America Trip 2019: Georgia

Our America trip was a total of 2 weeks and 2 days...or 3 days if you count the overnight trip back to Amsterdam.  I have already shown the first week in Maine with sister Ruth, BIL Don, and brother Nelson here.

So, that leaves 1 week and 2 days, split between two places as follows (as posted on Facebook):

The North Georgia Mountains:

Actually, the story begins with daughter Amy picking us up from our flight to Atlanta from Portland,

and immediately taking us to her place of business since March of this year:

the Mercedes-Benz USA Corporate Headquarters.

[This was my only photo, from inside the glass building--I was too busy listening/looking!]

Astrid made this collage of her images.

And yes, one of Amy's perks is having her own MB car to drive!

Top-left is their most expensive MB; the red one below is their cheapest, with a $100K difference!

You know Astrid...dying to get outside first thing every morning.

She loved practicing with her new camera, a 2-upgrade version of my Canon PowerShot.
[BTW, I also upgraded to the same camera but didn't get it till at Bob and Peggy's.]

I followed suit with my coloring.  HA!

In the meantime, we had 2 days of errands before our annual trip to the cabin,

sneaking in the obligatory how-he's-growing-up photos with Nicholas.

He's not in college this semester but is working at Chick-Fil-A as a shift supervisor.

After settling into our cabin in the North Georgia mountains, Astrid and I took a walk.

Because rain was forecast off-n-on for the next 3 days, we grabbed the good weather while we could.

So, what do you do when it rains all day at the cabin!  So many choices.

Amy had made a jigsaw puzzle of one of Astrid's past cabin photos...a fun challenge again.

Mark, Dennis, Amy and I continued our Spades games, while Astrid and Nicholas did their thing.

We watched the last two Avenger movies...and football, of course!

We've been carrying on like this for 10 years by now, most of the time at the same cabin.

Astrid had so much fun learning what her new camera can do.  Rain was good to practice on.

And since I was still coloring, yes, I had to post this for our Saturday football.

I got to watch my alma mater, Michigan, beat Notre Dame, 45-14.

You have no idea how good that made me feel.  GO BLUE!

Astrid made this collage of the muffin-making process I undertook each morning.

Son Mark brings the all-bran muffin mix every year and I bake them fresh each day.

OMG!  Another one of the obligatories!

This is the collage Astrid made of the jigsaw puzzle,

which she ended up working on more than the rest of us put together.

She was also the one who took walks, more than the rest of us!

When this popped up from 3 years ago, I had to post it again.

This was her old camera, of course, but she continued the practice with her new one (not as big).

By the last day, Mark, Astrid and I took our "annual" walk together, to catch up,

which Astrid captured beautifully here.  If you're counting, that makes a 3rd "obligatory."
The cherry on top is that Mark the next week got a promotion at his work during his annual review.

Bob and Peggy's South of Atlanta:

Just like that, we came down the mountain, grabbed the rest of our stuff, said good-bye to everyone and headed to our rendezvous point with Bob and Peggy (thanks to Mark).

You might remember that both Bob and Peggy love to cook.

How about a cream cheese, smoked salmon omelet for breakfast?  WOW!

Or the low-country boil Bob loves to make for us, under Astrid's supervision?!

Astrid's fun was also going with him to the DeKalb Farmer's Market to buy the ingredients.

My fun (and Peggy's, too) was eating it!

We had rain there, too, so Astrid took only one walk with Bob and Roscoe-the-Dog,

all decked out for Halloween.

Our last full day we treated Bob and Peggy to a meal out in Covington,

at one of their favorite restaurants, Real Louisiana Cuisine.

It was Astrid's first time to eat Jambalaya, which we both had.

If you like Cajun/Creole food, you'd be in heaven.

[Astrid's collage]

The day we started our flight back to Amsterdam was Halloween.

BOO!

I say "started" because we always fly overnight, arriving at home the next day.

It so happened that the weather was terrible that Thursday, with many roads closed.

Bob and Peggy had a prior engagement they didn't want to miss...so we started early,

which explains why we were at the Atlanta airport waiting for our flight for 9+ hours.

Not to worry!  Amy gave us her Sequence game after finding out how much we liked it in Maine,

so we pulled it out and quickly passed away the time.

By 7 p.m.the next day we were back home safe-n-sound.

There and back again.  It's always good to go and then come back home,

feeling so lucky for these times with family and friends.

Michigan 2018, Again...but with a Tear and a Smile

You may remember that Astrid and I were in Michigan 5 months ago for my 55th high school reunion.  If you had told us then that we would be back again in 2018 (let alone 5 months later), I would have wondered who had died!

It was SIL Peggy, of course, married 54 years to Nelson, the elder of our remaining Tribe.

We never feel good about the circumstance of such a trip but we really did make the most of it, which you will see by these collages both Astrid and I posted on Facebook throughout the week, Wednesday to Wednesday.  We actually returned home this morning.

We stayed with sister Ruth and BIL Don again in a wee town near Detroit.

Arriving at night that first day was so soulful.  We LOVE their farm house.

It feels like coming home for us every time we're there.

Our first full day was filling ourselves up, while walking The Farm.

[Astrid's collage]

Even on a grey, misty day, there are gifts everywhere to be found.

We already love Bishop, the outdoor cat who basks in attention.

But this time we both fell in love with her in a deeper way.

How can you not love a cat who follows you around like a dog!

One day, when we were out-n-about, Astrid snapped this deliciousness from the car.

She received 85 reactions on Facebook!

Pure Michigan.

Midway through our week, on Saturday, was Peggy's memorial service, November 3.

Her last breath on earth was November 17th.

My nephew, Paul, took all these photos at the celebration "parties" following the service.

That's Don and Ruth (top-left) and Ruth and Nelson (bottom-right).

Nelson and Susan are #1 and #2 (bottom-left).  I'm #3 in the sibling lineup.  Ruth is #8 (of 8).

Nelson's son David is the monk.

You can see Peggy's obituary here.

The next day, I posted my Watercolor Sunday image with this quote:

"Let no one weep for me, or celebrate my funeral with mourning; for I still live,

as I pass to and fro through the mouths of men."

--Quintus Ennius (239BC - 169BC, considered the father of Latin literature)

Then it was back to the farm again, with Astrid helping Don out with some of his chores.

[Astrid's collage]

Early on in our visit Don and Ruth told us they were making a Thanksgiving meal for us on Monday.

We found that out in the same moment, I think, when we saw this flock of wild turkeys strutting about.

OMG!  Almost everything of the meal was made from scratch!

During a lull in the day's activities, Don and Ruth power-walked their property 4 times in a row.

Astrid and I had fun doing our casual walking, snapping photos at every whip-stitch.

Astrid and Don even had time to do more outdoor chores that day.  She was in heaven.

And yes, that's moonshine from Don's relatives in Tennessee (top-left).

"Try anything once" is a good motto, right?!

[Astrid's collage]

That evening was the real Thanksgiving feast!

I was the one in heaven this time.  It had been 9 years since I celebrated it last.

Some of you understand why it's my hardest American holiday to miss!

Our last full day was Tuesday, when Astrid and I walked the nearby country roads.

Within the first 5 minutes she spotted what the Dutch call a Witches Circle (aka Fairy Ring).

It was a first for me.

It happened to be on the property of a Vietnam vet, whose son died in the Afghan war (2006),

earning the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.  

 I think we all made each other's day!

We continued our walk and grabbed the photo ops as they emerged.

[Astrid's collage]

Whenever I tell Ruth this area is so soulful to me,

she says she thinks all of us carry farm DNA inside of us!

Tuesday night we spent the evening watching the midterm-election incoming results,

going to bed that night wondering what the scene would look like in the morning, Wednesday...

while flying out of Detroit to Newark to Amsterdam.

The DEMS took the House!!!!  Need I say more?

We flew through the night and arrived home this morning by 9:30,

with farm memories still filling us...and thus this above post on FB once home.

I had to share this week, of course...the Tear and the Smile.

You don't forget these milestones...let alone all the euchre games we played!

Condolences for Nelson, Elder of the Tribe

This is not the post anyone ever wants to write, nor would the recipient of it ever wish to be called the Elder of the Tribe.

But this is for Nelson, my brother, who IS the elder of those of us who remain...the very one you have already met here from this past January when he visited us here in the Netherlands for a week.

Nelson's wife Peggy, of 53 years, "passed over the bridge" last evening.

Four days earlier, last Saturday, she suffered a bleeding stroke from which she never recovered.

It was sudden and, one could say, a blessing that it all came and went so quickly.

[recent image from sister, Ruth]

One of my favorite memories of Peggy is how relational she was with all generations.

She would always seek you out to find out how YOU were doing.
This was her gift which she gave freely, seeking nothing in return.

In 2006 she was as physically well as I've ever seen her.

But over the last years her health deteriorated.

Now we all deal with the emotional shock, of course.

Our brother, Bennett, died in 1996 (age 47), 22 years ago...our generational level.

We knew, with 8 kids, plus spouses, this time would come.

Within the next 22 years I'm guessing most of us will be gone,
so this is hitting hard.

Little did we know you would go before us, Nelson, after the untimely death of Bennett.

You didn't intend to lead us but it has fallen to you...and now we follow.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Astrid and I had not originally planned to fly back to Michigan for the memorial service,

but we will do just that as we find out the details.  We want to be together as sibs.

I'll keep you informed...

AMERICA 2017: The Overview with Bob and Peggy in GA

Remember that I said our October trip to America was in three basic parts, of which I shared the first week with Ted and Jane in Connecticut last post.  This week I'm sharing our shorter time with Bob and Peggy, from late Sunday to early Thursday in the middle of the following two weeks.  In other words, only 3 full days.

What Astrid and I posted on Facebook was short and sweet but I'm also filling in some of the blanks:

That Monday we drove approximately 60 miles to Warm Springs, GA,

to visit Franklin D. Roosevelt's Little White House and museum.

(FB post)

FDR was the 32nd President of the USA, from 1933 to his death in 1945 (my birth year).

Because of his polio at age 39, he found the warm springs in GA therapeutic,

after which he founded the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis in 1938,

leading to the development of polio vaccines.

Even though I had non-paralytic polio 7 years later, I feel I owe much to him!

For those of you wondering, Franklin was the 5th cousin of Teddy Roosevelt,

the 26th President of the USA, from 1901-1909. 

Later that afternoon we drove the short distance from Warm Springs to Pine Mountain, GA,

to spend the rest of the day, an overnight, and the following day at Callaway Gardens.

(FB post)

I had visited the gardens way back when Bill and I were married and took my mom and dad there.

That was eons ago but I have no clue when (after we moved to GA in 1987?).

The memory hung on long enough to make me want to go back and have Astrid see it with me.

What I most remembered about the place was the Butterfly Center,

so that late afternoon, after getting settled in our hotel, we went there first.

And now you see Bob and Peggy waiting patiently while we took photos.

Here's what Astrid put up on FB...and she nailed it.

Since coming back home, I've found a few of my own.

And yes, the two top-left are "doing it."  :)


Look what Bob captured!  Don't you wonder what the butterfly was thinking?!

After the Butterfly Center, we drove to the Chapel and the stream nearby.

Too bad for us, the chapel wasn't open, but we enjoyed the environment.

We then went back to the hotel to eat Peggy's picnic supper before calling it a day.

For breakfast the next day we had a Southern Georgia spread to which we couldn't say NO.

Then it was back to exploring.

We had seen the log cabin on arrival but this time stopped to check it out.

Then it was back to the gardens where butterflies were plentiful outside...

as were the bees, making us very happy campers.

Thank God for the butterflies and bees!  We need them.

Even though it was off-season in October, there was plenty to see of the gardens.

There was no way to be disappointed.

Our last hurrah before driving back home was the Birds of Prey show.

Well worth the time and energy as well as a nice good-bye.

Back at Bob and Peggy's the next day, Astrid and I took a walk-about, as we do each year.

(FB post)
Oh, and a last day of relaxing with good friends and food!

THANK YOU, Bob and Peggy (and Roscoe), for making these times so special each year.
So, where will we visit with you the next time!