Callaway Gardens

This past Saturday, after Ava’s gymnastics class, we met up with Anna Fletcher and headed to Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, GA.  We met up with Melissa Baillairge and Amy Hoffman, who were already there enjoying the beach. 

While at Callaway, we were able to check-out Mr. Cason’s vegetable garden.  In the same area, the PBS show Victory Gardens is actually filmed here.  It’s a gardener’s dream come true! 

We fed the ducks, turtles and fish in a pond.   The kids really seemed to enjoy this!  I almost lost my stomach, thinking about any one of them tumbling in the water.  :-0  We then visited the stone chapel, which is absolutely gorgeous!  I could just imagine a winter wedding in this chapel, which is situated right beside a nice lake. 

We also watched a show on “Birds of Prey”, during which we saw quite a few different owls, hawks and other birds.  I think it freaked Ava out a bit that they were flying right over our heads.  She wasn’t scared until they mentioned not to put your fingers in the air, that the birds might mistake them for food.  Ha ha! 

After that, we ventured over to the man-made lake that had a fountain in it.  The lake was very shallow for quite some distance, which great for the kids!  Liam stayed on the beach and built things out of sand.  Ava swam some, then decided she wanted to build a retaining wall.  Hmm, I wonder where she got that from?  ;-) 

It was 5 p.m. by the time we decided to head out for dinner at a local country diner.  The diner reminded me of a Cracker Barrel, complete with a very cool gift shop.  Ava decided to get a bag of mineral rocks as a souvenir.  Liam decided on an old green truck.  I ate my first fried green tomato sandwich, complete with Muscadine grape mayo sauce.  It was yummy!  We were all wiped out from the day’s festivities and the heat that came along with it.  We drove the 1 ½ hours home, at which point all of the kids in our van (Ava, Liam, Ryan-Ashton and Kylyn) all fell asleep. 

It was a fun day!  It was nice to spend the day with friends and for the mommies to catch up between kidling requests. :-)

Peace, love and lifelong friends,
Shelly, Doug, Ava and Liam

Ava the Gymnast

For the longest time, I had been meaning to check into gymnastics classes for Ava.  After her swimming classes were over last winter, we took a break from classes for a few months.  When I mentioned to her that gymnastics classes were available, she was over-the-top excited about the prospect.


I called Modern Gymnastics, on Johnson Ferry Road.  The person with whom I spoke mentioned they had two more Saturday classes left in their current session, but we could pay for just those two classes if we'd like to attend.  I thought it was perfect timing.  If Ava enjoyed those two classes, we could enroll her in their summer session.  If not, we wouldn't have invested in a whole session and have her hating it...


Ava. LOVES. GYMNASTICS.  She seems naturally-talented at it!  I know I sound like one of "those" parents.  But HONESTLY!  To watch her on the balance beam, she has beautiful posture and is very graceful.  With her natural athleticism, I think gymnastics is a perfect fit for her. 


The class is an hour long.  An hour seems like an eternity compared to her half-hour swimming classes.  Within the hour, though, they use:

• The balance beam
• The uneven bars (or just one bar)
• The springboard, to jump onto the pummel horse
• The floor (which has springs in it and is soft)
• Two trampolines that are built into the floor
• A Swedish (?) wall, that looks like a huge wall with short wooden shelves on it. 
• Padding and padded ramps on the floor, to practice tumbling.

They stretch first, do handstands and cartwheels on the floor.  They do "skin-the-cats", and then reverse themselves in-air while still holding on to the bars.  They go backward and face-forward on the balance beam, on their tip-toes, holding their arms in the air.  They practice straddle jumps, pike jumps off of the balance beam and also on the trampoline.  They use the climbing wall to do handstands (she's REALLY good at handstands, if she can put her feet against a wall!) and then try to stretch themselves as far up the climbing wall as they can. 


Leaving it up to Ava, I asked if she wanted to continue into their summer session.  She did.  After the summer session (and missing a few classes due to vacation or one illness), I asked Ava if she wanted to continue into the fall session.  At first she thought she might like to take dance instead.  I told her she could decide, but mentioned that she might not get to do much in dance, other than tap her feet to music and move to the music, that she might learn more tricks in gymnastics.  I told her she didn't have to decide right then, but to let me know.  She chose gymnastics.  I was so glad she did, as I can see can really improve if she practices.


I can tell Ava loves it, because she bounces in place while she is waiting for her turn on the next activity.  It's entirely too sweet to watch.  I'm so glad we picked this place.  It is a full-fledged gym.  Coach Alec is a very skilled gymnast himself.  He mentioned that Ava has quite a bit of upper-body strength.  (It's amazing what these little girls can do on a bar, for an extended period of time!) 


During the last class she attended, the coaches split the class of seven kids into two groups, each group trained by a different coach.  When I called to enroll Ava in the Sept/Oct session, I asked if Ava would have Coach Alec again, mentioning that Ava seems to do so well when Alec coaches her.  The gym contact mentioned Ava was in the more advanced of the two groups, that they split them out based on their ability.  He said if she continues to do as well as she is, she will stay with Coach Alec.


I hope she continues to enjoy gymnastics.  I hope she is able to learn something from it, as well.  For the time being, she seems to be having so much fun with it!


We're waiting just a little bit more to get Liam involved in something.  I'm hoping he enjoys baseball or something like that.  I know our neighbor Matthew is seriously involved in it.  Hopefully we can put his hand-me-downs (they've graciously given to us) to use on the baseball field!


Peace, love and "skin-the-cats",
Shelly, Doug, Ava and Liam


Here are some pictures I found on their Web site, as well as some I have taken.

From the Web site: