The Pond and the Swing

There was no doubt about BJ's favorite place at Grandpa D's and Grandma C's in Georgia -- he adored hanging out at the pond. Their house is surrounded by a lovely wood, and a long flight of stairs leads straight from their deck down to the water's edge. The pond was lower than usual, as a result of the ongoing drought, but there was still enough water for some fish and turtles to hang out. (Alas, none of them got close enough for a decent pic. BJ kept asking me to get a picture, and this is the best I could manage.) He simply loved "feeding" them leaves, acorns, and other debris by dropping stuff over the edge of the deck and into the water. The turtles were quite a ways off, but that didn't seem to matter to BJ.



He also informed me that in addition to the critters we could see, the pond contained alligators, crocodiles, and a sunfish. Apparently, in BJ's imagination, they also subsisted on tree droppings.


Every morning, BJ would ask to go down to the pond. It made me pretty anxious to see him darting around right next to a drop off into the water, but I tried not to let my jangled nerves show too much. Just being there brought this delighted grin immediately to his face, so it wasn't like I was going to forbid it entirely.



(In spite of the fall he took down the stairs his first day there. He's still talking about it. I wasn't there when it happened, but apparently he only slipped a little and got a bit of a scrape. Thank heavens -- it could have been a terrible tumble straight towards the water. Guess it was the week for falls that could have been much worse than they actually were.)


While BJ was hanging out at the pond, BB enjoyed the swing set that Grandpa D had built for the grandkids.

The weather was gorgeous -- 70's during the days we were there -- so we spent as much time as we could outdoors. It did my spirit good to be surrounded by so many beautiful trees. Both BJ and I did our share of tree hugging while we were there.