Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Our Little June Vacation

Dear friend and devoted reader, things have certainly picked up here at the Hunter house in the past few months. My Michael left his place of employment of the past 7 years and started a new job. He also applied to, got accepted to, and started graduate school. We thought we were busy before, but things have certainly been crazier than ever these past couple of months.

Allow me to brag a little: My Michael, smartypants that he is, got himself into a pretty good graduate program. He is now working on getting a Masters of Science in the Management of Information Technology from the University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce (say that ten times fast--I dare you). The program is geared toward working professionals and is an accelerated program. He'll have his M.S. in M.I.T. completed next August. Wa-hoo!

Now, he doesn't go to class for an hour or two every Tuesday/Thursday or Monday/Wednesday nights; instead he goes a couple of Saturdays a month, a l l d a y l o n g. Usually. In June, he had to report to the campus in Charlottesville, VA for two weeks straight.

Instead of having him drive home Saturday morning and head back to school again Sunday night, we decided to turn a weekend in Virginia into a family
mini-vacation. The kids and I had never been to Charlottesville and we thought it would be a great chance to be together without a ringing kitchen telephone and the responsibilities of home.

After Teensy played in her All-Star baseball game, I loaded up the kids and drove to the hotel where my Michael had been staying. We piled into the hotel room and hit the ground running in the morning.

After a yummy breakfast at a little corner deli, Michael gave us a tour of the University of Virginia's campus. I really thought the campus was beautiful. I am a sucker for brick and the red brick buildings with large white columns surrounded by all the lush greenery sure made for a pretty, pretty campus.


After touring the campus, we headed out to Thomas Jefferson's plantation, Monticello. I have heard many wonderful reviews of other people's visits to Monticello, so I was totally excited to go. My kids weren't sure why they were going to visit some dead guy's house, but Mason quickly became a believer. He found the estate fascinating.
Check out how big the stump of this tree is! Our entire family could have fit inside.

It was a super hot day and Mackenna, especially, started to melt (emotionally and physically) but I think everyone had fun. Monticello has a special family-friendly tour and our tour guide was very good at trying to do hands-on activities to interest the children. There is also a children's Discovery Room with all manner of hands-on exhibits that our kids didn't want to leave!

Teensy and Kenna both loved playing house in the slave quarters of the Discovery Room. I tried to tell them that the real slaves had to sleep on the floor, work all day, etc. but the girls thought it all looked great to them!

Maia had fun working on a loom.

Here's Mason writing with a quill. He was supposed to write his name, but he wrote his catchphrase, "I like pie," instead.

I would love to go back sometime with my Michael to do the regular tour and to visit all the nooks and crannies our kids were too pooped to explore. The scenery around the house itself was stunning; I can only imagine how beautiful all those trees are in the fall!

I will say this: I cannot quite figure out Thomas Jefferson. Certainly, he was a genius innovator. And he no doubt had some great ideas and believed in America. I just don't know how to reconcile all that with the slaves and the slave mistress thing. It boggles my mind.

Anyway, I am glad we got to steal this little weekend away. With all of my Michael's church, work, and now school responsibilities pulling him away and me running kids to piano and baseball back in June, it was awesome to just get away from it all and spend time together as a family.

10 comments:

Greg and Nicole Jensen said...

What a fun trip. You are buff taking on the grad school thing. Sounds like a lot of work......Your kids are growing up and are cute as ever.....

supersonicjan said...

wow, remember when we used to be friends and I would actually know all this stuff before I read it on your blog? miss you! emma sunday?!

Corinne said...

I love Charlottesville! And that discovery room at Monticello is fantastic :)

Deb said...

do you know he may not have had that slave mistress? it might have been his brother instead? just so you know... :)

oh i so want to see monticello. i'm glad you all got to go!

whitney allison said...

Nothing spells F-U-N like slave quarters. Glad you had a fun time!

Cami said...

I like pie too.

Yeah, I kind of named my son after him, but it's a little frightening to think that one day he'll find out about that mistress thing . . . ugh. THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE! HE WROTE IT!

Anywho . . . good luck with the school and everything! So exciting!

Margaret said...

Too bad Great-great Grandma Flora isn't around to tell them about picking cotton in bare feet - that got her away from home and never going back when she turned 17.

I love Thomas Jefferson. I had his picture on my wall when I was a teenager (instead of the Beatles or the Stones) And I also know the DNA said "from that family line - could have been the randy nephew."

Glad you're finding a way to have family fun time during this added stress on Michael's time. You're so great!

Tracy said...

Now that I'm keeping up on my blogs again, it's time for you to update!

Jenni said...

Congrats on Michael's new job and masters program! What a fun mini-vacay! I've always wanted to visit Monticello! Looks so neat!

Jessica said...

Cool blog! I love the title.

Thought you might be interested in my blog. I run a collaborative blog - DysfunctionalBeginnings.com. Literary works about growing up, family, and beginnings in general (expressed in a variety of mediums!) Submissions go to dysfunctionalbeginnings@gmail.com.
Let me know what you think!
Thanks for your support...

Quotation of the Month

There is no way to be a perfect mother, and a million ways to be a good one.

-Jill Churchill