On the Road Again: part 3
Finally, the rest of the post so I can move on to all the stuff that has been happening since August.
After spending several hours at the Maryland Science Center (and $15 poorer due to the cost of parking), we were off again, this time to spend the night a bloggy friend’s house for the night before heading to another bloggy friend’s house on the way home the next day. I have known Deb for several years now (initially through the web and later through a previous stop on the way home from our semiannual trip to visit another friend.) Her kids are in a similar age range to my own and they all thoroughly enjoy each other. Also Deb is full of awesome ideas and I love to absorb as much as I can while visiting. 🙂
There was a lot of mommy talk (poor Deb barely got any quiet I am afraid), dress-up and costumes (mostly the girls though they have plenty of awesome boy costumes and the boys got in on it),
quite a few practical jokes, light-saber and Nerf gun battles galore with some Lego’s thrown in the mix, and of course lots of swimming.
We had a lovely time and the kids had a hard time leaving.
Though I suspect poor Deb, who keeps a gorgeous, amazingly decorated, (and CLEAN) house despite having 4 kids and has an awful lot on her plate, was ready for a break. And isn’t this a beautiful picture of her and her youngest (okay, not a great picture but I love the mommy love going on in it.) So thank you again, Deb, for opening your home to us and your wonderful hospitality. You were such a blessing to us (and my house loves you– you are such an inspiration and it is much better organized and all those little things that I put off have happened since our last visit. I swear, one of these days I am going to kidnap you so you can help me make my house look nice.)
We then hopped in the car (it melting out and the one downside of our lovely, wonderful, blessing of a Toyota Sienna is that the air conditioning is meh if anything so 100 degrees was a bit much.) We headed north, back to PA, were we spent several wonderful hours visiting this wonderful family (I have known Beth online for as long as I have known Deb but as they only just moved to PA from Tennessee and I have never been to Tennessee this was our first time meeting. )
We spent so much time busy and talking and talking and talking, well, we forgot to take pictures. Where Deb is an inspiration (I always come home full of awesome ideas and my house spends the next month getting much more organized :)), Beth is a kindred spirit. So mostly we talked books, books, art, books, books, kids, books, books, Christianity, books, cooking, books, unschooling, books, and possibly, books. Her oldest gave his Lego collection over to Issac for the day (who relished some much needed alone time playing), the girls hit it off like that (and are bugging and bugging for another visit), and all the kids headed down to the creek for a long wade and some crayfish catching. I came home with several amazing books to read (Nourishing Traditions I bought myself having seen it at Beth’s and discussed it with her), Restoration: Returning the Torah of God to the Disciples of Jesus
she gave me (it has changed our lives and our relationship with God– heartily recommend it), plus a creation dinosaur book (Dinosaurs by Design
) that we didn’t have for Essie to read due to her sudden fascination with all things dinosaur (we had this one
and this one
. Oh, and she sent me home with some raw milk, which we tried, love, (can DRINK!!!), and which immediately spawned a search for a raw milk producer in the area (52 minutes away is the closest but what a blessing!) I can’t wait to go back and pick her brain about a multitude of things (and as I mentioned my oldest especially reminds me daily that we need to go back for a visit.. Of course now that both families have weekly activities it has been tricky to find the time but God’s timing is perfect and I am looking forward to the next visit (and can’t wait till they can get here to visit us!)
I wanna try RAW milk but hubs isn’t sure about it. It is supposed to be good for autoimmune disorders.
So, funny, I saw the pictures of Deb’s kids and thought, “Wait, I thought I was on Heather’s blog, why are Deb’s kids in these pictures?” LOL. Such a small world, isn’t it, this world of homeschoolers online? What an exciting trip. 🙂 I’ve never met any of my online friends who aren’t right in town — but I’ve made several local friends after finding their blogs first!
Heather, We had such a wonderful time meeting you and your kids as well. I look forward to our finding time to get together again, and am so thankful that you were blessed by our (awfully short) visit! We were as well.
Blessings, friend~