Road Trippin' to Ohio
Russ and I had just spent some time with my parents when they joined us to explore Charleston, South Carolina at the end of March. But, shortly after they returned home, my Mom suffered from a stroke. Luckily after a few days in the hospital she was able to come home and we are incredibly thankful that other than some loss of movement in her left hand she is doing great. My mom is one determined lady and she has already made great progress with moving and using her left hand. You make me proud, Momma! While exploring our wonderful country is fabulous, being far away from family becomes difficult in times like these. With all that had happened, we wanted to take time for a visit to Waldo, Ohio to be able to be with my mom & dad in person. It felt so great giving my mom a hug and seeing her with my own eyes!
When we realized that both my sister & her family and Russ & I would all be at my parent’s house the same few days, we decided to do a little early Mother’s Day gift. We decided to spruce up the front porch for my mom to enjoy during the spring, summer, and fall months. Our plan was to sand & repaint the current chairs with a color of my mom’s liking. Once we realized that the current chairs weren’t overly comfortable, our plan shifted to finding new chairs that were more comfy for porch sitting! My sister had a patio mat & step stool we revamped into a cute side table with just a bit of spray paint. To provide a little bit of shade, we added a set of curtains to the front of the porch. To the other side, we hung a net for the clematis to grow up. It will be fun to watch the clematis grow and bloom and add a natural wall of greenery! We were all happy with the little transformation that happened in the short time frame we had. Hope you enjoy your spruced up space, Mom! Happy Mother’s Day - we love you!
As an added bonus, we got to spend an unexpected few days with our 4 year old nephew Ben! He was pretty excited to be at Grandma & Grandpa’s house and we were treated with his enthusiasm and silliness. Hide-in-seek soccer (don’t ask for the rules because I’m still learning them), AlphaBots (Check them out here, affiliate link) tickle parties, keep the ballon off the ground (belly laughs), & a little batting practice (that kid has one heck of a good swing) filled our hearts with laughter and joy! Thanks for bringing him into the world, Krista & Jim!
Since my aunt & uncle live right next door, we were able to spend some time catching up with them. Growing up I was always intrigued by my Aunt Vick & Uncle Harry’s summer vacations. They would jump in the car and just head West. They would be gone for either weeks or months and explore some of the most beautiful parts of the country. So I guess you can blame them for contributing a bit to my case of wanderlust. We really enjoyed catching up with both of you and look forward to hopefully seeing you again later this year. Russ and I love that we have seen more of our families in the past year than we have in many years combined.
As you may have figured out, this road trip was made without our house Charlie in tow. So before we could head westerly toward Waldo, we had to find a place to park Charlie for a few days. In comes our old boat mechanic, Bob K. He hooked us up with a parking spot and an extension cord to keep our fridge running while we were away. We used to store our travel trailer “Melas” at his lot and we ended up parking “Charlie” in the exact same spot. Thanks so much Bob, you made the trip to Ohio stress-free!
After all was said and done, we definitely made a good decision to take a road trip to Ohio to see my parents. However, the road trip was a little different than our usual “moving day” drives. When 4 hours had passed, it seemed that we should be finishing up our drive, instead we had only made it about half the way to Ohio. Lucky for me, Russ was driving and doesn’t complain about long car trips as much as me. It was also strange riding in the car together as that is not the norm. Russ is usually in the Big Tow’er pulling Charlie and I am usually following behind in the Pilot. Since we like each other (a lot) this was a pleasant change.
Thanks Mom & Dad, Krista, Jim, and Ben for all the hugs, family time, good food, and laughter!
