Focht Family Blog

My next installment of campgrounds… Twin Lakes RV Park. This is where we stay when the Corp of Engineer parks are closed. They are open year round. Although we have had one of their full hookup sites we prefer the sites right on the lake that are only electric and water. Since the sites directly in front of the lake do not have full hookups we pulled in backwards so that our windshield is facing the lake so we have a better view. This is a picture of sites 81 and 82 in front of the lake.

Here is the view from the front of the RV…

Things I like: The view! This is a quiet park in a nice setting. Still close to my brother when Sawnee is closed.

Things I don’t like: I would obviously prefer that the sites on the lake had a sewer hookup. Also… this park does not have any bathroom, shower, or laundry facilities. The bathroom and showers don’t bother me but I would rather do laundry at the campground than having to find a laundromat.

Stars and Strikes is the name of the bowling alley in Cumming, GA where we had Timmy’s bowling party. We rented two lanes for an hour. One for the adults, one for the kids. My brother came with his wife and their two girls and one of my friends from Savannah that now lives here came with her two kids. We arrived a bit early because we weren’t sure how long it would take to get three kids and two pans of cupcakes into the truck. While we waited for the others to arrive I bought the kids tokens for games. Here is Joshua driving on some game and Timmy and Samantha playing air hockey.

After everyone arrived we settled into our lanes. We ordered some pizza and cokes for the kids and adults to enjoy in between turns. Here are the boys at one table… Timmy, Josh, and Tommy.

My mom and Celeste sat behind the action guarding the cupcakes and chatting…

Celeste is my friend from Savannah. Her kids are Tommy and Isabella. Isabella went to school with Samantha so that is how we know each other. The girls are always glad to see each other. Here is Isabella and Samantha playing with my brother’s youngest, Meghan.

After bowling we sat everyone down for cupcakes. These were the last of Timmy’s Halloween themed requests. They are supposed to be wizard hats.

The last picture I took of the party is Timmy trying to carry the present that Tommy and Isabella brought him. I think the box was a little too big for him to handle by himself. :)

Since we will be here for a week and Celeste’s kids have off school on Friday we have already made plans that we will go to the pumpkin patch on Friday.

Today we went to the South Carolina Aquarium. Our friend Chris Potter volunteers two Saturdays a month as a diver. He met us at the front and they had “Official Visitor” badges for all of us. Here is a picture of Chris with my mom and the kids. Chris went to college with my brother so my mom has known him for quite awhile.

Chris showed us around and walked with us for a bit until he had to go get dressed for the diving show. Once he was in the tank Nathan tried to take a picture of the kids with Chris behind them but the flash hit Chris’ mask so he is basically behind the flash.

While Chris was getting ready for the show we explored the Aquarium. In one spot there was a bald eagle. I think it is the closest we have been to one so far.

Yes it is real! They had a large touch tank area where they had workers educating about the different animals. Here is Josh looking at the underside of a horseshoe crab.

Here is Timmy next to one of the tanks. We spent quite a bit of time here because there was a Green Moray Eel that had his head sticking out of a rock.

Next we found a children’s play area where Josh was steering a boat and Samantha was matching animals up…

After the dive show Chris took us “behind the scenes”. He took us to the top of the tanks where the divers get in. He also showed us the quarantine tanks and the fish hospital tanks. Here is a picture of the main tank. The Loggerhead Turtle is on the top left portion of the picture.

Here is a picture of one of the quarantine tanks. They put the fish that they catch here to make sure they are not sick before adding them to the other tanks.

The last picture is of the filter system for one of the quarantine tanks. Nathan could not believe how big it was. We had two salt water tanks when we lived in Charleston and we had filter systems exactly like this but MUCH smaller. :)

We finished the day in Charleston with walking to a deli nearby and having lunch with Chris. Thanks Chris for a great day!! We are on the road again and should make it to Atlanta late this evening.

On Wednesday Nathan took the kids for a bike ride around the campground. On Thursday they found a path that took them to a large playground that we had seen driving in and out of the park. He didn’t take the camera but the kids had so much fun all of us went back on Friday since it was our last evening at James Island.

Here are pictures of Samantha, Timmy, and Joshua showing off their monkey skills.

At first Joshua found a small slide that he decided to go down…

After that he realized there were bigger slides. Samantha and Timmy joined him at the big slides…

While the boys were still playing on the slides, Samantha decided to go to the swings where grandma was resting…

The last two pictures are actually from the trip to the Aquarium but I have too many pictures from that day so I am putting them here. Timmy found a penny at lunch and had it balanced on his nose so I had to get a picture of him being silly. Also… Samantha got a penny from grandma to see if she could do it as well. Both of them had the pennies balanced on their noses the whole ride back to the campground.

Next up… the Aquarium!

A quick update from this week. I saw the surgeon on Monday who said that one of my vocal cords is paralyzed. This is why I have been having problems with swallowing, breathing and talking. They are fairly certain that the nerves will regenerate but can’t give me a timeline as to when that will happen.

I met with the endocrinologist, Dr. Fernandez, on Wednesday. She is a MILLION times nicer than the doctor in Savannah. She is concerned about my calcium levels so she told me all the symptoms for low calcium and told me to go to the ER if I get any of them. I am on calcium and Vitamin D supplements. She also put me on thyroid meds. I am starting out low and she is hoping to increase it slowly. My heartrate was high at the visit so she doesn’t want to increase too fast because it can accelerate your heartrate.

She said my thyroid levels were not that low but that I don’t want to make the left half of the thyroid do all the work or it will enlarge and have to be removed. Definitely do not want that!! So this way the thyroid meds will take some of the work off of the remaining thyroid. I go back in November for a check up on my levels although I will have my calcium tested next week and the week after and call her for the results.