it's game time!
DESCRIPTION
Lake Wedowee Life's October issue 'It's Game Day' highlights Football Season for the south. Lake Wedowee Life is a bi-monthly lifestyle magazine dedicated to life on Lake Wedowee. We promote many events on the lake and surrounding areas.TRANSCRIPT
FREE October/November 2012 October/November 2012 • • www.LakeWedoweeLife.net www.LakeWedoweeLife.net • •
Table of Contents
October/November 2012 Vol. 5 No. 5
Special Features 12. LWPOA News: Annual Cleanup Slated for October 14. Market Update: Real Estate Mar-ket Update 22. Fall Traditions It’s Game Time 26. Fall Traditions: Game Day Reci-pes 28. Fall Traditions Central High School of Clay County Undefeated to Open Season 30. Fall Traditions Handley Out-scores Region Foes 143-30 31. Fall Traditions RCHS Tigers Be-gin Season 3-0 32. Fall Traditions Wadley Regions Undefeated in Region Play 33. Fall Traditions Woodland Knocks Off No. 1 Team in State 36. Southern Holiday Life Model Search Winners Announced 40. Small Business Spotlight Local Jewelry Store to celebrate 75 years in 2013
In This Issue 8. Enjoy Life! - Letter from the Editor 10-11. Lake Wedowee At A Glance 16. Creative Crafting 20. Lake Map 46. Charley’s Treasures 34-35. Simply Fabulous 39. Hooked on Lake Wedowee 42. Where in the World? 43. Readers Instagram Photos 44. Let’s Go Pickin’ 50. Facebook Top 10
contributing writers Judy Awbrey, Darlene Bailey, Tim Brown, Leisel Caldwell, Candice Helton,
Wendell Huddleston, Jim McAlear, Brian Morris, Charley Norton
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On the Cover Contestants in the 2012 Living the Lake Wedowee Life Cover Model Search came participated in this cover shoot. Wendell Huddleston of Lakeview Auto provided
the truck for the shoot.
Lake Wedowee Life
877.959.LAKE (5253) 18285 Highway 431 � Wedowee, AL www.LakeWedoweeLife.com
Lake Wedowee Life magazine is published six times a year and available around the Lake Wedowee area which includes Randolph and Clay Counties in Alabama as well as parts of West Georgia. All content in this publication is protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, or otherwise published with-out the prior written permission of Neighborhood Publishing.
© 2008 Neighborhood Publishing
General Manager LEISEL CALDWELL
Editor KELLY CALDWELL
Writer/Photographer AMANDA CAUSEY
Advertising Sales LAVOY CALDWELL
We often highlight the finer points of small town living in the pages of Lake Wedowee Life and this year, we have been committed to spotlighting small busi-nesses in our area. We feel its important to shine the light on the businesses in our community because
they play such an impor-tant role in our successes. A lot of these small busi-nesses have been around for years and even run by the same families for multiple generations. The family owned business really fascinates me be-cause of the longevity they have. Hall’s Gas celebrates 50 years of continued service this year and next year Sheppard’s celebrates its 75th year of business.
In these economic times when businesses are shut-ting down left and right, it warms my heart to see family owned businesses not only fare well but thrive. I also urge each of you to patronize these fam-ily owned businesses in our communities. They are something to be celebrated and cherished for their hard work and determination. Lake Wedowee Life is a baby when it comes to the
family owned businesses in Randolph County (considering we celebrate our fifth anniversary in 2013), but we are a member of this special club none the less and will continue to do our part to promote the area in new and exciting ways for many years to come!
Kelly Caldwell Enjoy Life!
Family Owned Businesses should be celebrated
8 Lake Wedowee Life
upcoming events
September 29,2012 Bennett Farms Opening Day
Heflin, Alabama
October 5th-7th Cotton Pickin’ Fair
Gay, Georgia
October 6th Oxfordfest Arts & Crafts Show
Oxford, Alabama
October 7th-18th The Last Ride
Historic Ashland Theatre
October 12th-14th Homestead Hollow
Springville, Alabama
October 21st Festival of the Arts
Northport, Alabama
October 26th Country Living Fair-South
Stone Mountain Park, Georgia
October 31st– November 1st Christmas Village
BJCC Birmingham, Alabama
lake wedowee in your words
November 10th-11th Christmas in Lithia
Lithia Springs, Georgia
November 10th Veteran’s Day Parade Roanoke, Alabama
To get more information about upcoming events visit www.LakeWedoweeLife.com
and click on ‘Events’
It’s finally fall!! This is my favorite time to fish for numbers of bass, but it can be bitter-sweet according to what the bass are doing in this reservoir. I am always excited and con-fused to be honest! Fish are every-where from deep to shallow to sus-pending in depths up to 60 feet of water. What this means is that every fishing angler out there has the opportunity to catch fish with a variety of techniques and how they are com-fortable of fishing. Here is a little secret of what I do during the fall. I always look for schooling fish in main channels or creek mouths and all the way up into the backs of creeks. Find bait find fish!! I rely on my elec-tronics this time of year because you never
know where the fish might be. Look for points off the main river, throw top water early or even a small diving crank bait. Try this technique on secondary points in creeks as well for bass. After the sun gets up, revert to a shaky head or Carolina rig and always( something in green) throw shad colors for
your crank baits. On bright sunny days look for cover like lay downs or boat docks. Crappie are making their way up, also look for docks on main creek bends 10 to 20 ft of wa-ter throwing a crappie jig around
docks and structures, something in shad color. Just remember fall is a feeding frenzy for crappie and bass. Find bait, find fish and catch,. Keep it simple throw something that resembles bait fish and you may end up with the best day of you life fishing on Lake We-dowee!!!! God Bless and Good fishing!!
As the summer season winds down, garden-ers can begin considering their fall planting options. Among the most popular varieties that will be planted this fall are the crucifer-ous vegetables. Included in this group are leafy greens such as tur-nips, kale, mustard, collards, and radishes. Leafy greens have gained popularity with gardeners because they are so easy to grow and harvest. An aver-age soil ph of 6 and a general 8-8-8 or 10-10-10 fertilizer will help pro-duce a good crop of vegetables. Not only are leafy green vegetables easy to grow, but they also provide the consumer with a bounty of vitamins and minerals. Leafy greens can be grown in an open garden area in rows or broadcast. If a garden plot is not available,
leafy greens make excellent container crops. In our area leafy green vegetables should be planted around early September. The plants tolerate the cool weather very well, even sweetening with light frost. Varieties such as kale and collards can withstand even more harsh weather. The leafy greens boast a variety of textures.
Turnip greens and mustard are gen-erally considered the most tender plants. Kale and rape have a thicker leaf, with collards having the heavi-est foliage. The roots of radishes, rutabagas, and turnips add not only to the length of one’s fall harvest, but also the vari-ety. Sparkler white tip and cherry
belle are two common varieties of radish. Finally, after harvest time, any remaining roots of the turnip will produce a beneficial flower that will be a welcome aid to bee population, providing the insects with a rare source of pollen during cool weather.
Lake Wedowee Fishing Advice By Brian Morris, Fishing Guide
Diggin’ In The Dirt By Tim Brown
Randolph Farmer’s Co-Op
The Lake We-dowee Property Owners have sched-uled their annual lake clean-up for Oct. 24 through Oct. 27. Volunteers will meet each morning at 8:00 at the high-way 48 bridge boat ramp. Having a clean pristine lake is beneficial to each and every property owner. Keeping the lake clean is a con-tinuous challenge and, as such, this is one of the most im-portant activities that the organization under-takes each year. The in-cluded pictures give you an idea of the amount of trash collected in our ef-fort. Just imagine what the lake would look like if this trash was allowed to accumulate. This year, the rains that we had this spring, while greatly appreciated, brought with them a lot of trash from the roadways. The coves on both the Big Tallapoosa and the Little Tallapoosa accumulate lots of litter. The Lake clean-up just seems
to grow each year and the LWPOA has many loyal volun-teers that have been working for years on the clean-up and we couldn’t do it without them. However, we need additional vol-unteers to help with the project. If
you can volunteer and bring a neighbor with you to help, our lake will certainly appreciate it. Lunch is provided for all volun-teers. There are several ways you can help: You can participate di-rectly by driving boats and collect-ing garbage along the shoreline. You can participate behind the
scenes and help out with T-shirts or meals. You can help with the adver-tising or donate drinks, ice, boat gas and food. We always have more people than boats so if you can volunteer a boat please call one of the numbers below. LWPOA pays for all the gas and will clean your boat afterwards if neces-sary, Alabama Power's Renew our Rivers program is a tremendous help on all of the lake cleanups around the state and the southern region. They
provide manpower, T-shirts, and barges to haul the gar-bage to the shore. From there the Randolph County Com-missioners do their part by hauling the stuff to the dis-posal facility. The community service workers, are a tremen-dous help to our efforts, as
they supply lots of manpower for our cause. Lake Wedowee Property Own-
ers Association contributes finan-cially by providing boat gas and all of the other necessities for the cleanup. We couldn't do it with-out this coordinated community effort. So mark your calendars for October 24th through the 27th and join us at the highway 48 boat ramp at 8:00. Call Marlon Glover at 770-823-6761 or Bob May at 256-357-2656 or Sheila Smith at 256- 396-5093 if you have questions.
LWPOA Annual Cleanup begins Oct. 24
Lake Wedowee Property Owners
by Jim McAlear
The Lake Wedowee Property Owners Association invites each of you to participate in this year’s lake cleanup. Vol-unteers are encouraged to meet at the HWY 48 boat ramp
www.lakewedoweelife.com
It is not easy being green... Well Kermit, it is not easy
being a real estate agent these days either! As a practicing real estate agent and broker in the local market, I can tell you the majority of active real estate agents are taking a hard hit. Anyone associated with real
estate is working a lot harder and making a lot less than they did just a few years ago. Many issues and problems are plagu-ing local agents: low appraisals, less financing options for lake property, more stringent financ-ing guidelines on all real estate, fewer qualified buyers, title is-sues, the lack of buyer or seller loyalty as well as the doom and gloom of the national economy. Another factor is the over abun-dance of agents competing for the actual number of viable sales in our market. This has created a situation where very few local agents are making a living by solely selling real estate.
The national news outlets are reporting the housing market is getting better. Is this true or is it
just more political propaganda? Personally, it has not been a good year for me as an agent (my team) and I know I am not alone. The majority of active real estate agents I know are struggling. A lot of the general public is not familiar with how real estate agents are compensated, so let me explain... If we don't sale and close the sale we don't get paid. When the news media talks about unemployment sta-tistics, real estate agents are not figured into those numbers. We also can't collect unemployment and we have very few benefits like corporate America and gov-ernment employees. This is also true for most small businesses. No, it is not easy being a real
estate agent but just like Kermit, I am proud to be what I am and I will continue to work hard for my buyers and sellers and be the best real estate agent I can be.
Leisel Caldwell is the broker of
RE/MAX Lakefront on Lake Wedowee.
Real Estate Market Update
Market Update by Leisel Caldwell
www.lakewedoweelife.com
Creative Crafting Feathered Owl Wreath
My love affair with owls began at a young age. My grandmother, “Mama Liz”, was ob-sessed with them. She had some of the scari-est looking owls I had ever seen...but it was the cute little snow owls that made me fall in love. People constantly give me owl figurines and décor items they find at the thrift or at yard sale. While I really do appreciate the
kindness I have an abundance owls in every part of my house. The one in the wreath just
happens to be one of them. This wreath is a straw base wreath from the dollar store. Harvest swag and feather boa from the local craft store and my thrift gift snow owl. Use hot glue to adhere the boa to wreath base. Insert swag and hot glue figu-rine. Allow the figurine plenty of time to set depending upon it’s weight. Hang & enjoy your fall décor piece for under 5 bucks!
By: Amanda Causey
Rustic Harvest Vases Making something fun and festive out of
items that would normally be thrown away is my specialty! I love creating something new from something old! These glass bottles were actually used during our tailgating cover
shoot. Instead of throwing them out I saved them...like I always do with glass containers. I used spray paint to cover the brown and or-ange bottles. Once dry I used natural jute twine to cover each. The easiest way to ad-here twine/yarn/string to an object is to use hot glue and form a perpendicular line down the length of the container and then wrap. Use more glue if it hardens faster than you wrap. Adorn with your choice of other décor items or leave them plain. Enjoy your Fall!
18 Lake Wedowee Life
Lake Wedowee Life 19
Growing up as a child on the west side of At-lanta I don’t recall a whole lot about col-lege foot-ball. Don’t get me wrong we had our UGA shirts and Ga. Tech flags out, but I don’t re-member ever watch-ing a college football game. We watched the Falcons every Sunday, but college football just never had an important role in our weekend schedules. Seven years ago I became a
resident of the great state of Alabama! Shortly after moving here, on our Saturday shop-ping trips I noticed something strange. Every few houses that we passed on our way to town would have 10 to 20 vehicles parked in the driveway. I thought, “What the heck is go-ing on at all these houses?” It was a year or so later that I was enlightened and came to learn that there are 3 things you bet-ter watch your step when speaking about in this area… Politics, Religion and College Football! THIS IS COLLEGE FOOTBALL COUNTRY! As time passed people
would ask me “Alabama or
Au-burn?” like it was a “Paper or Plas-tic?” “One lump or two?” type of ques-tion. I didn’t realize that I had to chose. I also learned that not
only do you watch out what you say, you have to be careful who you are saying it in front of. Some people get fighting mad, or won’t speak to you for weeks if you trash talk “Their Team”. Getting thrown off someone’s porch for talking bad about “Their Team” is not my idea of fun! Having a close family member delete you from their Facebook friends for not rooting for “Their Team” is not the type of thing that should happen. Since I know that I cannot
be the only person who walks on egg shells while trying to make friendly conversation (wondering if I’m standing in line at WM Grocery beside a die hard Crimson Tide fan or the biggest War Eagle shouting fan in the county), I have col-lected few tips to keep you in
Fall Traditions by Amanda Causey
the college football neutral zone and keep your foot out of your mouth.
First and foremost is you have to be observant. Look at the colors the person is cur-rently wearing. A die hard Alabama fan will not be caught wearing orange...just as an Auburn fan will not be caught in public sporting a crimson t-shirt. If those do not help look for a keychain, jew-elry, or other accessories that might help you determine who is “Their Team”. Next
check out their vehicle. Most die hard fans will have a tag or decal on their car/truck proudly displaying their un-dying support to “Their Team”.
Another tip for after you have spoken out and are start-ing to dig yourself a hole could be to just play dumb. Act like you have no clue about college football and hopefully the person you have angered will feel sorry for you. If you use this tactic just be prepared for a lecture about why college football is the greatest thing ever...and why you should be cheering for “Their Team”.
The last tip, and most im-portant, is to do what I do. Avoid all conversation about college football in general and do not tell anyone that you are from Georgia!
So “Alabama or Auburn” you ask? If I have to choose then I say ROLL TIDE… be-cause I look better in Crimson than I do in orange.
Game Day Party Packs
I created these awe-some download & print game day invi-tations, banners,
cupcake wrappers & toppers for your tail-gating/football par-ties. Visit our web-site to download “Your Team’s” party pack.
I will be giving away several of these through out the month of Octo-ber so keep your eyes on our Facebook page!
Burlap & Tulle Game Day Wreath I threw this wreath together as a last minute example to share a different way to use the cupcake toppers. I cut strips of bur-lap and red Christmas tulle, wrapped and tied them around the wreath form. I found a foam cut out football and used a craft punch to make the scalloped cupcake topper and glued it to the football. Adhere to the wreath there you have it. A quick, simple and inexpensive game day décor. If you have a football party and use one of the party packs or make a décor item from them please email us some photos so we can share.
Win “Your Team” Necklaces
Beginning in October I will be giving away these cus-tom necklaces that I made from the party pack de-
signs. Check on our website regularly to see how you can win. Through out the whole month of October we will be giving these away as well as the Game
Day Party Packs!
Lavoy’s Bacon Burgers 2 lbs. %93 Lean Ground Beef
2 lbs. Market Bacon 2 tbls. Worcestershire Sauce
1 tbls. Garlic Pepper Go to WM Grocery and have Lamar in the meat department grind bacon and beef together. Combine garlic pepper and
Worcestershire sauce together with the meat. Makes 16 1/4 lbs patties. Pan fry. Serve and eat!
Hey Joe, ROLL TIDE!
Beer & Pretzel Cupcakes Cake Frosting 1c. All Purpose Flour 3/4 c. Heavy Cream 1c. Sugar 4 tbs. Butter 1/3c. Cocoa Powder 1/4 tsp. Veg. Oil 1/2 tsp. Baking Soda 14oz. Chocolate Chopped 1/4 tsp. Salt Pretzels 1/2c. Butter Melted Chocolate Drizzle 2 Eggs Caramel Drizzle 1tsp. Pure Vanilla 1/2c. Guinness
(Cake) Add flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a bowl and mix . Add in the butter, eggs, and va-nilla and beat on medium speed for one minute. Add 1/4 cup of the beer into the mixture and beat for 20 seconds. Repeat with remaining beer until smooth. Bake 18-22 min-utes Set the pan on a rack to cool. Frost the cupcakes when they are completely cool.
(Frosting) Bring heavy cream, butter and vegetable oil to a light boil. Pour hot heavy cream mixture over chocolate. Using a spatula gently fold chocolate through heavy cream until well combined. Set aside to cool for at least an two hours or until frosting consistency is achieved. Frost-ing will thicken as sits. Add pretzels & drizzle.
White Pizza Dip 16 oz. Sour Cream 8 oz. Ricotta Cheese 1 c. Shredded Mozzarella 1 tbsp. Italian Herbs 1/4 c. Chopped Pepperoni 1 tsp. Garlic Powder
1 tsp. Crushed Red Pepper 1 Baguette/Pretzels/Chips
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine ingredients into a mixing bowl. Leave some of shredded moz-zarella for topping. Pour into casserole dish and bake for 30-45 minutes. Add remaining mozza-rella to the top during the last 10 minutes. Cut ba-guette in thin slices and toast or use chip/pretzels.
We want to see your Game Day Recipes! Submit a photo and your recipe to [email protected] to win a Game Day Party Pack for your favorite team! Visit us online at LakeWedoweeLife.com to find out more information!
Woo Hoo! for some and Oh Me! for others. At any rate the bell has rang and school is in session. That laid back summer schedule has ended!
Early to rise and late to bed. Joy, joy..,Just kidding I treasurer whatever stage of life I'm in.
I have a 31 and a 14 year old and the first born's younger years went by much too quickly. It seemed she went from being a baby right into kin-dergarten then blessing us with our first grandson.
At the moment I did not realize that precious time was flying by.
Now I roll with the flow and what gets done, does and what doesn't get done....well it just doesn't. Sending the family out the door with a good break-fast is important. So greet the morning with some yummy homemade blueberry muffins. What a way to say....Have A Good Day!!
I hope you enjoy!! Glass Slipper Events 256.449.2946
Blueberry Muffins
In a bowl combine pancake mix and sugar. In another bowl whisk egg water and oil. Stir the two together until moistened. Fold in berries. Preheat oven to 400 and fill each paper lined muffin cup 2/3 full of mixture. Bake 14-18 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Let cool in pan 5 minutes before removing. (makes one dozen muffins) Helpful Hint: If using frozen berries do NOT thaw. It will cause batter to be a ugly blue color.
2 1/2 c pancake mix 1/2 c sugar 1 egg 2/3 c water 1/4 cup oil 1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen berries
Simply Fabulous Story by Darlene Bailey ���� Photo by Kelly Caldwell
(Top row, left to right) Addison Sudduth, Alayna White Alston McLane, Andrew Pike & Cole Davis
model search contest
Southern Holiday Life
Congratulations to The Franklin Children; Joel, Hunter and Daisy-Marie for winning our Southern Holi-day Life Model Search Contest! They
will be featured in our upcoming South-ern Holiday Life magazine. We would like to thank everyone who participated in our contest. Whether you were a contestant, voter, or an advocate for your favorite model we are apprecia-tive for you help in making our second model search contest a huge success! There will be several opportunities for all contestants to participate in an up-coming photo shoot so look closely at the following faces as they will show up in later publications. If you would like to know more about current contests Lake Wedowee Life has please visit our website and look for the ’Contests’ tab at www.LakeWedoweeLife.com
Fan Favorite
Winner
Addison
Sudduth
(Top row, left to right) Daisy Marie Franklin, Ethan Wilkerson, Evan Pike, Hayden Wilkerson, Hunter Franklin, Isabel Blackburn, Jacob Cofield, Jake Crowson, Joel Franklin, Kathryne Causey, Khloe Traylor & Krymson Huddleston.
(Top row, left to right) Macon Cofield, Mallory Mitchell, Melody Jordan, Paxton Gowens, Rafe Jordan & Trace Yawn
Lake Wedowee Life 55
Try your hand at catching a Spotted Bass What a privilege, no
make that a blessing to live on Lake Wedowee. Clean beautiful water, friendly people, good fish-ing. Did you know that the Alabama fish and game department lifted the "slot" on spotted bass a few years ago? before you had to catch one that was sixteen inches long or un-der twelve inches to keep it. They said that Lake Wedowee is over populated with spotted bass. You read it right (over populated). Doesn't that sound better than en-dangered? This mean the odds are in your favor on Lake Wedowee. Spotted bass are very aggressive especially in the fall. So if you want to have some fun or get a child in-terested in fishing, now’s the time.
I've heard it said on several occa-sions that a spotted bass fights like a smallmouth bass. If you have
watched a fishing show that shows a smallmouth being caught then you know that is saying a lot. My wife Bonny and I will go out some times, throw-ing tiny baits on light line, just to see how many "spots" we can catch. The best part is the small lures will get a lot of attention from all sorts of swim-ming creatures. The spot-
ted bass is easy to identify, it will have a rough spot right in the center of its tongue and the hinge of its mouth will be even with its eye when viewed from the side. So get out on Lake Wedowee and give it a try, you'll have a blast.
One word of advise though, Hold on tight to the rod those spots will try to take it from you.
Hooked on Lake Wedowee
by Wendell Huddleston
Judy Sheppard Awbrey is the owner of Sheppard’s jew-elry store in Roa-noke. She took time to write a brief history of the store her parents opened in 1938 to share with Lake Wedowee Life recently. The fol-lowing is in her own words.
Russell /
Sheppard Jewelers began business on May 10, 1938 in a small build-ing next to the Roanoke Leader building on Chestnut Street in Roanoke. Hillis Sheppard and his bride, Merle, came from Lanett and bought a watch repair shop from the Moore estate. Hillis be-ing only 19 years old at the time could not buy merchandise for his business due to his age, therefore it was Russell Sheppard until 1940 when Sheppard turned 21. Hillis would catch the train in Roanoke and go to Atlanta to buy materials for his little repair shop and would buy whatever he could in watches to resale.
When Hillis joined the marines, his wife Merle kept the business going with a small line of jewelry added that was being sent from a wholesaler in Chicago. She would send a money order and the com-pany would send her whatever they had available that would ac-commodate her money. When Hillis came back from the marines in the late 1940s, the business be-gan to grow.
In the early 1950s, the couple lost everything in the business
due to a Sunday afternoon fire. Starting over was difficult, but they were determined not to give up. They had a son and a daugh-ter to raise.
The fire forced them to relo-cate the business and they decided to try their luck on Main Street. They rented a small space in the Martin Theatre building and added gift lines to their business. Weddings were becoming a big deal and they could help young couples with their wedding rings and dinnerware for their first home. They had evolved into a full line jeweler by then and was able to furnish jewelry to all ages from newborn baby gifts to great grandmother rings. They even had a call every now and then for a piece of jewelry for a departed soul.
During the mid 1960s, Merle
decided it was time to expand their gift lines even more and they decided to make another move to a larger building on Main Street, the old City Bank Build-ing at the corner of Knight Ave-nue and Main Street. Hillis had his watch repair bench in the back of the store and
Merle kept the front going with bridal registry and gift items. Eve-rybody wanted a pretty table set-ting of fine china, crystal and ster-ling flatware. The pieces were considerably less than now. When Mark and I married in 1967 our sterling flatware teaspoon was around $5 compared to today’s price of $100 for the same tea-spoon. A stem of Fostoria crystal was about $1.25 back then and while the company went out of business nearly 30 years ago, you can still find their stemware but not for that price. The $1.25 stem now sells for roughly $25.
I came back to work full time at the store in 1969. Mama had some health problems and I felt I needed to do what I could to help them. They had given so much of their lives so that Aaron, my brother and I could have a good life growing up in small town. Aaron and his family were living in Decatur, GA and I was here in Roanoke. I knew about the jewelry store because I had been raised in the store. (I still have the showcase in the store where I took my after-
Local jewelry store to celebrate 75 years in 2013
Small Business Spotlight by Judy Awbrey
noon nap as a little girl underneath it.)
Jewelry through the years has not changed that much. It goes in cycles. Yellow gold jewelry was a big thing the 70s and 80s. Every-body wanted a pretty gold chain to wear and gold was approximately $25 an ounce, so most people could afford to put one on layaway. Lay-away was a big thing back then. People would begin putting items on layaway in June to have it paid out by December. I have seen the time when we would have 200 or more layaways in the store at one time.
Christmas was always crazy. Mother and I would go to the store on Thanksgiving afternoon to decorate the store for Christmas and put out the seasonal gifts. The Friday after Thanksgiving was al-ways a big day for shoppers. We could usually judge how the sea-son was going to be by that one day of shopping. WE would get home around 10 p.m. that night and be ready the next morning to go again.
In 1980 Daddy became ill. One day, Daddy was at the repair bench and I heard him crying. Went to the back to see about him and he didn't know how to put the watch he was working on back together. We called a cousin that had a jew-elry store in West Point and he came and fixed the watch for us.
That was the end of our in store watch repair service. For several years we sent watch repair to this cousin, until he retired at the age of 80. Daddy a short time later was diagnosed with Alzheimer and he died in 1998. When Mama and Daddy celebrated their gold wed-ding anniversary they decide it was time to retire. In 1984 I became one of the owners of the store. It changed from D. H. Sheppard Jew-eler to Sheppard's. An opportunity came in 1990 to buy the building where we are now located and move the store, which we did. We opened in our present location on November 1, 1991. Increasing the gift lines and offering more items of fine jewelry, we had our own in house jewelry repair and were able to turn around a repaired item in a day or so, which helped our busi-ness.
In May 2011 Mark and I became owners of Sheppard's. We have changed several things since be-coming the owners and it is still a work in progress. Although we don't do as much repair in the store, we still do some with a re-turn time of 3 to 5 days.
Jewelry has always been a part of our lives. We've seen many changes through the years. A nor-mal cycle of style is about ten to fifteen years from shite gold to yellow gold. There is always something new and different look-
ing coming our so that people will keep buying or remounting what they have, but here is always one piece that person will always re-member having. It could be an heirloom form a grandparent or a piece that was bought on a special trip.
In the 50s and 60s everybody wanted silver serving pieces, the 80s and 90s they wanted crystal because the silver was too hard to keep clean and now it is a world of acrylic servers. Our lines have changed through the years to suit our customer needs.
My parents would not believe how the store is now and all the different items that we carry. You can still buy that first piece of jew-elry for a newborn and a piece of great grandmother, but in between is a different world with vinyl monograms, acrylic serving pieces, monogrammed bags and more. Like my Daddy always said, “For a gift you give with pride, let Sheppard's be your guide. “
Buying has changed a lot through the years. In the earlier days an opening order from a company might be $20.00 to $50.00. Today companies require anywhere from $250.00 to $30,000.00. A lot of companies do not want to fool with small busi-nesses, they seem to forget we are the ones that them where they are today.
(Clockwise from Top) Randy & Kathy Morris as well as Jimmy & Mary Ann Ward took their copy of Lake Wedowee life to the Yamaha Wa-tercraft Dealers meeting at the El Conquistador Resort in Fajardo, Puerto Rico; Brad Prince & his fam-ily ran the Anniston 5k run with their copy of Lake Wedowee Life; Mark & Smith Pass, Cameron & Eli Jackson, Carson & Seth Pass took their copy of LWL to the Duomo in Milan, Italy . Ann McCord, Shonda Knight, Danny Joe McCord, Kevin Knight, Madlyn Knight, Joyce Knight and Donnie Knight brought Lake Wedowee Life to the Cincin-nati Reds Hall of Fame. Mia and Jace Dunn along with their Dad Jim and stepmom Kesa brought
LWL to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Valerie and Barry Morris took a copy of their favorite magazine to Chama, New Mexico, at the depot of the Cumbres and Toltec Scenic RR. If you travel, be sure to take Lake Wedowee Life along with you. Take a picture at a landmark and send it back to us at [email protected]. Please be sure to tell us where you are and who is with you!! Thanks and Happy Travels! Visit our website to view our inter-active Where In The World map! See previous photos and check out everywhere Lake Wedowee Life has been!
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Matt Blaskowski @b1asko
Ashley Colon @jadipsails
Korey Elliot @koreyelliot
McKenna Dobinson @mldobinson2012
Matt Pickard @mpickard
Blake Protzman @mtnbiker95
Riley Sheppard @bekah_james
Stefanie Dewhurst @stefdewhurst
Zach Crunpler @zachc113
Some woman love spending their days shopping at the mall, trying on shoes, modeling the latest fashions. Me, I'm a picker. Call it treasure hunting, dumpster diving, modern ar-chaeology or recycling; nothing excites me more than a good yard sale or thrift store. Seeing a pile of junk gets my mind churning, trying to think of ways to turn junk into works of art.
Last week I was out and about in search of my next DIY project. I tend to go right for the rusted metal and broken down furniture you find in the
back of the store or thrown to the side. The things that, once upon a time someone loved and couldn’t live without, that are now tossed in the garbage.
The kind of stuff people will pretty much pay you to take off their hands. As I was rummag-ing, I stumbled across a pile of old fan blades and wondered what kind of life I could give them. There is at least a dozen times on my picking sprees I hear my fiancé’s voice saying, "Great, that’s all we need is more junk piled up in the yard." Call it the voice of rea-son…that I don’t listen to. I went ahead and got them. At a buck each I couldn’t just leave them behind, they were calling my name! Days passed and there in the corner of my porch sat the fan blades. Still really unsure of what I wanted to make I went out behind my
News to Know by Candice Helton
shed searching for some inspiration. I had a pile of old wood siding, old rusty nuts and bolts, other odds and ends. A pile of old ta-ble legs caught my eye. That's when it hit me. Dragonflies! The fan blades already had a simi-lar shape of wings and the table legs resembled their long narrow body. That's it! With my good friend the jig saw I got to work and added a little more shape to the blades and slathered on a few layers of paint. With a little sand paper and elbow grease I sanded away at the freshly painted wings revealing the colors below. Once they were complete I at-tached them to an aged ta-
ble leg and added the fin-ishing touches. This par-ticular dragonfly stands over 3 feet tall and is a one of a kind piece that will add a little fun to any gar-den. Some projects do not come to you immediately, so if you see something that you just can’t say no to, hang onto it until you are hit with inspiration to make something truly unique. Happy Picking!
Visit Candice on her Facebook page
Facebook.com/JunkRethunk Repurposed Junk is transformed into a creative piece of art.
My brother Tom tells a story every so often about two guys that wanted to start a business. They pooled their money one spring and took their truck down to Flor-ida and bought a load of water-melons. They paid a dollar for each one they loaded. When they returned, they set up a roadside stand and were very successful at selling every one for a dollar apiece. But when they finished counting their money, they real-ized that they hadn’t made any-thing. Realizing immediately what they had to do, they went and bought a bigger truck.
It seems nowadays that there are a lot of people getting bigger trucks. The more you try, you end up the same way but that is what a recession does, it makes those affected by it (which is most of us) work twice as hard to do what half the effort did just a few years ago and for many of us, it still is-n’t quite what we hoped for nor do we know if what we’re doing is the right thing to do. And al-though I hope that we never see times like this again, I know that most of us will benefit from what we’ve learned from it. I say this because of the stories my parents told me about the great depres-sion. About the struggle they had and what they did to get through it (without the government aide that we enjoy today). I could feel the emotions that came from these stories and I could see the strength and wisdom that was a product of it. My hope is that we all obtain some of this strength and wisdom from these hard times as they did with theirs. Maybe by surviving
this, we will appreciate all the things that we used to take for granted, have more compassion for others, take more pride in our work and appreciate the job, whatever it may be.
Leadership comes from many places and when you choose someone to lead, you have to look at where this persons abili-ties came from. There are three types of leaders as far as I am con-cerned. There is the wise leader, the powerful leader and the intel-ligent leader. Each are as impor-tant as the other so you have to decide which of the three are the most important for the job they are considered. Ideally you want
someone that is well balanced in all three areas. But that is rare so you have to choose the one with best ability to handle the job at hand. If I was talking about the job of president, my choice would be the wise leader, with a minor in powerful . Being wise, he (or she) would know to hire very intelli-gent people who are knowledge-able in the areas that he is not. And with a minor in powerful, he would have the courage to stand his ground. Wisdom comes from experience and perseverance so no decision would be taken lightly and wouldn’t be made solely on what the intelligent people advise or what history and books say should be done. A wise person
weighs everything and decides what each situation calls for.
Personally, I wish we had 50 candidates to choose from, one each state would vote to repre-sent. I think the job of president should be without party affiliation (someone up there needs to be im-partial) so there would be no con-vention and there would be no electoral college. There would be no debates and there would be a limit to how much advertising each candidate could do. Each candidate would provide a re-sume that would be verified fac-tual by government intelligence and they would all have to have physicals to assure they are healthy enough to handle the stress of the job. Their would be an interview with each candidate that the public could watch where each of them would be asked 100 questions that would cover all the aspects of the job. The questions will be the same for each person and they will not be privy to the content before the interview.
If this was done, only the most qualified would get the job, not the most popular or most funded. We would have more to choose from and more qualified people could have an opportunity to enter. There would be less lies and empty promises to suffer and filter through along with an in-credible amount of money saved. A president would be elected based on his qualifications and would be elected completely by the public instead of two choices put before us that came from a popularity vote made by a select few. Removing party affiliation
A Bigger Truck isn’t the answer
Charley’s Treasures by Charley Norton
would bring the country together and would reduce the limitations of party loyalty. It makes sense which is exactly why it will
never happen. It will never happen because the peo-ple that could do it are the very people that it would hurt the most. All we can hope for is that they make us a good choice and they have a few times so there is some hope there. Anyway, that’s what I think for what it’s worth. Regardless, let your voice be heard and go vote on
Nov. 6. Charley Norton is the co-owner of Norton’s Floor-
ing with his brother Tom. The company was founded by his parents more than 35 years ago.
64 Lake Wedowee Life
Index of Advertisers A & E Metal 21
Affordable Tire & Repair 19
Alabama Power 7
Bank of Wedowee 8
BB&T 48
Beaumonde Photography 45
Benefield Funeral Home 19
Brian Morris 47
Chad Lee, Attorney At Law 35
Charles Thompson Construction 27
Classic on Noble 4
Clay County Automotive 52
Corson Tree Service 48
D & S Marine 35
Dr. Michael Edwards 17
Farmer’s Insurance 48
Fiberglass Unlimited 21
Gerson’s Garden 47
H& M Drugs 19
Hall’s Propane 17
Kevin Cavender 47
Lakeside Grill 3
Lakeview Auto Service 48
Lake Wedowee Construction 13
Lake Wedowee Property Owners 15
Mac McKinney Properties 39
Main Street Animal Hospital 21
Modern Woodmen of America 19
Norton's Floor Covering 29
Perryland Foods 47
Randolph County Cooperative 29
RE/MAX Lakefront Grady & Linda Stone 18
Scott Hewitt, Attorney at Law 21
Sheppard's Jewelry 15
SmallTown Bank 17
Southern Holiday Life 2
Southern Restoration 18
Southern Union State Community College 6
State Farm Insurance 47
Steele Chiropractic 18
Summit Storage 41
Superior Gas 38
Tallapoosa River Electric Coop 38
W & M Grocery 51
Waste Solutions 14
Wedowee Building Supply 15
Wedowee Lake and Lands 29
Wedowee Marine 9
Williamsburg Manor 29
Jennifer Cofield: Alabama. I cannot think of any reason NOT to love them the best! ROLL TIDE!
Marty Kirby: Jacksonville State Univer-sity!! I’m a graduate! Go Gamecocks!
Amanda Stewart Davis: Auburn! No other mascot as cool as Aubie! War Ea-gle! Tammy Herren: Georgia Bulldogs!!
Amanda Hubbard Caldwell: Roll Tide!!
Robin Evans Buton: Georgia Tech!
Lisa Wortham: Alabama...it may sound a bit crazy, I graduated from Auburn University but I was born Crimson! Roll Tide Roll!
Claire Brown Lacour: Born and raised in New Orleans LSU is always number one.
We asked our Facebook Fans to pick their favorite college football team The University of Alabama won by a landslide. Here are some comments made
by our Facebook Fans about their favorite college team! Thanks to everyone who participated!
