Home, Home at last!!

Sunday August 14th. We went to "The Hermitage" President Andrew Jackson's home. It was a southern plantation. It has many of the original furniture in it. Some of the wallpaper is 200 years old! Incredible! What a place to visit. We took a golf cart ride up to the mansion and then to see the back portion of the estate we went on a horse drawn ride to the outreaches of the plantation. On the property there was a replica of an English garden.....and that is where the graves of Andrew and Rachel Jackson are located. This really was interesting and if you are interested in history this should be a must see.

Monday we planned on leaving Nashville area....and we hoped to get to Perry, Georgia. Well we started out early and we arrived in Perry to soon to stop for the evening.....so we kept on driving and driving and driving!!! We got off the road about 6:30 and lo and behold we found ourselves in Lake City, Florida. Well anyone that has been on the road a long time knows when you are that close to home you find yourself awake early the next morning and on the road again to arrive home in Estero about 1:00 early afternoon.

We spent the rest of Tuesday, all day Wednesday and Thursday clearing out the R.V. Then Thursday a.m. We took the R.V out to where we store it. It sure seems be good to be but our travels will continue down the road.

When we were in Mackinac City we met a nice couple from Ft. Myers....Erin, Keith and family. Sure would be nice to get in touch with them...but I can't seem to find their blog. If Erin or Keith see this...please email your blog. Thx. Nancy

Saturday August 13th.

What a day....it's overcast drizzly and what do we do? Well we thought we should do something in the car. We head southeast of Nashville towards the little (361 pop.) town of Lynchburg. For anyone not in the know any Jack Daniels purchased anywhere in the world it all is made right there in Lynchburg! We take a walking tour of the facility and one and a half hours later we have learned all about making whiskey and our legs are tired! But we go into town and find the general store where you can purchase anything Jack.....even fenders for a motorcycle or a pool table to stick pins. Oh look there is a Harley shop.....we have to go there. Then we head towards Nashville and our campsite. We arrived back in time to rest before our big doings tonight.

Saturday evening the show starts at 7:00 and we know it is a sold out performance. We leave our campsite so we can get a good parking spot at 5:00.... Arriving about 5:30, the doors won't open until 6:15 so we found a pleasant spot to sit as the storms had passed and it was a real pleasant evening.

The doors opened a little early so we went in found our seats and sat in the a/c. What a great show...they celebrated Vince Gill's 20 years with the Grand Ole Opry. Our performers for our star studded evening were Little Jimmy Dickens (90 hrs. Young), John Anderson, Emmylou Harris,Martina McBride, Jenny Gill ( yes she is Vince Gill's daughter...but what a voice), Amy Grant ( wife) and then of course Vince Gill. There were others performing....but these were the ones you might have heard of. The show is suppose to be 2-2 1/2 hours but this one lasted just shy of 3 hours. What a tremendous day we had, the Jack factory and the Grand Ole Opry!!! Can life get any better than this? I want a return visit to the Opry....it is something else and if you like country it should be a must see venue.

Thursday, August 11 & Friday the 12th

We leave southern, Illinois and it's off to Tennessee....big plans for our visit here. We arrived shortly after noontime and wind our way down country roads to another Corp of Engineers park we were greeted at the front gate by the park rangers and their lovely southern drawl. Just love to listen to them speak. That afternoon we thought we should find the Grand Ole Opry handpick up our tickets for Saturday nights performance. What luck, we find the Opryland area....remember all the flooding back in May of 2010? Well it still has areas where things aren't back to normal....there was a mall right next to the Grand Ole Opry which still hasn't reopened....but hopefully will soon. Anyhow we could not figure out where the Opry building was so I saw a Grayline tour guide and asked him. We were right at the correct spot to go pick up tickets. We got our tickets and went to the gift shop. Still we were glad to find out how to maneuver our way around.

Friday finds us heading out to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. We weave around the city streets and find on street parking just around the corner from the Hall. When we entered we could tell this was a BIG building and it traces country music from the 1920's on up. There is lots to see and do just there in that building. Afterwards we find the Harley shop....then it's onto the state Capitol building. We can't find any close parking so we see the Capitol building from the car. With our handy little map we find Music Row where there are lots of small recording studios. Easy city to find our way around in...the small little map we picked up at the welcome center.

Plainfield...Cisco

Saturday we left the farm in the car and headed north to Plainfield...where the Greg Milton family lives. We arrived in time to attend daughter in law Lynn's celebration birthday party for older sister LeeAnn and younger sister Laura. It was held at Laura and Joe's home which just happens to have a pool. Bet you know where all the kids were....that's right in the water! Big surprise there, huh? Anyhow after a wonderful dinner we headed back to our hotel room and peace and quiet!

Sunday we took the kids to dinner and shopped a little bit before heading back to Carol's. It was a busy week end but again we aren't sure when we will get to see the kids...like maybe not until next summer. One of the pitfalls of living far away from our children....but we sure do enjoy our lovely winter weather.

Monday was another veg day for us.....cause we left on Tuesday morn. We drove the motor home to southern Illinois for a two day stay at a Corp of Engineers park. Great park.....but the sites weren't level.

Saturday July 30

Ahhh, Saturday....Katie goes home and we celebrate Daniel's first birthday. The kids had a first
birthday party for the little man. There were about 35 people who attended!

Paws, the Detroit Tigers mascot attended, too!My sisters, his other grandparents and a few cousins, plus neighbors and their children. We had good eats and then I got to hold Danny and give him his bottle(?) really a two handled cup he holds....

he fell asleep in my arms for a couple of hours.

During that time his sisters and a neighbor girl had fun opening his gifts for him.

It sure was a good time....but all things come to an end and we headed back to the RV. No kids, just the two of us.

Sunday.......the kids had purchased tickets to the Tigers game for Jeff, Tom and Richard (Amy's step father). Richard did not go so a friend Mike took his ticket..they were right on the first base line over the Tigers dugout about 30 rows up.

Tom had a wonderful time while I went with Amy and kids to IKEA. What fun it is to shop with four young children. At the end of the day when we were all back at the house we called out for pizza. Another tiring day but as always, totally enjoyable.

Monday we took stock of where we want to go and when we look to return to Estero. We had a call from Barbara Toth to tell us Tom has jury duty on August 31st. I guess we now know, we will be home no later than then.

Sunday July, 24

Sunday is a day of rest, which is exactly what we did.

Monday we drove to Port Huron to see Peg & Bill Heine. Thy both look great. Bill is walking without a cane and Peg who is just one month out from her hip replacement is doing great. She still has some pain (refuses to take pain pills)....but walks with a cane and her spirits are fantastic!

Tuesday, ahhhhh, it is nearing the end of our stay here at Harbor Beach. We knew our next stop we would not have sewer hook up so I want to get there with everything clean....yup, another wash day. Not much else to do... so we started planning our travels for the next couple of weeks.

Wednesday found us leaving early in the day. Our trip to Addison Oaks will be a only a couple of hours time. Tom decided he would drive the whole way. We arrived before noon, set up for the next week and settled in.

Grand daughter Katie called and asked us to dinner so we just cleaned up and then headed into Jeff and Amy's. Katie had an ulterior motive....she really wanted to stay with Grandma and Grandpa in the RV. If we came to dinner on Wednesday night she figured she could stay until Saturday. Well, we brought Katie back with us that evening and wow...let's just say having a seven year old around is fun.

Thursday started out dreary so we went grocery shopping. Abagail, the kids Nanny, took Dan the Man home for a "sleepover" Thursday night. Jeff and Amy were "childless" for the first time in 6 years.

Anyone remember

what it's like to shop with a seven year old? Grandma can I have this? Grandma can I have that? Are we going to get back to the RV in time so I can go swimming? Can I ride my bike? Can we do this or can we do that? Well it certainly is fun

and we had many great laughs. Katie loved walking Charley so much, I think Charley was exhausted every night during Katie's stay. Having a youngster around the campsite brings all sorts of little ones around...and Katie made friends with lots of children. Dillon, Kendyl and Katie were like the three musketeers......together whether they were riding bikes, walking Charley, playing with Grandpa's bubble machine or going to the playground. We did take Katie to the beach on Friday and she had lots of fun with "Dudes" splashing in the water. Anybody she doesn't know their name, she refers to as "Dude"!.... When we arrived back at the campsite she had Dillon and Kendyl to roam around with again. At the end of her stay we were surprised how slow life was without her.