"T" in Tennessee!

Love older U.S. stamps!

I've been a part of an organization called postcrossing for about 6 months now! I love it. www.postcrossing.com.  Send a postcard out into the world and get a postcard from some random stranger friend out in the world.  I am really really loving it!  I've received around 62 postcards now and am regularly corresponding, via snail mail, with about 4 folks due to postcrossing!  I recently discovered a stamp vendor at the Nashville flea market who has a huge box of stamps that he sells for face value!  OH MY!  What a joy! 

Lovely stamps! :)

Great postcards received !:)  I am really enjoying being a part of postcrossing! :)  T in T, T

Backing Up a Bit.....Summer of 2011!

I was very fortunate to have a wonderful Chinese friend (currently a law school student at Case Western University School of Law) stay with me for a month as she worked as an intern for a federal judge here in Nashville.  She and I had wonderful conversations but also created great meals. :)

I just can't say how grateful I was for being the beneficiary of such wonderful dishes while Tracy lived with me this past summer! :)

These are some of the wonderful pork/cabbage dumplings that we just couldn't manage to consume. But no worries.  They were saved and enjoyed for lunch the next day! :)

I was happy to take Tracy to Atlanta, Georgia, and show her many sights while enjoying a nice stay with my dear friend, Connie. :)

Tracy especially enjoyed getting to meet Mr. Anderson! ha

I took Tracy on a a tour of the CNN headquarters in Atlanta and we both had a great time. :)

We also met up with another dear friend, Liyin, while enjoying the wonderful laser show at Stone Mountain Park! :)

On the drive back to Nashville stopped off in Chattanooga so I could show Tracy the Chattanooga Choo Choo and the great hotel where you can sleep on the train cars! :)

This is Tracy inside one of the Chattanooga "sleeping" cars! :)  We had a wonderful time exploring Atlanta and also Chattanooga and Tracy enjoyed seeing some American cities that she had never seen before. :)  It was a great trip! T in T, T

Weekend at Cumberland Mtn. State Park!

It might be hard to top all those photos (see post below) of the Minister's Treehouse! ha But there is MORE to the weekend. :)  Marsha Haas and I have known each other since 1983 when we both worked for the same company (just after I graduated from the Univ. of Tennessee).  We have been friends through thick and thin for 27 years so it was so nice to do what we'd been talking about doing for years....have a girls' weekend together.  We did just that! :)

I arrived about 2 hours prior to Marsha's arrival and I was determined to have a wonderful fire going in the fireplace of our "rustic" 2 bedroom cabin. Things didn't quite work as I had planned (though I did bake some chocolate chip cookies before she arrived so the cabin's "funky" smell was replaced by some wonderful cookie smells! ha)  Well, when Marsha arrived she quickly determined that we needed "fire starter" supplies. Two heads are always better than one, right? 

Marsha not only brought the corkscrew for that expensive bottle of Trader Joe's wine (smile)....but also introduced me to the fine art of drinking red wine while eating a bit of chocolate cake brought back from our dinner at the Lodge of the Park. :)  Aren't friends great?

So on Saturday morning we arose to a wonderfully bright, though cool, day.  One of my self-assigned tasks was to prepare Saturday morning's breakfast.  We enjoyed great coffee and I prepared western omlettes with mushrooms, green peppers, onions and cheese!  They actually looked like omlettes and not scrambled eggs.  I was so proud.  Then we set off on a nice and gentle hike around the lake at the Park.

This is Marsha looking all nice and innocent. But she was saying "Come on, Teresa!" while she was jumping around on this swinging bridge and shaking it terribly! ha I was determined to make sure she had traveled to the other side before I ventured onto the bridge because, you know, I wasn't completely sure it could hold her AND me at the same time! ha  She finally gave up on her shenanigans and allowed me to cross all on my own.

From the middle of the swinging bridge.

NIce.

Cool rock formations/shelves that I am sure are part of plate tectonics from way back when.

Throwing the "peace/victory" sign because, you know, that's just how I roll. :)  Not too long after this photo...as we plodded along on the trail...a fierce (yes, that's right...it was fierce) wind came up and just as I was walking under an acorn tree one of those little suckers came down hard and fast and hit me on my thumb....and it really hurt!  Marsha, just laughed.  (Did I call her "dear" earlier?)

Well, hello, little duckies!  Where ya going?  Come back, come back!  Can't you hear me speaking "duck?"  Seriously...I can speak duck.

Here we are....about to end our nice little hike...but not before coming across these guys!

Geese are not to be taken lightly! ha  They are very protective and very territorial.  We gave them a wide berth as we passed by because, you know, getting pecked to death is not something I want to see on my death certificate!

Whew! ha  We've passed the evil geese and about to cross this wonderful historic masonry bridge/dam to head back to our cabin.

We've walked across the bridge and here's the other side.  After our hike we enjoyed a nice lunch of peanut butter and honey sandwiches (great post-hiking food), enjoyed chatting and then left to see a great comedy play (The Dearly Departed on it's last night of production) at the Cumberland County Playhouse! After the play we enjoyed a nice dinner at Cracker Barrel.  What a wonderful weekend catching up with a friend. T in T.

 

The Minister's Treehouse: An American Oddity! :)

First of all, major apologies for the huge distance between my last post and now.  I hope to post a lot in the coming days to make up for it! :)  So...moving on.  Last week, I met up with a dear friend who lives in Knoxville, Tennessee, Marsha Haas.  She drove from Knoxville, I drove from Nashville, and we met in Crossville, Tennessee where we had rented a cabin at Cumberland Mtn. State Park for the weekend with plans to enjoy the weeking chatting, drinking coffee, sitting by a fire, hiking, and taking in a play at the Cumberland County Playhouse.  I left early Friday morning, November 11 (yep, 11-11-11) so I could take in a special site just off I-40 in Crossville.  Somehow I came across information about The Minister's Treehouse on the internet about a year ago.  I vowed to see it.  I read that a combination farmer/preacher, the Reverend Burgess, was told by God many years ago to build a treehouse and that God would provide all the materials needed.  So he started building....and kept building for 15 years (still building, as far as I know).  Folks found out about it and started coming.  Build it and they will come, right?  He built.  They came.  So many folks that he began to worry that someone would get hurt so he posted "No Trespassing" and "Private Property" signs on the gravel road leading to the treehouse.  All the websites informed me that everyone just ignores those signs and he only did it to supposedly remove himself from liability if someone were "trespassing"and got hurt.  But there are no locked gates and no efforts to keep anyone out and signs posted on where to park, along with a donation box. :)  So....here's my first view:

Pretty interesting, right?  It's said to be 10 stories tall and with the height measure to the very tip-top....I believe it! I DID climb to the top, by the way, but you can't get go outside on that very top platform.

ha ha!  I doubt that one little extinguisher will do much for this huge wooden structure!

The Rev. is a proud American.

In Tennessee we might call this homemade lawnchair swing.....a bit redneck! :) (I convinced this stranger guy to swing in it for my photo).

Cool and quirky.  Inside all this scrap lumbar just nailed around is a big spiral staircase that leads to each floor and all kinds of odd rooms and, of course, the Chapel.

Praise the Lord, Amen....now let's play some basketball! :)  (there's a reason why this place is listed on "oddities" of America websites and the Roadside America website) This is, of course, the Chapel.

Taken from near the basketball goal....and yes...to the far right you can see some stadium seating. :)  Tired of photos?  Too bad.  I have more! :)

Lots and lots of graffiti all around....but if you write any swear words....it gets spray-painted over.  Mostly, the words are nice, about peace and love, or just folks leaving their names and such.  Cool.

Proof that this treehouse really is a treehouse.  In fact, there are several trees that the house is built around.  It's actually quite stable...though it's still a little scary and I walked up and among it very carefully.  Not a great place for kids though I've read that they love "running" through it.

When I arrived...around 10:00 a.m.....there were about 5 folks milling around the treehouse but they'd already been up in it.  So when I was climbing up and around inside the treehouse...it was just me.  It was fun to explore alone and find all the quirky things like this room with about 10 carvings that kinda looked like chainsaw art. :)

"Talk to the hand!"  Okay....that's probably not the intended message here....

I can only hope that this wood-burning stove is NO LONGER USED! ha  Another quirky fact on this wonderful crisp fall day:  The minute I stepped out of my car I heard drumming and chanting.  Like you might hear at a Native American PowWow!  Seriously. 

I was right.  Quirky is the theme here, folks.  A corrugated iron teepee?  There were LIVE people inside doing some LIVE drumming and chanting while others milled around outside.  I think they were family members of the owner.  Okay....let's get to the top! :)

This shot would have certainly been even more beautiful about 3 weeks earlier with all the changing leaves.  Still...I loved it!

And from the other side.....JESUS! :)  Upon closer inspection from the ground...it seems monkey grass is the tool used to do the Jesus spelling. :)  It was a little....well, scary, to be in that little room at the very top so...um....I'm gonna climb down now, okay?

Kinda glad to be back on the ground...

As I left the Minister's Treehouse....I had to stop, roll down the window, and take a pic of this great sign.  Just when you thought it couldn't get any better, right? :) By asking a few questions, seems they used to have trouble with some homeless, drug users, and I guess "sex fiends" trying to use Burgess' wonderful quirky structure for evil-doing.

Bye bye quirky treehouse!  I enjoyed my visit immensely!  And though it seems I've poked fun here...well, that's true.  But I honestly think it's wonderful that this man, Horace Burgess, built such a wonderful treehouse for folks all across America and beyond to behold and enjoy!  You can go here for a good article:  http://www.johnsoncitypress.com/Living/article.php?id=91362

And if you're ever traveling between Nashville and Knoxville on I-40....do yourself a favor and get off at Exit 320 and go north for just a few yards. Turn right at Cooks Lane (or Drive, or Road, can't remember). Travel about a mile and when the road turns SHARPLY to the right...take a left on Beehive Lane. It's a paved one lane road.  Drive down that road until it turns into a gravel road.  Drive right on past those Private Property and No Trespassing Signs. Trust me.  You are welcome there. :) T in Tennessee, Teresa