Allenby Road Trip - Part Two - Ohio

After our amazing time in Pittsburgh, we packed up the car and said goodbye to the Swanson clan.  We headed out on the 4.5ish hour drive to Dayton where we spent the evening and the following morning with Grampy (my Dad's Dad) and his wife Ellen.  It was so, so wonderful to spend time with Grampy.  The last time I had seen him was a couple months before my Dad passed away when he came out to NH to see my Dad.  The trip had taken so much out of him, that he wasn't able to turn back around to come to the memorial service which was obviously very devastating for him not to be there.  Seeing Grampy and Ellen was one of the major reasons why we wanted to take on this major road trip and we are SO glad it worked out to spend time with them.  Grampy just turned 90 years old in June and is honestly doing really, really well.  Ellen takes great care of him and her family lives in the area and have been a huge blessing to Grampy.  (My Grammy passed away about 8 years ago and Ellen's husband had passed away a few years before that.  The two couples had known each other for years and I'm so glad that Grampy and Ellen got married and have been such a wonderful support to each other.  It's a pretty adorable story and I'm just so glad he's not living all alone).

It was a really special visit that I'll remember for a long time.  So great to spend time together and definitely made me miss my Dad like crazy...

 At 90 years old Grampy was kicking around the soccer ball with the boys!

 Grampy and Ellen...

After leaving their house the following day, we stopped for a brief visit with our friend Ben who just left his job at Proctor to return to his old high school to take over the football program.  High School football is big-time in Ohio and it was so fun to see him in his new environment!

 After a brief stop at Carroll High School we hit the road for Columbus where we stopped at Uncle Greg's house for a short visit and swim in his pool on our way to Cleveland!  Aunt Karen (Greg and Steve's sister works nearby and was able to swing over for a little visit too!)  We're looking forward to seeing these guys again soon at a family wedding in September!

Ever since we sat in Uncle Greg's hot tub, the boys have teamed up with me to try to convince Scott that we need one at our house.  I don't think it's going to happen, but we'll keep working on him!

 After another stretch in the car we finally made it to Uncle Jeff and Aunt Kerry's (Jeff is Steve's youngest sibling.  So we saw all of the Allenby siblings on this day, except for Scott's Dad) house where we stayed for two nights.  Cousin Jill was home and the boys had a blast playing with her.  We also had a great visit with Grandma and Grampa Erickson (Nancy's parents) and Aunt Amy (Nan's sister!)  Phew!  Lots of wonderful time with family and the kids really had a blast with this crowd! 


Grandma and Grandpa...

 

Our crazy child...

Ice cream with Jill!

These guys had so much fun in this (turned-down) hot tub!  Check out Camden's face!  :)

 We had a lovely dinner with both Nan and Pop's side of the family coming together to visit with us! 

 Uncle Jeff (the boys' Great Uncle) had fun reading them bedtime stories both nights we were there.  It's pretty special that they're loved by such a huge extended family! 

 After two nights and one full day in Cleveland, we hit the road again on our way back east to Lake George.  This truck stop was a favorite stopping place for the Allenby family when Scott was a kid, and our boys had a blast waving at all the cars and trucks that passed beneath us! 

Final road trip installment coming soon!

Allenby Road Trip - Part One

**Written on the road on Wednesday 8/13, but posted 8/18**

As I type this we are driving through farm land somewhere in western New York.  For a rare moment the car is quiet.  After spending the first 2.5 hour leg of this trip sitting on the tiny middle seat next to Sadie in the back, entertaining her and the boys, reading books out loud, handing out snack and comforting a crying 16 month old I am now back up front next to my man.  Sadie is passed out – sleeping under her same cozy blue blanket that she falls asleep under in her crib at home.  The boys are watching Curious George on a computer in the way back, listening to the sound on their matching tiger headphones that I thankfully thought to purchase on Amazon just a couple of days before our departure.  The sun is shining, we’re safe and it’s quiet.  Life is good. 

Our trip so far has gone surprisingly smoothly…(well, except for a few bumps and poor navigating decisions...i.e. – deciding to drive “25” minutes out of our way to go see the US side of Niagra Falls after already being on the road for 8.5 hours.  We thought we would be those fun, adventurous parents who go out of their way to give their children incredible cultural experiences that they’ll never forget.  Well, I’m pretty sure we could have done without this detour because Sadie was screaming the entire way in the car, we were stuck in traffic which turned the “25” minutes into more than 60, we drove around this crazy mini-Las Vegas looking for parking and then wandered aimlessly around the poorly-marked area looking for a way to just get a glimpse of the falls.  Kids were tired, parents were tired, we were surrounded by lots of tourists and let’s be honest….if you’re going to visit Niagra Falls – you gotta do the Canada side.  The US side just wasn’t all that exciting.  But we snapped some cute photos to remember our adventure and the kids already have fond memories of it.  

Unfortunately, everyone was starving and we were still a couple of hours away from the hotel we had booked.  Instead of pushing everyone too far, we decided to pull off just south of Buffalo and checked into a hotel there.  We brought the kids for a quick swim in the pool and put them to bed.  Everything worked out just fine, but that was definitely the most stressful part of the trip so far.   

To make matters worse on that first day, Camden was sick.  He had a fever the night before we left (none of us slept that last night in our own beds) and his fever kept spiking through that long travel day.  He was exhausted and uncomfortable and laid low for the first couple of days of our trip.  Thankfully, by Day #3, his BIRTHDAY, he was much better and we were able to enjoy a fun day with the Swansons!). 
Here are a few pictures from a random stop we had along the road earlier in the day.  Camden was so sick...poor baby...

One of the primary reasons for taking this road trip was to visit my sister, brother-in-law and niece at their new home in Pittsburgh, PA.  After living on a little farm at the end of a dirt road in our same town, they moved down to North Carolina three years ago for Dave to attend a program at Duke Divinity School.  It was sad to not share our New Hampshire home with them any more, but so exciting to see them pursuing this dream and making a new home in NC.  Sadly, we never made it down to Durham to visit them during their time there.  We didn’t go down their very first year, and then with my Dad’s sickness and passing, and the birth of Sadie and the chaos of three little kids it just never happened.  Thankfully, Caren came up to NH for many visits (not always under the best circumstances) during these few years, so we’ve remained close, but we always felt bad for not seeing their home down South.  We had a road trip planned for last March during our Spring Break to go visit them in NC, but it turned out that during that same time, they were flying up to Pittsburgh to check out an amazing opportunity for them and we had to cancel our trip.  Needless to say, it was really important for us to go see them.  To see their new life in this new city.  To spend some time on their turf.  We realized, sitting around one night, that we’ve never stayed at each other’s houses before and just enjoyed that post-kids-in-bed downtime together.  We’ve either lived in the same town, or they’ve stayed at my parents’ house on their visits to NH.  It was fun to just hang out and catch up.  We loved watching our kids play together.  We went to the Children’s Museum on Camden’s birthday as a special outing (FREE for our family with our amazing reciprocal pass from our NH museum!  Yahoo!), played on a fun playground and swam in a city pool!  We planned our trip specifically so that we would be there on a Sunday so that we could see Dave in action as pastor of his new church.  It is an amazing community of really neat people – lots of young families and people wanting to put time and energy into bettering their community.  A perfect fit for Caren and Dave!  Thanks guys, for hosting us and showing us your new stomping grounds!  We had a blast!  

Camden was too sick to enjoy the playground.  :(

 Big girl with her own juice popsicle! 

 Cousins...

 Sadie was pretty shy, as usual, but warmed up when Auntie read her favorite book to her!

 We had a blast at the Children's Museum!

The real puppets from Mr. Roger's Neighborhood!

The whole top floor of the museum is a water area/splash park!  Super fun!

 Clara wrote an amazing birthday poem for Camden that he is STILL re-reading and laughing about.  So sweet...

Birthday ice cream!

Dave, who generally mocks church signs, has one of his own!  *Working on Awesome*

to be continued...

Good Friends

We had a wonderful, spontaneous trip to go visit our dear friends Courtney and Adam in upstate New York this past weekend.  Spontaneous isn't generally the word used to describe our small little family, in fact, my parents were shocked to hear of us making such a last minute decision, but I talked to Courtney on Thursday night and we left first thing Saturday morning.  We went straight to Court's parents house on the beautiful Great Sacandaga Lake for a fun afternoon of swimming and running around their gorgeous property.  Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald for an amazing afternoon! 

This photo was taken about 3 minutes after we got out of the car.  Camden and Annabelle were pretty excited to see each other!!

A beautiful spot!

Their own private little piece of paradise! 

Camden was a total fish!  After refusing to participate in swimming lessons for the last three weeks (that's another blog post altogether) he splashed, swam and played in the water for over two hours straight! 

Here's little Oliver who is about 4 months older than Micah.

Such a big boy!

Friends for 12 years now!  So thankful for this friendship!

Hard to believe we have four little ones running around now!  Here they are as we headed out for a boat ride!

Camden must have had something very interesting to say! 

Micah didn't really like the boat very much.  He did better than I expected though! 

Camden, on the other hand, LOVED the boat ride!

Husbands and babies.  We are lucky girls!

We stopped for ice cream on our way back to Courtney and Adam's house after a fun day in the water!  The kids were pretty psyched!

I am in love with Annabelle's face in this one.  So cute!

She is a little daredevil!

Scott was reading them a "scary" book.  I love how they are all snuggled up together! 

Friends.

Micah didn't want to leave.

Thanks for another great trip, Court!  This is our fourth summer in a row (maybe more than that) of having special time with our two families.  (Here is our trip last summer and here is 2010 and 2008)

Precious.

Of course, we had to stop at White Cottage in Woodstock, VT on the way home to eat ice cream and play in the river.  A great ending to a wonderful adventure. 

Thanks for all the fun, food and fellowship Court and Adam!  We love you guys!!!!