June 27 -July 1st

June 27 – July 1^st

This week we spent with our Jeff and David’s families. It is funny how the last couple of days I have been worrying about how I was going to feed and clothe my family. I can’t imagine how the pioneer mother must have stressed about that. It really bothers me not to know how I can feed them or when I will be able to wash their clothes and we have walmart at almost every exit. Anyway for the last couple days I have thought if we can just get through these days we will be at Jeff’s and then everything will be ok. Even though our trip was going wonderfully and we were having a great time and hadn’t encountered any really problems it is kind of a nerve racking thing to be 2000 miles from home in a 12 year old RV. We pulled into Jeff’s parking lot around 9:00 Sunday evening. He had dinner ready for us and then we all crashed in his basement. We were pretty exhausted having gone pretty hard all day.

The next day Stacey took us on to campus and we went to a life science museum and learned about evolution and dinosaurs. Then we grabbed some pizza at a little campus shop and Jeff took us on a tour around campus. He showed us some cool building and best of all (according to him) some waterless urinals. He choose a pretty cool school. We rode the bus which the kids loved – we need to get more public transportation out our way. We had dinner at a nice park by the Huron river for fhe. We took a little walk and played on the playground and battled some attacking geese. It was a great dinner and a fun evening. The kids had a great time playing out at Jacob’s sandbox and with his toys.

The next morning we went to Detroit to tour the Ford Rouge Factory. Rick was really interested in seeing them make cars. I went with Jeff a couple years ago but it was during a time when Ford was experiencing rough financial times and couldn’t keep the factory running full time – we happened to come when they weren’t making trucks. This time they were. It was pretty cool to watch the trucks come together. I have to admit I would never want to be an assembly line worker – I can’t think of a whole lot more boring to do then stand there all day screwing things in over and over and over again. But I guess they make pretty great money for doing it.

Wednesday morning we took off for Beavercreek. Benjamin opened the door for us and said he didn’t know where his mom or brother and sisters were. We waited for a them for a few minutes and they finally came walking up- they had walked down the corner to wait for us – but our gps brought us in the opposite way. We then all loaded up the RV and went to play putt putt at Dairy farm. We played a great game and I came really close to getting the winning score – I guess it helped that I skipped a few holes. After the game we got ice cream and went to the petting zoo. The kids have been so excited to see their cousins. They have loved playing with all of them. Anna loves the little girls and “mothering” them around – she did a pretty good job too. Rachel tried to but she pretty much ended up just making them mad. Rebecca and Abbi were both darling, we kind of miss having a baby at our house.

After golfing we had a surprise birthday party of Uncle Jeff. He and Stacey arrived just a few minutes before we got in from golfing. We had a delicious dinner and played games. We had a three legged race, egg toss and a relay where we had to fill up a jar with a quarter cup measuring cup – running the cup of water across the lawn. It was the Hoopes’s against the Carters. Things we going ok – well they were about to win and our jar was only ½ full when Rachel decided she wanted to win even if it meant cheating, so she ran over and dumped their jar out. What good sports I’ve raised. We then had a piñata.- now we do piñata we don’t do a whole lot of swinging it around with a rope – no wonder ours are so easy to break. We finally got it open and the kids gorged on candy the rest of the night. We had cupcakes and Jeff got a couple presents.

Thursday we met David for lunch at a Chinese Buffet. He had wanted to go to an Indian Buffett but the kids won out and we opted for Chinese. They put us back in our own room. We had a great time eating and talking. Megan then took us to see the Airforce museum and the Wright Brothers museum. Rick was pretty fascinated by the planes. They all look pretty much the same to me but I still marvel at how such huge chunks of metal can get off the ground. It is pretty amazing what we have accomplished in the world of transportation.

After dinner we watched the God’s Must be Crazy. I hadn’t seen it for years. My kids and Rick never had. I think the all liked it – at least they laughed pretty hard. What a good movie with a great moral.

Friday David took the day off and we went canoeing. We went 8 miles down the little Miami river. It was a lot of fun. We took 4 canoes – David and Megan and girls in one, Jeff’s family, Rick, Rachel and I and our little kids and then Taylor, Dallin, Benjamin, Ryan and Josh went in the other. I was a little nervous sending all those boys in one but I figured we could always save them if needed. They did a great job, probably better than me. We saw lots of turtles which successfully avoided getting caught. We did pull over for lunch and then to try out a rope swing. David, Jeff, Rick and Ben were brave enough to swing into the river. Not me – I am pretty sure I couldn’t support my own weight enough to get off the tree over the water. So I stayed put in the canoe and cheered them on. It looked like a lot of fun though.

We got home packed up, had some dinner and pulled out around 8:30. We had hoped to get out a little earlier but it wasn’t too bad. We made it to Louisville with no problems and found a walmart to sleep at. We were told us it was a really pretty drive – and as far as we could tell in the dark – it was. The next morning we woke up to a really pretty little town filled with some friendly, cute sounding people.