Final Day

A bittersweet day! Paul and I have had such a good time together visiting family and seeing so much of the United States that we’ve not seen before. We’ve had lots of adventures and good times together! We’ve laughed a lot, especially doing the “feet” shots! (I’ll explain those in a minute.) We’ve traveled through 17 states, some more than once. I had to get key chains from every state to add to my collection of places we’ve been. We traveled all four directions in Arizona, north, south, east, and west. What a beautiful state, and it is so diverse in its characteristics! We visited the Sonora desert, the Grand Canyon, and Sedona, all very different but beautiful in their own ways! Every where we went people were as diverse as the land. One thing so many of them had in common, however, was their friendliness. We spent more time in Arizona than in any other state, so Arizona was, by far, the friendliest state. So many of the other states we just rode through. Albuquerque and Branson were also beautiful and friendly. People all over our land are so much like one another but can be so different at the same time. I am so thankful that Paul and I had this opportunity, not only to spend some time with our children and grandchildren, but to be together to explore our country.

As you can see from the picture of the odometer, we put about 7, 250 miles on the van. Not once did it let us down! It was very comfortable, and it was our own little place day after day. It needs a good washing, though! A lot of different states’ dirt and bugs are on it! Maybe tomorrow we’ll reward it by taking it through the car wash!

We didn’t see much of the North Carolina Mountains today because of the route we took home. I was a little disappointed about that, but I’d seen the Virginia Mountains and they look a lot alike. By this time, I was ready to be home, so I didn’t complain about it. We soon were very familiar with our surroundings. I wondered, though, what first timers in our state thought about it. I hope they thought it was as beautiful as I did. Each landmark brought us closer and closer to home. We traveled past the exit for Chapel Hill Hospital, the exit we had taken so many times during Timmy’s ordeal. We traveled past the exits that we took when Timmy lived in Morrisville and Cary. Another bittersweet emotion, since Timmy and his family are there no longer. We stopped at our usual pit stop in Zebulon for a bathroom break. We even remembered the rough dip in the road we had to take just right or we’d bump the bottom of the van. On and on toward home.

We called Brandon when we got closer to Rocky Mount to arrange to meet him if we could when we came through. He wasn’t able to meet for lunch, but we did stop and visit with him for awhile. It was so good to see him, especially in his uniform, looking so handsome! It was coincidental, I guess, that we met him right beside the Veteran’s Memorial with all the flags from the different branches of service waving in the breeze on the Fourth of July. How fitting is that?! I’m so proud of him and all my boys!

We pulled off in Tarboro, another usual exit, for a quick sandwich from Wendy’s. We didn’t want to take too much time to eat. We were ready to see home! Finally, the Martin County line, then the Williamston exit! We were in the short rows! We came to the end of Roberson Chapel Road where we could see the house across the field. Lastly, we turned into our driveway! Our house and yard looked so good to me!

Autumn, Kirsten, and Grace were at the house to meet us! We were so glad to see them! Then Charity, Craig, and Carter came in a little while to welcome us home as well. We all visited and we shared some funny stories and exciting stories about our trip with them. (After unloading the van, that it!) Seal did her usually meowing to let us know she was glad we were home, too. We all had a good time just being together at home! I’m so appreciative of our family!

Okay, about the “feet”! It started off with Paul aggravating me by taking pictures of my feet. So, the next time I had the camera, I took pictures of his feet to get back at him. We were just messing around, having a good time. Then he started concocting different poses for our feet, like the cooler and the elevator. It became a game to see what he would come up with next. It was just a lot of fun! Then, when we saw Brandon, we had to include him in the “circle of feet”. When we got home and Autumn and the girls were here, it was a little bit bigger circle. Then later, with Charity, another circle was formed. (We had to get a little more of Carter than just his feet.) Our final “feet” shot was of Paul and me at home relaxing with our feet propped up. Appropriate after all the miles we put on them, huh? So, now you know the meaning of the feet!

Home! Family! The Lord has been so good to allow us to do all the things we’ve done sine we left more than three weeks ago. Every day we prayed for safety for us and the rest of our family, wherever they were. The ones we left in Arizona and the ones back in North Carolina. The Lord was so gracious to answer our prayers. He has been and continues to be so good to us. This family may not be close together in a physical sense, some living so far away, but this family is very close in love and concern for each other. The Lord has truly blessed us with children and grandchildren that we love with all our hearts. We are so thankful that they love us in return and want us to be part of their lives as much as possible.

Father, thank You for blessing Paul and me with the trip we have desired to take for so long. Thank you for our loving children that You gave us to enrich our lives. Help us to be the parents and grandparents You would have us be to them. You have blessed us beyond measure. We love You, Lord. Thank You for allowing us to travel to see Your beautiful creations and to return home safely. We love You.

Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, Mt. Airy, NC

We left Louisville, KY, early this morning since we woke up right on cue. I don’t think we’ve set the alarm clock the entire trip. We just seem to know when to wake up. Kentucky and West Virginia were what I’d pictured them to be. Rolling hills, fenced in pastures with lots of horses, old barns and new barns. We finally got to larger mountains in West Virginia and Virginia. They were so beautiful to me! If I had to live somewhere else besides Bear Grass, the mountains of North Carolina or Virginia is where I’d like to live. Of course, I also like the Outer Banks. So, maybe I’ll have additional houses someday, one in the mountains and one on the Outer Banks! Yippee! (As long as I don’t have to clean them all.) (lol) We finally arrived in Mt. Airy around 4:00. We decided to eat supper early since we hadn’t had much lunch and to get ahead of the crowd. Mt. Airy was swarming with people! I guess the holiday was bringing them in. We did have a quieter supper than last night. We came back and I immediately fell asleep at 6:00.
I woke up later and thought it was about 3:00 a.m., but it was only 9:00 p.m. It took a long time to go back to sleep. I guess I was excited about heading for home and the last day on the road! Bear Grass is getting closer and closer!

Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana all in one day!

Well, we left Branson early, about 7:00 a.m. and drove and drove and drove! We didn’t even stop for lunch. We ate peanut butter and vanilla wafers and a bowl of fruit (while we drove) Paul had bought the night before! It was such a delicious lunch! (and I’m not being sarcastic!) We crossed the Mississippi River and saw the Gateway Arch (known as the “Gateway to the West” in St. Louis. We were well into Illinois before we even realized we were in another state, Missouri and Illinois look so much alike—long stretches of farmland once you get out of the city a ways. We drove and drove some more through Indiana. Still the same scenery! We crossed the Ohio River from Indiana into Kentucky and back into our own time zone. Our bodies will take awhile to adjust when we get home. After all, we’ve been through 6 time zones in 3 ½ weeks. I’ll let you know when we get home how many miles we actually put on the van since we’ve been gone.

Most of today has been overcast and cloudy. For the longest time we kept thinking we were going to get into a storm, but we never did. The sky was beautiful, all stormy looking. It hasn’t been so hot today, and I’m glad of that. We didn’t even have to use the air conditioning much.

I am so thankful to be still for a little while. Our room in Kentucky isn’t quite as nice as the one in Branson, but it is pretty good just the same. We went out and grabbed a bite of supper, and I came back and got in the whirlpool tub. Yea! I finally got a room with one in it! My body was screaming for it, too. Our supper was anything but relaxing! I won’t give details, but I’ll just say there was at least one squealing kid (with a very high pitch) in the restaurant right close to us. Mom and Dad seemed to be totally oblivious to his screams, but everyone else in the restaurant wasn’t.

Tomorrow night will be our last night on the road. Two more days of driving. I am excited about driving through Kentucky and West Virginia, though. These are two states I’ve always wanted to visit. Tomorrow’s my chance. By this time tomorrow night we will be in Mount Airy, North Carolina. Home! At least our home state! We have had a great time, but we are both ready to see Bear Grass and our home. We’ve missed everyone. (yes, Seal too) We are ready for some relaxing time at home now. But, of course, Paul has to go back to work on Monday. You probably know Embarq has been bought out by CenturyTel and will now become CenturyLink. There will be a lot of changes coming, as he found out some of them just today. Hopefully, it won’t affect his job too much. We’ll see.

ORU and Branson

Oral Roberts University was as beautiful as I expected. Of course, it is summertime, so there was a lot of construction and landscaping going on because most of the students were not there. Paul and I went to the prayer tower, but we couldn’t go up into it because it hadn’t opened yet. It was wonderful to be there anyway. The landscaping was pretty, but the buildings themselves were also beautiful.

We did go to Wal Mart after that for some needed replenishing of our food box and bottled water. Then we went to the main Goodwill store. It was huge! I did find a few things, not many, though. (We didn’t have anyplace to put too many things!)

Right outside of Tulsa in Claremore is the Will Rogers museum. That was on our agenda of things to do. I knew Paul wanted to stop here, but I couldn’t even remember who Will Rogers was. When we got there, I was duly impressed! The museum was huge and so beautiful. It almost looked like a castle! When I saw a picture of Will Rogers I remembered who he was. I didn’t know he did so many things besides star is cowboy movies. We spent quite a while here, but it was well worth the time. Then we headed out for Branson.

We took a little detour through Kansas (on purpose) just so we could add another state to my collection of key chains from states I have been in. It only added about another half hour to our drive, and Branson wasn’t that far of a drive for the day.

Ahh, Branson! Busy, busy, busy! Our hotel is at Branson Landing on the promenade. It is a beautiful little place where people can just stroll and watch the water show and the fountains. Every hour they have a water show similar to the Bellagio, just on a little bit smaller scale. We watched the water show from our window as it overlooks the whole area. It’s a beautiful spot. Our hotel room is gorgeous, too. I told Paul after he told me what the room rate was that I was very thankful we had saved up enough points on our credit card to get the room free! Otherwise, we wouldn’t be here.

We went to the show “The Acrobats of China” last night. It was very good! The Cirque du Solei at Las Vegas was a much bigger performance on a much grander scale. (more expensive, too) These acrobats here were remarkable too, however. They were very graceful and could do things you wouldn’t think a human body could possibly do.
We enjoyed it very much. When we got back to the hotel we went down on the promenade and watched the water show from down there. There’s a big fountain there also that is very relaxing to just sit by. The water show played one of the songs from “August Rush”, a very good movie and a favorite of mine.

Today, we slept in until 9:30! I couldn’t believe it when Paul told me how late it was! We ate breakfast in our room before we headed out. We went to a HUGE quilt store and a thrift store. I found a cute pattern for a purse at the quilt store. I was going to buy some fabric, but there were so many things to choose from, I couldn’t decide on anything!
Then we came back to the hotel and ate some lunch in one of the cafes right on the water front in the promenade. Of course, we watched the water show from there also. We had just a little while to rest before our dinner cruise on the Showboat Branson Belle.

The showboat was the highlight of our Branson stay! It was remarkable! I think why we liked the show here so much was because the performers openly acknowledged God and gave Him the honor and credit for what they were doing. They were all very good performers! (Paul even enjoyed all the singing.) I think our favorite was Tod Oliver. He is a famous ventriloquist who has appeared on TV on many shows. He used live dogs in his performance and made them look like they were talking. He was so funny! We enjoyed the whole thing: the boat, the dinner, the performances, everything! We said we would have to come to Branson again just to go to the Branson Belle again. Yea, it was that good.

On the drive back to Branson, we found Faith Life Church, which is Billie Brim’s church and where Keith Moore and his wife are the pastors. I had wanted to go to the Wednesday night service, but we got there too late. It had already started, and we didn’t want to interrupt.

The weather today has been so beautiful, not too hot or muggy. When we got back to the hotel we went down to the promenade. I have wanted a funnel cake since I got here, and I knew it was my last chance. So, I got my cake (with lots of powdered sugar) and sat down by the fountain to watch a family that was performing on the promenade. They were so delightful! They were playing instruments and singing “ole time music” they called it. There was one girl playing an accordion, another girl playing the violin, a boy playing a mandolin, another boy playing wooden spoons, and their father playing a guitar. They had a bucket there which said “ Lender music lessons fund”. We sat and listened to them for awhile. I then asked them if they knew, “You Are My Sunshine”, which was one of Pa’s songs he used to play on the harmonica, and sometimes he would sing it. They did play it for us, and Paul recorded it so we could bring it back and show it to his mama. I still miss Pa sometimes, so I’m sure she does.

It’s been a very good day in Branson. Paul and I have enjoyed being here, but we are also ready to hit the road tomorrow morning early because we are ready to see home. We have had such a good trip! It’s been so good to do all these things together, but we also enjoy our home together. Two more nights after tonight. Tomorrow night will be in Louisville, Kentucky and the next night in Mt. Airy, NC. Saturday—Bear Grass here we come!