June was fun, y'all.
No, really. June was packed with family visiting, garden-harvesting, summer-starting, swimming, cycling, you name it.
First, A's older sister came to visit with all her family (plus a guest). Our little house was a tight fit but they were wonderful, tolerant guests and we were quite happy to have them. They really seemed to enjoy Nashville, particularly all of the tall trees and the cyclist-friendly roads in our neighborhood.
We took them out to Burgess Falls, which was sadly closed due to some flooding. Still, parts of the river and the trail to the top of the falls were open so the trip wasn't wasted.
The next day we stayed a little closer to home and went to the Harpeth River to beat the heat. (It was so hot that we set a heat record set back in 1880!)
After that, we took them out for the true Nashville experience - hot chicken. Only Owen was brave enough to try the hot variety, and he suffered accordingly.
After the Pitts family headed home, A's mom, middle sister, and her kids came to visit for a couple of days. Cue more trips to parks.
My grandparents, now in their 80's, also came to visit. It was pretty great to be able to show my grandfather, an avid gardener himself, how we have made use of our large yard with chickens, bees, fruit trees, vegetables, berries, grapes, and whatnot.
Lastly, we went to the first Cornelia Fort Picking Party of the year. It was right after a storm had blown through, so the crowd was pretty small, but the girls still had a blast playing with friends in the old airfield.
Cornelia Fort, for whom the now-decommissioned airport is named, was quite an interesting woman. She was the daughter of a well-off family here that became a pilot and was the first American to run into the Japanese at Pearl Harbor. NPT did a short special on her.
The blackberries started coming in!
I also found a snake in the chicken pen. It was caught up in the bird netting; I'm not 100% sure how that happened. I cut it loose (while it hissed at me the entire time) and I hope it recovered.
June, while fun, was also exhausting. C expressed it best.
