Tag Archives: Memories

Mondays are for Memories – The Grand Canyon!

The header picture from yesterday’s Sabbath Rest post was from our time at the Grand Canyon back in late April, 2010. And it reminded me of that great “Rock Tour” we did way back then! So here is one of the posts from our time at The Grand Canyon –
4/24/2010 – I Better Get This Posted
WOW – what a great day we had at the Grand Canyon! And tomorrow promises to be just as lovely – and just as exhausting, I’m sure!
So, let me say that yesterday’s (Friday) snow
Road to Grand Canyon-8
and threatening skys
Grand Canyon Day One-5
gave way this morning to bright blue skys and warming (well, up to the mid-50’s anyway) temperatures!
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So – of the almost 200 pictures I took, I whittled them down to about 50. And that was HARD! So, if you’d like to see the rest from today (with a couple from yesterday thrown in), you can check them out here.
I haven’t even downloaded the ones from the sunset tonight – and we’re planning on getting up for the sunrise tomorrow.
Yikes!
And that’s why I’m leaving this short and sweet tonight. Bed is certainly calling!
Sunrise – 5:45 (and we have to figure out the whole shuttle bus schedule!).
G’night!
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If you’d like to check out the original post (or maybe have a look at some of the neighboring posts that are all about our fabulous time in the many National Parks we enjoyed during our Rock Tour, you can check it out HERE!

Helping Out

There’s nothing like planning a housewarming party to motivate you to get your house in good order. And when the party is TOMORROW, it’s all hands on deck! Gary and I arrived in the morning with fresh bagels and joined daughter Lara (whose party it is) and DIL Abigail (who was able to fly in for the weekend!) in getting the house party-ready! There were boxes to empty, dusting to do, floors to vacuum, and some mac and cheese to make! One of the most enjoyable chores of the day was helping to put together some of the decorative items in the living room.
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Abigail has a wonderful eye for arranging items on the wall, and then we had the great fun of opening up all the treasures Lara had carefully wrapped as they were transported to their new home.
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Such a collection! Many of those items came from the home where we raised our kids (especially all those little shoes/boots – I had quite a collection!), so it was like a sweet walk down memory lane. Before too long, the shelves were hung and then filled!
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One final vacuum, one last furniture placement, and voila –
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A cozy living room emerges!
The Mac & Cheese is ready for the oven tomorrow, and almost all of the boxes have been emptied. This house is just about ready for it’s official ‘opening’! To add to the delight of the day, my niece and family from Michigan arrived just in time for some delicious Chinese take-out!
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It was a busy, productive day. But we were working alongside precious family members, so it was all good. It was all Very, Very Good.
…But man, am I ready for bed!

Sweet dreams, friends!
Steph

Whittling down the memories

When we set out on our RV adventure, we essentially moved from a 3500 sq. ft. house to a 300 sq. ft. tin can. Needless to say, we got rid of a LOT of stuff. But still, there are always things you hold onto. For a while our ‘need to keep’ stash lived in our friends’ basement. We thinned it out considerably when we moved it to our son’s house in Ohio. When Lara moved to Ohio and had a little more room at her house, we thinned out the remnants one more time and moved everything into her basement.  Now that we have a small home in Texas and she was in the process of moving, we thought it was the perfect time to finally take possession of the Grams and Pops tubs.  Yep – after all this time we had reduced our ‘need to keep’ items to three large blue tubs and one smaller clear one.  One and a half of those tubs were filled with T-shirts. (Pretty sure (someday) I’ll be making a T-shirt quilt (or six).)  The other contents were old pictures (including some wedding albums!), memorabilia from college and our dating years, baby books (ours!), goblets that were wedding presents to my parents, some teddy bears, and my wedding dress!  This afternoon we sorted through the bins,  found some things that could be thrown away, and moved the remains into four watertight bins.

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After all, these need to travel with us for two more months until we get back to Texas.  I’m leaving it to Gary to figure that one out, but I know it won’t be inside the RV!
We also found a birthday card the kids gave to Gary back in the 90’s. Aside from two cards Gary sent me when we were engaged, it was apparently the only other card that seemed worthy of saving.
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and inside…
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Truly a classic!

It was a quick sort, but it while Gary was repacking all those T-shirts, I was having quite the stroll down memory lane.  Once we get those bins to Texas, I’ll be giving things a more careful review. I guess if I can’t figure out who the folks in the pictures are, our kids never will!

But for now, it’s late, and Gary really did go to bed hours ago! Better head that way myself!

Steph

 

 

Mondays are for Memories – A Mowing we will go!

With all of the mowing that Gary has been doing (he was on the mover over 6 hours today), I was reminded of the time that I was asked to man the mower. It was early in our SOWER life – July 2007 – and at a camp in Tennessee. I tracked down that post –

With 130 campers running around, it’s pretty tough to stay on top of “pool maintenance”. So, I have been moved to Lawn Maintenance. Yes, the girl that somehow managed to never even get on the riding mower when we lived in Jamison, has spent the last four days cutting lawn with a zero-turn lawn mower. Here I am – Mower Steph (with a view of some of my domain!)
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Ten things that I have learned while mowing acres and acres of grass:

1. The “zero turn” thing? Well it’s a little easier said than done.
2. Young campers are prone to enter your mowing area. Stop and find a new patch to mow. There is always somewhere you can mow.
3. Straight line mowing is highly over-rated. I personally think that a nice scallop to the lines adds interest.
4. Sunscreen
5. And if you forgot the sunscreen on the first day, DO NOT forget it on the subsequent days.
6. No matter how carefully you turn, there will be times when you eat grass. Or dirt. Or bugs.
7. Fingers usually stop tingling within 3 hours of turning off the mower.
8. There is nothing quite as lovely as the sound generated after turning off the mower.
9. “Getting close” to trees and bushes takes a lot of practice and is usually best left to those more experienced. (Sorry about that little Bradford Pear =/.)
10. Mowing provides a great opportunity to catch up with your prayer time. After all, who else can hear you? (Just don’t close your eyes and fold your hands!)

Oh – and my tan is really coming along!

This morning was one of those picture-perfect mornings. I carried my camera with me to take some shots – here’s the best one.
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(and yes, I even mowed the island!)

When I have a better internet connection I’ll try to upload some of the others so you can see our home base for July.
No big plans for the weekend – it’s time for some household chores for sure! Watch out dust bunnies!

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If you’d like to see the original post, you can check it out here! 

Have a great week, everyone!
Steph

Mondays are for Memories – Our First Anniversary

It’s been fun looking back over those ‘early years’ remembering the delight that awaited us around every corner. Here is a (slightly adapted) post from August 3, 2005. My format back then was different, so I’ve added some photos to illustrate how varied that first year was!
Aug 3, 2005 –
It’s hard for us to believe that we’ve been traveling about the country (well, the eastern half of it anyway) for a full year. What had seemed like a far off dream for so very long, is now old news. It just doesn’t seem possible!
We’ve had an amazing year. We’ve been as far north as Copper Harbor, Michigan (which is only a couple of degrees farther north than our Maine stop or our visit to beautiful Georgian Bay in Ontario),
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as far south as Fort Myers, FL,
Six Mile Cypress-3 (Six Mile Cypress Swamp)
and as far west as Eureka Springs, Arkansas.
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We’ve had our toes (or more) in the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, all of the Great Lakes, and Georgian Bay.
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We’ve driven through mountains and valleys, and descended into caves and mines.
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All along we have continued to marvel at the amazing country we live in, and the Awesome God that has created such a place and allowed us the privilege to be traveling through it.
But more than the places to see and things to do, we’ve been able to connect with friends and family – some of whom we hadn’t seen in many, many years. We’ve made new friends and seen firsthand how beautiful and diverse the Family of God is. Our work with the SOWER Ministry has blessed us in too many ways to recount. We have been able to use our skills and abilities while still having time to see the country. The friends we’ve made and the different communities we have been a part of have all been part of the treasures of this trip.
And so we continue on. We’ve found that living in our RV has added a new dimension to our relationship to each other, our relationship to the world around us, and our relationship to our Awesome God. Until He tells us otherwise, we’re content to be serving Him from our little house on wheels. Thanks for stopping by our website – it’s good to have you along! Please feel free to add a comment or send along a hello! We’d love to hear from you!
We have so much to see, and so much yet to learn!
And yes, we are still working on getting to the West Coast!