Dear Blog Readers,                                    Friday December 18, 2009

I am writing to you from Jacksonville, Florida on the 18^th of December at 5:15pm and I feel so blessed to be hanging by the St. John’s River in the sun with the palm trees blowing in the wind.  My mountain home apparently is underneath 7-8 inches of snow.  I skirted out of Asheville in the knick of time.  I left yesterday afternoon and went straight to my parents house in the south and did not see one snow flake.  I woke this morning in South Georgia to torrential downpours, so I decided to stay cozy in my bed and drink coffee with my mom.  Around noon, I left to go down to Florida and it was a rainy rainy drive all the way til I crossed the Florida state line, where I saw a sign welcoming me to the Sunny State.

So in the sunny state of Florida I am blissed out in a sunny state of mind, sippin coffee by the St. John’s River about to meet up with some friends.  The daylight hours are melting into the evening twilight where a group of us are going to get together to have dinner and we are going to celebrate my friend Brenda’s 60^th bday.  Brenda is super duper special to me.  Her last name is Star Walker and she stands up to that name.  She turned me on to yoga 10 years ago.  So I love her tremendously.  I will probably crash in her yoga studio tonite.  She has no idea that I am going to be here tonight, so I am excited about surprising her.

I love to document so I will keep doing that.  Talk to you later.

Love,

Caroline Pond

Phewww, no time to rest for this girl, even though I am craving some respite.  I have barely stopped.  Between gigs, practices, studio time and radio shows, I have been running around like a chicken with her head cut off.  But, that’s the life of a musician.  I wish that I could do this full time and be financially stable.  That is my hope for 2010.  Let’s see what happens.  I have got to get my goals organized for 2010.

Snake Oil Dec 12th Emerald Lounge photo courtesy John Ottone

I leave in the morning to head to Florida.  So, I will post stories about my trip while I am on the road.

P.S.  I will be in Park City and Salt Lake City Utah, January 2-7th.  If you know of a coffee shop, radio show, pub, living room or party, that I can play my fiddle and uke at, let me know.

Peace xoxoxooxox

Happy Friday everyone, this is a shout out to my buddy Spyder, thanks for reminding me about the letter U is for Ukulele.  I forgot to mention that in my post on bloggie blog tag words.

I am going to try and do more ukulele tunes on my blog with lessons and answers to any questions you may have.

So here is an old time tune called Fall on my Knees that I video recorded for you and here are the chords for you to play along if you want to.  D  G   D  G  D  A  D  G   D A  D

(D)I Fall on my (G) knees and I (D) beg you (G)

please (D) wont you (A)stand by  (D)me Little (G)Girl

(D) wont you  (A)stand  (D)by me..

More ukulele lessons in the future.  Let me know what you want to learn and I will start doing video uke lessons.   Cheers and have a great weekend everyone.

Between the peanut butter cookies, Indian Food and the fresh Christmas Tree my house smells good.  The fire is roaring and I am warm as toast.  Thats what’s going on in my home this December Tuesday.  This is what our Christmas Tree looks like, it has flashing LED lights and homeade pom poms on it.  Fun and colorful.  

OOOOOh  I just blended an amazing smoothie, I call it Peachy Carrot Delight, here is how to make it.

Peachy Carrot Smoothie with one of my paintings in the background

Peachy Carrot Delight

In a blender or vitamix, blend these ingredients:

• 2 bananas
• a handful of mini carrots
• a chunk of ginger
• 2 cups of frozen peaches
• water to cover the ingredients

Blend away and enjoy.  Yummy…

I am so happy.  My life feels really really good.  Enriched with friends, family, music and travel.  I am so grateful.  I have been real busy this week, working every day, so my life has been hectic.  So today is Sunday and its time for me to relax.  The Christmas Tree is flickering with bright lights in our living room, there is still snow on the ground from yesterday’s blizzard, the fire is toasty warm and our front office has just been painted Belize Ocean Blue.  Not much else to report on this Sunday except that I am happy and content.

What are you grateful for this Sunday???  Love hearing from you guys so much.  Thanks for commenting and reading my blog.  That is what I am grateful for.

Caroline on the Boardwalk on the Plantation on Turkey Day 2009

I just happened to glance at all my tag words that I have used for my postings on this here blog in the past year, and it is so fascinating seeing all the things I talk about in alphabetic order.  Just love it.  Words are fun.

Abundance, Ami Worthen

Beets, barometric pressures, Blue Ridge Tribal Gathering of Beautiful People and Brynn Bazemore

Caroline Pond, Caveman Chinese New Years and Coverlicious

Deep Blue Ripples and Dream Jobs

Family, Fiddle Girl and French Broad River Fest, Fridays

George Pond, Georgia and Golden Hour

Halloween and Hot Tubs

Iphones

Jamaican Sunsets and Josh Phillips Folk Festival, Josie niece, Justyn

Kale

Laura Reed, LED lights

New Years and Niece Love

Pond Farm Pickers

Raw Foods and Rocket Club

Shredded Beets, Smoothies, Snake Oil Medicine Show, Snow Vacations, Sol Driven Train, Sugar & Spice, Sunshine Diaz

Tater Diggers, Traveling, Tree Sound Studios

Yoga

Some of my favorite pics that we took from the Plantation in South Carolina from Turkey Day,  are all here for your viewing pleasure.  Pictures can tell a thousand words.

Awww, the Spanish Moss

We really had a wonderful sunny time, walking around in the woods and going on hayrides and I played my fiddle for the family.

Life can be so adventurous, especially around Holiday Times.

Noli on the Boardwalk of the Plantation

Plantation on the Cooper River

Walkin in the woods with nametags on

Pilgrims and Pecans

I had such an amazing Holiday vacation in Charleston and South Georgia.  Thursday morning(Turkey Day) Justyn and I went down to his Uncle’s Plantation on the Cooper River.  Its one of the oldest rice plantations in South Carolina and its on the Cooper River.  It is called the Limerick Plantation.    James B. Edwards, his Uncle, holds a family reunion every year and this was the 25th year.  We ate yummy catered food, hiked the plantation, saw a ton of ducks and went on a hayride.

Friday we got up in the morning and went on a 10 mile bike ride over the brand new Cooper River Bridge.  It was spectacular.  Lots of biking up hill, but the view on top of the bridge was phenomenal.  We rode over to the Aquarium and met up with JT’s niece and sister.  We had a blast.  Unfortunately, my bike had a flat tire, so we had to load the bikes in to the car.  We did stop at Folly Beach to take out the dog and fly the kite.

That evening we had a lovely dinner at The  Mustard Seed in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina and then met up with friends afterwards to celebrate the night life.   We saw a band at Art’s Place, and they were extremely loud, but I loved how they played Duran Duran’s song Rio.  I danced my butt off.  Awesome.

Saturday morning, we woke up and went to The Waterfront Park with JT’s family. The park is underneath the Cooper River Bridge.  It is extremely nice.  JT flew his kite down there, it was amazing.  The weather was windy and brisk, but sunny too.

After our morning adventures, we headed to Sylvania, Georgia to hang with my mom and dad.  It was so lovely and sweet to see them.  We went to a real cool restaurant in the middle of nowhere, Georgia.  It felt like we were at a NYC restaurant plopped on a dirt road in Southern, Georgia, next to a deer processing plant.  Very interesting.  The place was called Doe Doe’s.

More pics to follow, I just can’t find the camera chord thingy.  xoxoxoxo.  Peace.

I am so thankful for the life God gave me

I am so thankful for my family and friends

I am so thankful that I am in a wonderful relationship

I am so thankful for my health

I am so thankful that my life is rich in adventures

I am so thankful that my mom made me practice my violin as a kid

I am so thankful that you folks come over to my blog to read about my adventures.  Thanks soooo much for your support

I am so thankful for my sweet brothers and sister

I am so thankful that I laugh about sooo much

I am so thankful that I have food on my table.

I just wish that the poor and sad people get many blessings as well.  My heart goes out to them.

Much Love. xoxoxoxo