We went to Burgess Falls in Sparta, TN this Memorial Day weekend. You hike up the mountain and there are look outs over 3 different waterfalls. The tallest one is 130 ft tall.

(I also took the opportunity to test out a bunch of different options on my Hiptamic for iPhone app... Random, different looking shots below...)

A short video of the kids reaction to seeing their first waterfall.

For relative size, those little specks at the bottom of the waterfall are people.

One of the smaller falls.

On the way up Michael made friends with a park ranger. They chatted for quite a while.

Before we left I asked Jarod if flip flops would be fine for the hike. Probably a stupid question but his answer was yes...

Yeah right! Thanks, babe... ;-)

Once we got back down the side of the mountain to the base of the falls the kids played around in the water and on the rocks a bit.

Thanks to Kaylee's skort, I felt like I was playing Where's Waldo all day...

A short clip of the largest waterfall. I highly recommend this trip! The hike was fun and the waterfalls were breathtaking!

Every Sunday is our "family day". It's the one day we all have off together and so we make a point of spending it together. Fortunately the area that we live in is loaded with family friendly activities so we are never at a loss for something fun to do. This past week we went to the park. Being on the tail end of spring, it was not too hot to enjoy the abundance of wild life.

We are surrounded by lakes and creeks here. It's fabulous. Even more fabulous is the lack of gators in said lakes...

Having lived in Florida for so long, I forgot how much I love ducks. The Mallard is my favorite, they remind me of feeding ducks as a kid. I'm loving the white ducks though. Anyone know what they are called?

Baby ducks! They flee when approached so it was incredibly hard to get a good shot. Aren't they cute as heck??

The geese, however, did not flee...

They walked right up to you and asked for food...

"Demanded" might be a better word for it...

My favorite shot of the day. The storms here have been knocking down quite a few trees. They had a blast climbing all over this one.

Wait for it...

Maybe it's just cause I'm "mom" but the hug at the end warms my insides and, although it inspires me to write an entire blog post about what it means to be a REAL dad, I won't. I will say this though: It has very little, if anything, to do with sharing the same DNA.

He's tall, dark and handsome and his name is Mike....

Seriously. You can't make this stuff up!

This happens at my house quite frequently and yet, not nearly enough. Ladies and gentlemen, I present Jarod on drums, Kaylee on vocals and a special dance appearance by Michael.

Heck yes. How can you not love a family THIS awesome? ;-)

Every 13 years this Middle Tennessee Cicada comes up out of the ground in droves. We've been having a ton of fun observing these little creatures.

This little dude talked to us. The kids thought it was hilarious.

Kaylee: Mom, I don't like Care Bears anymore.

Me: Why?

Kaylee: Cause they are fat.

Me: They are not fat, they're bears. They're supposed to be cute and chubby.

Kaylee: But they are fat!

Me: They're not fat, they're bears. Bears look like that. 

Kaylee: THEY. ARE. FAT!

Me: They. are. BEARS!

Kaylee: *eyeroll and big sigh* (cause I'm obviously NOT getting it)