wishing she was there a hawk flew down below the tree line to my left side and flew about 20 feet above my head for the next half mile. That gave me a new surge of energy.

I saw some really beautiful things along the way, to many to begin to tell- but here are a few...
There was BUNCHES of old houses and old barns, and falling down structures- each one with history, thumb prints, foot prints, and stories in the decay.
It took about 2 1/2 hours to go 22.4 miles total (cause we were going soooo slow), but we finally made it to the area called Trust. Totally deserving of a thumbs up.
Trust is about 2 miles from my house - and there is actually a Trust STORE! I ran in there to use the bathroom and saw a mish mash of crazy mountain stuff - carved bears, hunting vests, T-shirt with a deer painted on the front, and even a camo lounge chair, snacks, drinks, and cigs. I want to go sit on their porch and people watch.
Soon after there was the turn to my personal paradise. All I could think and say outloud was "oh my gawd, oh my gawd, oh my gawd" because everything was so amazing, beautiful, hardcore wilderness, tiers of waterfalls, sliding smooth giant rocks, creeks rushing along the road - pure air, the sounds of water, big houses with their own tennis court and putting green, and then we finally pulled up to my new tiny home.

The frogs & my friend Noelle were waiting there to greet me. Yay baby! I did it!
Xoxoxoxoo