The Fake Picnickers at Sweetwater Creek

Me:  on the foot bridge

One thing I miss about living in California, Illinois, and Virginia is riding bicycles.  When we lived in Alexandria, VA,  for ten months,I chose to only ride the Metro or my black and pink beach cruiser bicycle.  No car for me! It was awesome!  It's too hilly in our Atlanta neighborhood for bike riding, so we have to hook the bikes onto the car carrier and drive them to Silver Comet Trail (a LONG trail that used to be a train track- it goes all the way to Alabama!) to ride.  I must say, as a kid I lived on my bike.  Since we couldn't ride in the street until we were 12 years old, we were fortunate to have sidewalks to serve as our bike path.  It's sad that we don't have sidewalks here in our Georgia neighborhood.

Old mill that was burned in the civil war.  

To avoid the bike-car transport hassle, we chose to hike instead.  We went to Sweetwater Creek Park in the southern part of the city again.  It was lovely, breezy, sunny weather, so many visitors were there, including a wedding.  Aside from wedding goers, there were many people wearing fancy clothes.  Women and girls were tramping along the dirt trails in their pretty pastel dresses and there were lots of families in identically matched clothes.  This is also common in Georgia, and it is something I dangle over my Marine's head in case he ever loses a bet or "owes" me in some way.  Matching outfits with me.  In public.  I haven't observed this phenomenon in other parts of the country.

Ubiquitous Georgia Dad and kids in matching striped shirts.

We also noticed a mom, dad, and toddler boy all gussied up near where we had stopped to kick off our shoes and enjoy the cool water.  We joke that the weekend "uniform" for Georgia men is khaki shorts, deck shoes,  and a polo or button-down shirt, and the dad was on point with it.  The family had a photographer lady with them.  It was sad to see the family go to a spot, set up a blanket as if they were having a picnic, bribe the toddler with candy to sit down, and then chat with the photog about where to move on to the next photo spot (a bench this time).  The toddler kept trying to come by my Marine and I, since he saw my Marine skipping rocks across the creek (it's a very full creek, with rushing water at parts) and enjoying the water.  We hope the kid got to play at some point after finishing his photo shoot obligations.  And we hope the family really does have picnics.  Like, where they eat outside and enjoy one another's company...without professional photographers.

Here are some of our pics.  Aside from a quick, "honey, turn around", I try to capture them as they happen naturally, without disruption of real life.  That's just our style.  To each his own.

Toes in the cool creek water.