False Cape State Park

I realize I still haven't posted the swimming pictures, but I've been busy.  Deal with it :-)

Part of the reason I've been busy is work.  I recently spent 3 days at False Cape State Park, which is south of Virginia Beach, right along the Virginia/North Carolina border.  Very close to Norfolk and NAS Oceana so there is plenty of air activity.  I had never been to this park before but knew that it was isolated and difficult to get to, despite being so near a major population like Virginia Beach. 

To say the least, it was beautiful.  I was very happy that I took my nice camera along for this trip, as there was plenty to take pictures of.

We did quite a bit of work while there, but we also had a good time.  We went for a nice kayak trip one day where we saw some bald eagles, blue herons, and plenty of water snakes.  We also went for a ride on the Terra Gator, which is a former military personnel transport that the park now uses to move people up and down the beach.  Pretty impressive piece of equipment, although I've been warned that you shouldn't linger in it if it catches on fire O_o

Days were spent working and enjoying the natural beauty.  Nights were spent fishing on the beach and playing cornhole next to the bay.  Not a bad work trip at all.  Here are some of my pictures from the days we spent there. 

 



Busy, busy, busy

Who knew having a child would take up so much time?!  Things are hectic around here, but I think we're all learning that this will probably be the norm for the next 15-18 years.  Adaptation is key I suppose. 

We're finally getting into a good home rhythm with evenings.  Mila dropped her late nap, so there isn't as much downtime to get things done, but its much more fun to do things with her anyway.  We started swim lessons a few weeks ago at the rec center up the street.  Some days she loves it, some days....not so much.  Last night was a night she loved it.  She kicks her legs and moves her arms well, but isn't really into getting her ears wet when floating on her back.  Last night I dunked her a few times and she made the most hilarious face when she came out of the water.  I wish we had pictures of it.

I'll post some swim pictures when I get access to them tonight.  Ejdo has found that they are incredibly hard to post process due to the funny lighting in the pool.  I think they look great though.  Talk about priceless memories. 

Other than swimming and running around after a 9 month old, Ejdo spent most of Sunday building a cold smoker to make the bacon from our pig butchering day.  He put the bacon slabs into a brine on Wednesday and then built the smoker and smoked them on Sunday.  The house smelled amazing. 

Essentially how it works is the coals and chips are in the small smoker to the left.  The smoke is contained within an aluminum case (made from the aluminum pans at the grocery store) and piped through the ducting into the other smoker.  You don't want the meat to cook, just to get smoked, so it should be around 80-90 degrees max.  Amazingly, this worked really well.  Took some trial and error with the aluminum pans, but Ejdo got it nailed down pretty quickly. 

We cooked up a piece already to see how it tasted.  Its fatty, like the rest of this pig, and salty, which is probably very typical of a traditional bacon.  I think it will be awesome in a BLT.  Very excited to make some for dinner soon.