Daddy's Birthday & Harrison Woodlands Logo

We celebrated Daddy’s birthday this month, and we decided a fun way to commemorate it would be to create a logo for Harrison Woodlands, and to have some “merchandise” for everyone to wear. It was really fun to work on this project, and extra rewarding to see all the youngest members wearing their logo proudly (and it was extra cute that Texas did not want to take his off!).

Here is the logo:

We wanted it to have the feeling of a scouting patch and a vintage park sign. We added the little flags that say “planting today for tomorrow” because that is the spirit behind what we are doing; leaving a legacy and a love for the land and the trees. We thought it was important to have that stamped onto the logo as a reminder of the purpose behind what Daddy/Grandpa began.

To surprise Daddy, we took a photo of the grandkids wearing their tees and caps, and presented the photo to Daddy on his birthday at Mikata along with his own shirt and hat!

Aren’t they so cute? This is peak summer, and half of them are fresh out of the pool! They were really proud of their matching gear, and getting to surprise Grandpa.

Here are all of us after dinner with Daddy wearing his hat! We can’t wait to all be matching on our trip out West in a couple of weeks!

It was also so special to have Daddy’s brothers at supper to celebrate, too!

We had so much fun getting to celebrate him, and look forward to our next post about our trip out West!

Christmas at the Farm 2023

Winter has seemed to fly by this year. The Teagues are up here visiting us for Easter, and we are all wishing we could be at the farm because it’s the best time to be there with this beautiful spring weather. We are all looking forward to being there soon! I want to make sure I record Christmas at the farm last year; it’s always fun to have these photos tucked in here to revisit.

For Christmas 2023, we tried something new, and postponed our big Harrison Christmas supper to the 27th. This worked out really well, as we were able to all come to the Bluff House on the 26th and have some time to celebrate Christmas with the Teagues and the Lays and JeeJee and Grandpa before having to set everything up for the big family event.

All of the kids were very excited to see the surprise Henry and Grandpa worked hard to construct: a zipline! It’s so fun, and everyone, Pippa included, got to enjoy it.

Texas and Marjorie are two peas in a pod. They have been inseparable this weekend and have had so much fun sharing a room.

It was also very fun to have a moment to open gifts; can you believe this lineup of kids and presents? I also loved the tree; Daddy cut it down from one of our own stands and it was so tall and looked beautiful with all the lights.

Here is a photo so you can appreciate how tall the tree was! It was perfect.

The Harrison Christmas supper was a full event, as usual, and Jimmy and Martha filled the tables with soups, sandwiches, and desserts, and everything was delicious and perfect. I love this photo of all the great-grandkids (Teagues, Lays, and Brewbakers!) with Great- Grandpa.

This is a good photo of the Harrison men. Daddy moved the Christmas tree into the shelter so we could enjoy it at supper.

Stellie was so cute in their matching dresses, and they loved their dolls from JeeJee and Grandpa!

The big kids had a lot of fun spending the night in the treehouse.

Ellie made a special request to drive one of Grandpa’s tractors, and he let her. She was very excited about this, and has brought up this memory often since then! She loved getting to drive.

It was a very memorable Christmas. We are missing the farm, and can’t wait to go back. We are glad, at least, that the cousins are all getting to be together this weekend. We are all looking forward to the spring and summer memories ahead of us to be made.

The Best Birthday Party of My Life

This summer, I had the best birthday party of my life. I invited some of my best friends from school to spend two days and one night at the farm.

We played hide and seek at the bluff house, fished for hours, and boated on the pond, and shot guns with Grandpa. Then we cooled off by playing on the slip and slide in the field for awhile.

We continued to explore and fish and play while Grandpa and Mama fixed supper.

We ate a LOT of watermelon, along with fried turkey and french fries. We also each had one fried fish that we caught that afternoon.

Later, we had cake and traded baseball cards in the cabin kitchen. We watched a movie in the loft and the cabin and then fell asleep after a fun hot day.

The next morning, we had breakfast, then fished some more before heading home.

I hope I can do this again.

~Henry

Blackberry Picking Visit

The past few months have been very busy with the end of school, but we made sure to make it to the farm to pick some yummy blackberries. It was a short and sweet visit (only 24 hours), but a good reminder that quick visits can still be full of adventure and memory making.

On the way to the farm, we stopped by Jimmy’s coffee shop. It was beautiful, and the girls were very impressed with the kid friendly options. The cinnamon rolls were delicious, and I enjoyed an excellent cup of hot tea. As you can see, Marjorie is in the middle of her balletleisure phase, and prefers to not wear actual clothes.

I snapped a picture of Saturday Snacks because I love it so much. Perhaps we could move it to sit by the bluff house?

The girls were very eager to begin picking blackberries, and immediately suited up in boots to wade through the briars. Grandpa recommended we start picking across the road from the gate, so that is where we went.

We found some good ones, and Vivi was the most fearless, walking farther out into the trees and briars than everyone else.

Marjorie was not having it, and as she was inappropriately dressed for a romp through the briars in her balletleisure, she stayed perched on the beast and watched from afar, happy to sample as many berries as her big sisters would allow her to have.

We picked as many as we dared (the bushes were very thick and tall with lots of briars, and we didn’t want to encounter any snakes), so we decided to check out the field where JeeJee had lots of luck. On the way, we found some honeysuckle, which the girls were very excited to pick.

The entire field next to the dirt road entrance was completely full of blackberries. We followed JeeJee’s recommendation, and just drove through them in the beast, picking them where we sat. It was hard to stop because there were so many!

We had lots of blackberries - enough to make a cobbler, and it was time to go pick up Chip to get supper at the Pizza Place, but we discovered one of the Beasts was very quickly running out of battery. We couldn’t make it up the hill or across the field, and got stuck in the woods.

Thankfully, Grandpa rescued us in no time, and we were able to get supper. The girls were all very happy to play arcade games at the Pizza Place and fill up on pizza before going to bed at the Bluff House. We had planned to make blackberry cobbler, but it ended up being a late night, so we saved that project for when we got to Albany.

Sunday morning was perfectly overcast and slightly cool, which was an unexpected treat for June. We started the morning with some rope swinging.

The girls wanted to ride boats in the pond, and on our way to the boathouse, we found this cute little turtle. Brigette was very excited to check it out, and decided we shouldn’t move or disturb her.

When we got to the boathouse, we wiped down the paddle boat and the gheenoe.

Chip took Marjorie and Ellie out in the gheenoe, and Vivi, Brigette, and Eliana did a little trip around the pond in the paddleboat, and then everyone did some switching around. The clouds made for such a nice morning, and it didn’t get too hot. The little girls also had fun overfeeding the fish.

We had a great visit, and we wish we could have stayed longer, but we had a lot of fun doing everything we could! The blackberries were so yummy, and made a fantastic cobbler. We can’t wait to return!

What is Your Favorite Thing About Fall?

by Brigette Lay, fourth grade

What is your favorite thing about fall? Mine is Thanksgiving dinner. Every year my family travels to my family’s tree farm. The tree farm is a big forest where we grow pine trees and there is a house in it where we hang out if we visit. On Thanksgiving my family and I and all our cousins, aunts, and uncles, and grandparents go there. Everyone brings food for dinner. When we arrive there, me and my mom work on making her scrumptious pumpkin biscuits. I usually devour three! Once they are done we get all the tables, chairs, and decorations. While the parents bake a mouthwatering meal and set up, my sisters and cousins and I play together. Once people begin arriving, we welcome them in and we arrange everything they bring on a table, grab plates, and find our food. Once we’re all settled and sitting down, someone says a prayer and we eat! After dinner, we have dessert. One of the best desserts is Aunt Martha’s pretzel salad. It has whipped cream, pretzels, and jello! It’s delicious. Once everyone leaves we clean up the food and tables. Each Thanksgiving dinner is always exciting!

Hosting Friends at the Bluff House

In early September, we got the chance to take some extra friends with us to the Bluff House! We drove down two cars packed with 8 girls total, and they all agreed that since the Teague girls are the Lay girls’ cousins’ cousins that they should just go ahead and declare they are actually cousins, too.

Here are ALL the girls walking into Chick fil A with Chip for our lunch stop.

Shortly after we arrived, the kids all wanted to go on a hike. Below is the lineup of everyone (just missing baby Pipps!)

The big kids went on an adventure with Uncle Kemble, and the little ones went fishing with Uncle Chip and myself.

They all enjoyed it, and Ellie Teague caught a fish!

Marjorie and Texas very much enjoyed checking out Great Grandpa’s squishy worms, and that was their favorite part.

Brigette coordinate a fashion show with Stellie in the shelter on the stage, and of course Stellie put on a great show.

Homer was also there, and everyone enjoyed lots and lots of Homer snuggles.

Texas and Marjorie were inseparable, as usual.

We had Shepherd’s Pie for supper on Sunday night, and could hardly squeeze in everyone around the table, but that always makes for the best kind of meal when you are all squished together with your favorite people.

Henry and Texas also were really good sports about letting me take a Hardy Boys photo of them. They are pretty much professionals.

The big kids (Vivi, Brigette, Henry, Nora, and Quinn) all walked over to the cabin by themselves, and spent the night in the loft. This was such a fun big kid thing to get to do, and they did a great job of being brave and doing it!

It was an exhausting, non stop weekend full of fun and memories. We are so grateful to have a special place where we can bring friends and family to give them some fresh air and a break from really hard things. We hope we can have the Teague girls back with us soon for some more farm adventures!

Tree Planting Winter 2022

All of the grandchildren with Grandpa and JeeJee after planting their trees

This year, it worked out that the Lays and the Teagues had the same winter break, so we were able to all spend a long weekend together at the farm. Some highlights of the weekend included Vivi and her friend Eliana spending the night in the treehouse by themselves (this was the first time the kids have had an overnight in the treehouse without a grownup!).

Vivi and Eliana in the treehouse

As usual, Stellie walked to the cabin, and Brigette went with them. They decided to dress up like adventurers this time. Homer always adds some fun, and he went with them.

Brigette and Stellie ready for an adventure

Every adventuring company needs a good dog.

I always love watching them when they think they are so big, but really they are still so small.

We managed to make time for planting some tree seedlings across the pond. It started to rain our last day there, and we weren’t sure it would happen, but we ended up having the perfect window. The kids all became completely engrossed in searching for arrowheads in the newly upturned dirt. We will be sure to spend a lot of time there our next visit, because it was really hard to pull them away. Henry ended up finding a really great arrowhead, and that made it even more difficult for them to leave.

Grandpa had a selection of really nice seedlings, so each grandkid took a turn placing one in the dirt.

Vivi and Grandpa

Brigette petting her baby tree

Henry and Grandpa

Ellie and Grandpa

Stella and Grandpa

Texas and Grandpa

Marjorie and Grandpa

Pippa was not very excited about planting a tree, but she did it! Go Pippa!

The big kids also planted a tree.

It will be fun to watch these trees grow, and to be able to look back at these photos to see just how small they once were - the baby trees and the baby grandchildren, too!

We are looking forward to the next trip, and we are hoping for some arrowhead or Indian artifact finds.

Spring 2020

Just as we were gearing up for a busy season of baseball and ballet, wondering when we would ever get in a good spring weekend at the farm, we were hit with the reality of a new season known as quarantine. A new virus known first as the coronavirus and later as COVID-19 was spreading at a rapid pace, particularly in Albany, GA, and the news was a constant roll of closings and cancellations. Instead of wondering how we would fill the time at our sad rental house with three active young children, we knew what we would do. We would go to the farm every weekend we could to escape the news, enjoy the beautiful spring weather in our very own woodlands, and eat the best food we could throw on the grill or in a fryer. And that is just what we did. 

The first weekend we were all a little shocked and confused at our new reality. The men (Mike, Kemble, and Henry) enjoyed a canoe adventure down Buck Creek, we let Henry fish to his heart's content, and we all watched Stella's favorite movie, "The Sound of Music" to cheer ourselves up. 

The second weekend we made the most of it and let Henry and Stella enjoy the sinking sand in the wading creek, watched Henry take some golf lessons from his Daddy, and let Texas continue his sampling out of Grandpa's tractors. During nap time before we headed home on Sunday, Henry and I ventured out to Rice Branch right as a thunderstorm was starting to hit to work on our rock-skipping skills.

The third weekend, we took the boat out on the pond, celebrated Kemble killing his first turkey early on Saturday morning, cheered as Stella and Texas drove the gator around the Bluff House loop over and over, and let the kids get in the wading creek again, this time with swimwear on.

The next weekend Texas continued his sampling of tractors and we enjoyed playing "guess who" in the cabin.

Some highlight suppers during our weekend retreats include hamburgers, a fish fry, fried turkey, ribs, all the s'mores a three and six-year-old could handle. We quickly forgot that not a single restaurant was open.

Since then we have moved into our new home and enjoyed settling in or being in the pool during the summer heat, but we had to escape to the farm again for some blackberry picking and Rice Branch exploring.

We are so thankful to have the farm and the Bluff House as a refuge when the world turns upside down, which it certainly did during the spring of 2020. We enjoyed safety, togetherness, and the beauty of God's creation all around us. 

Winter 2020 Farm Trip

As I was preparing to write this post, I organized the photos from this trip into a folder, and began to label them February 2019. Then I realized these were from 2020 - it wasn’t that long ago, but yet it feels like forever ago. What a crazy month it has been as we have been staying home and not going out because of the coronavirus. We are really missing the farm and the trees, so it’s been fun to look at and organize these photos from our last trip.

We spent a chilly and rainy weekend down at the farm in February (it was actually colder than it was at Christmas, which felt almost like springtime!), and we had fun bundling up and taking beast rides. We especially had fun putting baby Marjorie in the furry bear hat that used to be Henry’s. She was so cute!

Vivi had been learning at school about cedar bark, and how people formerly used cedar bark to weave textiles, so Grandpa took us on an adventure to find some cedar bark.

Vivi had fun getting her own samples of bark to take to school and show her classmates. Brigie also wanted to try, and Grandpa cut us a limb or two to enjoy the cedar smell.

While we were getting our cedar bark, we got to watch the field by the beaver pond get planted. The girls loved watching the man behind the tractor place all the little baby trees!

We also had another fun adventure with Grandpa riding around on JeeJee’s new beast, and the girls had so much fun wading in the stream that was overflowing from all the rain.

It was hard to pull the girls away from the fun of following the stream into the woods; they could have kept walking all day!

In between all of this, I enjoyed one of my personal favorite activities at the farm, which is rocking a sleepy baby.

It has also been so fun to see Vivi and Brigette and Henry get old enough to have some independence and let them walk around the farm on their own. Vivi and Brigie went on their own walk and had so much fun (it’s hard to keep them out of the water!). Ellie and I let them wander for awhile, and then she and I set off to find them.

Grandpa found us, and the girls enjoyed getting to ride in the back of his truck.

We also had a lot of fun fishing with Great Grandpa; that was such a special treat and memory.

It was fun to catch some fish with him and “pet” the fish, and Ellie was sure to name them all.

We had plans to have a fish fry, but Ellie was sick over spring break and the coronavirus hit, and our plans were put on hold. We are still hoping we will get to do it!

We can’t wait to get back to the farm. We are planning to head down the weekend of May 2nd, which can’t get here fast enough.

The girls talked this morning over breakfast about how they missed Grandpa’s cheese toast and JeeJee’s chocolate chip pancakes, but I think I speak for all of us when I say the thing we miss the most is hugs.

(Oh, and our visit wouldn’t be complete without getting to see Barney.)