Two weeks and 13 states later…

Jul 23, 2010

I am home and just in time to turn around and head to CHA tomor­row morn­ing. I had a won­der­ful time with my mom and dad dri­ving up to see my Aunts, Uncles, Cousins and my Grand­fa­ther. It was a lot of dri­ving but so worth see­ing every­one. Here is a quick recap of my last two weeks…

Vis­ited my mom’s (Childers) side of the fam­ily in Buck­han­non, WV. Had so much fun see­ing every­one. Down­town Buck­han­non has some adorable and super won­der­ful antique stores. They even have a scrapping/stamping store that I was so happy to be able to visit. I found lots of items to incor­po­rate into projects for classes.

This is what you see as you look down the hill from my aunt and uncle’s house. This is the old home­stead of my great great aunts and uncles. The house and small build­ings are over 100 years old. I love look­ing inside the build­ings and the house. We had lots of fun fam­ily pic­nics there when I was lit­tle. My grand­mother cooked the best meal on the old wood burn­ing stove.

And when you are out in the coun­try you get to do fun things like learn how to shoot a revolver. The is me and my cousin Kathy a.k.a. Lon­es­tar and Lefty. Yes we did hit the tar­get and more than once. So much fun.

My Aunt and Uncle don’t live far from the Sago Mine. So we went over to see the memo­r­ial they have for the min­ers that did not sur­vive. It is a really pretty memo­r­ial. I loved how the made the two end pieces look like coal carts.  They have a bench hon­or­ing Ran­dal McCloy Jr. the only survivor.

Here is my Uncle Ed (mom’s brother), Mom and Aunt Wilda (mom’s sis­ter). Uncle Ed used to flip his top eye­lids inside out and have me look for the head­less horse­man  on the dirt roads at night… he was such a tease when I was grow­ing up… always fun when he was around.

After stay­ing in WV for 4 days we headed over to San­ford, Maine to see my dad’s father. Grampa fell a few days before we got there and was so beat up. But he still has his sense of humor.

It was cer­tainly a no make up day while vis­it­ing him… the temps were so hot. I could not believe it. A few days it felt as though I was back in Texas. While dad cared for Grampa dur­ing the day. Mom and I would leave for a few hours and head out on an adven­ture. We laughed so hard each day we cried. When we got back we always had some­thing funny to tell dad and gramps dur­ing our shift. I tell ya mom and I can keep you enter­tained for hours.

We picked some of the best blue­ber­ries I have ever eaten. They were so big, juicy and sweet. After we picked these we headed home and put them on pound cake. Dad and Gramps liked that days adven­ture quite well.

While look­ing for antique stores of which we found many. We stum­bled onto this old meet­ing house. Spin­ney is my maiden name so of course we had to stop and take a photo. This was some­place in the Acton, Maine area… way out in the boonies.

We also got to go to Long Sands and Short Sands. Mom and I bought some salt water taffy sat on a rock and ate it, lis­tened to the waves roll in, smelled the salty air, lis­tened to the seag­ulls, watched peo­ple swim­ming in the water (and think­ing they were crazy cause that water is so cold) and pretty much decided life was pretty darn good at this very moment.

The old Nub­ble Light house is one of Mom’s favorites so I drove her over to see it and take a few pho­tos. It is really pretty and the rocks around it are huge and gorgeous.

One day we headed over to Ken­neb­unkport to see the beach. It was a gor­geous day. We walked around a bit then headed over to get some­thing to eat.

It was another no make up day due to the heat and Mom was mak­ing me laugh. Who knows what it was about. We laughed so much every­day we can’t even remem­ber all the things we laughed about. We ate the best fried clams at this place. It is called Bartley’s Dock­side Restau­rant. I highly rec­om­mend you order these if you are ever in the area.

So after dri­ving from Texas through Arkansas, Ten­nessee, Vir­ginia, West Vir­ginia, Maryland,Pennsylvania,  New Jer­sey, New York, Con­necti­cut, Mass­a­chu­setts, New Hamp­shire and Maine I am so glad tomor­row I am fly­ing to Chicago. I don’t think I could take another car trip so soon. I will post my CHA projects later this after­noon. I think a nap is in my very near future.