Festival of the Four Rivers

This weekend Becky and I went to a bluegrass festival in Hinton, WV; the festival is called the Festival of the Rivers because several rivers converge near Hinton. It was 50 minute drive for us, and it took us deep into the hills of West Virginia. Luckily the weather was nice. It was a beautiful drive, but, like most country roads here, it can be twisty and can make you car sick if you’re not careful. Hinton, we learned, is a small town surrounded by tall mountains on every side. It’s set right on a river bank too. It seems isolated and peaceful, though a little bit rundown too. The mountains here aren’t exactly like the mountains out West; they’re not as high for one thing, but they are too steep to climb; and here you never see the actual ground because there are too many trees growing. So you get these lush green walls rising up all around. It is a very pretty area.
The festival was set up next to the city swimming pool. The first thing I thought when I got there was “coming here was a mistake.” There were a few small bleachers and two or three small food venders set up and about 10 people listening to the performer. The performer had lots of heart, but it sounded like the kind of performance you hear at an audition for a school talent show (just the audition, because the singer doesn’t get into the actual show). He was very religious, and for awhile Becky and I felt like we were at a revival. One of his songs was a knock-off of the rock-n-roll song where the chorus is “Give me the beat boys and free my soul, I wanna get lost in the rock-n-roll and drift away.” This man sang: “Give me my Jesus and free my soul, I wanna get lost in the Holy Ghost and drift away.” I had to chuckle a little bit when I heard those lyrics.
We decided to stay for the next band, and I’m glad we did. The next band was actually quite good. They were a bit more blues than bluegrass, but they had a fun sound. I’ve uploaded 2 videos of them for you. They don’t come through very well on our camera, but they were actually pretty fun to listen too. The second band is named Margo and the Bluegills. By the time we left many more people had arrived, so it was starting to shape up into a pretty good festival. We looked at the program and saw some bands that had traveled quite a distance to play at the festival. The moral from this trip is: Don’t arrive too early; or perhaps: Don’t judge too quickly.
It was fun to get out and do something out of the ordinary on Labor Day. We don’t have any special love of bluegrass music, but it was nice to just change up our routine a little and see something new. Now we are just hunkering down and waiting for Sophie to come; I’m sure that she will shake up our routine enough to satisfy even the strongest urge.

This is a picture of the cutest girl at the festival! (I'm talking about the girl in blue looking at the camera by the way)

This is the first singer and a friend of his.

This is the second band, Margo and the Blugills. You'll notice the old couple off to the left dancing to the music.

My Project

Last year I started a project here in my home with the hopes to one day sale my homemade items to folks here locally or maybe on line. My idea was to make a blanket that had a road on it, so the child could use it both as a toy and blanket for sleeping. I began this blanket before I found my current job, but shortly there after I started working as a receptionist part time in a dental office, so my blanket was put on hold. After things settled down I started working on my blanket again. I had it nearly finished by the time Stewart and I went home to Idaho for the summer, I decided to take it with us so I could get Stewart’s Grandma (who is an amazing quilter) show me some of her neat quilting tips, and tricks of the trade. By the time we left Idaho my blanket was finished! I am very happy with how it turned out, yes I can see my simple errors I made while in the learning process, but with every mistake I made a note of what I will do differently when I make the next one. I just recently sold this blanket to my office manager at work who will give it to her grand kids; she was so excited to have it from the moment I showed her. I decided to post some pictures of the blanket, to show you just what I am talking about. It was lots of fun to mentally take an image and see it go from the pattern stage all the way to the completed stage. The best part is it turned out just the way I pictured it! Many thanks to all who offered there opinions, and advice... I could not have done it without you!

The pattern Stage

The Finished Project

More Finished Project

Close up of some of the buildings or houses

Finished Project with the Backside

August Update

Oh man I must be on vacation still; I am getting bad at not updating the blog. To be honest thou there is not a lot to update you all on. Stewart has started school; the first day he had to study late into the evening was probably harder on me then on him. I forgot what it was like not to have Stewart around all the time to talk to, or to bounce my ideas off of. I really do miss him when he is not home… good thing it did not take me long to adjust back to his school schedule/routine.

Next summer Stewart and I will have to move to a new site location for him to complete his third and fourth years of school. WVSOM has several base hospitals where they have physicians help instruct the students while they rotate and get hands on experience in different medical professions. Stewart and I have been looking at all the sites and trying to find the best one that fits us. So far we have our top three picked out, but that can change as we learn more about the other areas. We won’t know where we are officially moving to until the end of November, after Thanksgiving.

One neat thing about living in WV, is all the local produce! Stewart and I have taken advantage of the produce that has been coming into season lately. We bought us a box of peaches from a local orchard and turned them into fruit leather, jelly, and dried peach slices. We also did the same with Strawberries, raspberries, and we hope to buy a box of apples to turn into applesauce sometime with in the next month. Holy cow, August is almost over (I just realized that)!!!

Other then that there really is no new news for ya, I am doing well and am feeling fine. I just started my bi-monthly exams for the pregnancy. I keep thinking I have lots of time to get things done and ready before Sophie arrives, but really my time is winding down. I am now 33 weeks pregnant. Lots of people at church have started telling me that it is about time I start looking pregnant. I guess the consensus here is that I don’t look like I could be 7 ½ months pregnant. Oh well, the doctors say all is well thus far. Stewart and I feel very blessed to have made it this far in our pregnancy without serious complications. Heavenly Father really is looking out for us, we are truly blessed.

I am not one to post pictures of myself or even allow a lot of them to be taken, but I thought I would post at least one real pregnant shot of me so that all who are interested can see for themselves what a pregnant Becky North looks like. LOVE YA!!!

Oh What Did We Do In The Summer Time?

I know it has been a long time since Stewart or I got on and updated our blog. Truth is we have been having a blast this summer and just have not taken the time to tell you about it. Stewart and I saved our money up last school year so that we could go back to Idaho for the summer. We left West Virginia on June 9th and flew Idaho where we stayed until July 13th! We had such a great time visiting both our families and seeing some good friends in the area.

We had a great time being with our families and learning all about what they have been up to since we moved to WV. We did so much that I think the best way to tell you about our trip back west is best with pictures

We visited the Bruneau Canyon, with Becky's family

Becky's Parents at Bruneau Canyon

Stewart and Becky at Bruneau Canyon

Stewart at the Bruneau Canyon (love this pic)

Becky's family (minus Emily, she is on a mission, and Stewart, he was taking the picture.)

North Family 4 square

More Family 4 square

Stewart's Parents

Stewart and his Dad, they look tough don't they :)

Becky with Blaz (Stewart's and my only nephew)

Us with Stewart's good childhood buddy, Andrew and his wife Kiersi

Stewart's last good deed while in Burneau... he mowed my parents back lawn (I think this was the first time he has ever used a riding lawn mower).

Along with hanging out with family and friends Stewart and I tried to go to the temple as often as we could. Being so close to a temple, is one thing that we miss most about living in West Virginia. To travel to the DC temple takes us 5 hours; it is an all day affair. Those of you who live so close enjoy the temples as much a possible, because if you ever have to move away you will miss it dearly.

Since being back in WV, I have gone back to work and Stewart has been reading a lot of Harry Potter, anything but text books if he can avoid it. Although he has had to study for an EKG test that he has coming up the first week he gets back to school. YUCK!

Everything is going well with the development of our baby, she moves around a lot more now. I enjoy feeling her wiggle around in my belly. It brings a since of comfort knowing she is growing strong daily. One funny thing that Sophie does is that she will not let Stewart feel her kick. She can be carrying on kicking me over and over, but as soon as Stewart puts his hand on my stomach, she stops. I can’t even use his name and call Stewart over to look at my belly bouncing without her stopping. Stewart and I just laugh about it, and joke that Sophie is going to be a mama’s girl. In reality I am sure she and Stewart will be wrapped around each others pinkies not long after she is born.

This coming week, Stewart and I were given tickets, by my boss, to go to the PGA Golf tournament happening here in the area. We also got tickets to go to the Reba McEntire and a Rascal Flats concerts happening Wednesday and Thursday night. We are excited to be around all this excitement, although I am sure our opinion will change after a while of having to deal with the traffic issues caused by all the spectators taking over our town.

Other than that we are both doing well, we feel so blessed to be starting year two of med school. We want to say thanks to our families for all they did for us while we were in Idaho. Thanks to all our friends as well for organizing events so we could say hi to everyone. We had a great time, and love you all!!! Our door is always opened to anyone who would like to visit us… hint hint. LOVES!!!

To Cool Not to Post

Holy Cow!!! I was just going thru my pictures that I took last month and found probably two of the best pictures I will ever be in. I have no idea why I waited so long to post this on our blog. This is completely 100% blog worthy. Enjoy the pictures!!!!

Yep that is me with the Oscar Meyer Weiner-Mobile!!!! It came to Lewisburg about a month ago. Many thanks goes out to my husband, Stewart who took this picture, wondering the whole time what the big deal was. Hello.... do I need to say why this was a BIG deal??? The pictures speak for themselves. Ciao!

Battle of Lewisburg

Last Saturday Becky and I went for a walk. We decided to stroll through downtown Lewisburg. It has a pleasant, small-town feel to it, and we thought it would be a nice way to relax on a Saturday afternoon. Soon after we started our walk we could tell that something was different. Where were all the people? Why weren’t any birds singing? Something unusual was happening. Then we heard the crack of musket fire coming from somewhere up ahead. It was echoed by another shot, and then a scream. What was happening?

We heard footsteps coming quickly from behind. We turned to look and saw some men in dusty, battle-worn uniforms, carrying muskets and running in our direction. I pulled Becky off to the side, out of their path; as they passed one yelled “Y’all best be takin’ cover! Turn ‘round now ya’ hear!” They ran passed us toward the sound of the musket fire.

We knew we should turn around, but curiosity compelled us on. We continued up the street. More musket fire…then a much larger explosion. Was that a canon? As we continued we began to make out other sounds, the clatter of hooves on the road, the clash of sabers and bayonets, and the yelling men.

When we finally reached Court St. we could see the cause of the commotion, but we couldn’t believe our eyes. There, on either end of the street were men in battle uniform, on the South side they were dressed in grey, on the North they were dressed in blue. They were lined up in companies firing at each other! My mind was numb, what could this mean? What was happening? I didn’t know how to react. Fortunately for you all the photographer deep inside me took over and I was able to snap some pictures of the battle.

Okay, maybe my description of what happened up above wasn’t entirely accurate. During the Civil War there was a battle fought here on the streets of Lewisburg. Many of the buildings that survived the battle are still standing today in the downtown area. Every year they re-enact the battle to remember their heritage. It is a 3-day long “festival.” Lots of people dress up in period costumes, there are demonstrations on period surgeries, cooking, living, etc (I think they use manikins to demonstrate the surgeries). It is a great opportunity to learn about the past. Friday evening Becky and I went on a tour of local haunted sites…apparently there are several local ghosts and we got to learn their stories. Saturday afternoon was the skirmish on Court St. that I described above. We went, and got some neat pictures. We hope you enjoy them.