9/22/15
Three Years Ago
After reading and seeing both my daughter’s
writings and pictures on Facebook that are titled 3 years ago, I found myself
remembering back three years ago. Was
three years ago really that long ago?
When I see the pictures of my grandchildren 3 years ago they look so
young, and those three years seem so long ago.
Both daughters had been posting pictures and comments about our trip to
Washington DC. I call that trip, “Trip
of a Lifetime.” I gave it that name in
my driveway as we had just gotten home from the cross country trip in a Class C
motorhome. We spent 12 days on the road;
I kissed Julie and told her how great it was spending time with her and our
four young grandchildren. She had a
different viewpoint, and said she would not take a trip like that for at least
10 years. On her Facebook posting two
days ago, it read “Missing our fall trips right now…but we will take a little
blessing in exchange…” No big fall
family trip this year due to the fact that Landon could come any day now. If we do have another trip all together, it
will be called Trip of a Lifetime #5, and it has not even been 10 years, only 3
years!
That trip took us to Washington DC to
visit Angie. It is great having her back
in NE. We just saw her in Grand Island
last weekend, and it only took 2.5 hours to drive to see her. From DC we drove south to Charlotte, NC to
visit the kid’s grandma Karen and aunt Danee.
We drove to Chattanooga, TN to visit one of Julie’s friends. From there we went to Hartville, MO to see
the kid’s gramie and popie. We did a lot
of sightseeing along with trying to keep the kids entertained with games and
projects. Also we worked on their school assignments. Jocelyn hated working on her spelling
words. I tried to make it fun. The boys
traveled in car seats and that became hard for Weston the youngest. On one traveling video, he is screaming,
Mommy”. Julie was in the back bedroom
trying to take a nap. I was up front
helping Pat drive, or was I taking a rest break from the kids? He sent me back to quiet down Wes, so I did
what most grandparents do. You know give
him a cup of fish crackers to stop him from yelling and crying.
The older the kids get, the quieter the
trips become. We will be starting over
with traveling with a little one again when Landon is born. This summer we took Katelyn on a trip by
herself. That was really fun. We still need to take Easton by himself. Jocelyn got to go to Grand Canyon when she
was little. Weston may still be too
young and would miss his mom too much. My
son in law Sean only went on one of the family trips. He drove in his van and camped in his tent
when we went to CO #3 trip. This allowed
Julie and Sean to go river rafting etc. while we watched the kids. There was also the family trip in 2014 #4 to
FL so Julie and Angie could go on a cruise, while we watched the kids. I was such a mean grandma; I would not let
the girls go to the pool at Lazy Days, if their school work was not done. One girl had to sit on the pool side watching
others have fun. In the fall of 2013 we
did a family trip #2 to Niagara Falls.
Angie drove up from DC to hang out with us. Angie, Julie, and the girls spent time
staying and visiting Canada. We also went to see friends in Goffstown, NH
during that trip. For our 2014 trips we
moved up to a Class A motor home which was a little larger than the Class C
that we had. This next month we will be getting a new Class A which is three
feet longer than the one we have now. I
have had it with getting new RV’s. This
new one is it!
Thanks Julie and Angie for going on these
trips. Thanks Sean for letting Julie and
the kids come with us. Thanks Katelyn for being my seeing eye
granddaughter. She will grab my hand and
help me walk and not run into things. I
have a white cane to use, but really hate using it. Thanks Pat for the driving and paying for the
trips with the family, as they are growing up so fast and may not want to
travel with their grandparents when older.
Julie has the kids so busy with activities that it is getting harder and
harder to plan a trip. Katelyn had to
miss a few activities to go with us this summer. She really wanted to go and we were glad that
she did.
Love looking back on the videos and pictures
as we took on our “Trips of a Lifetime.” I have great memories, and so different than
my memories of traveling with Angie and Julie when they were young. We traveled in a station wagon and slept in a
popup camper with no air conditioning, bathroom or fridge. I better stop complaining about our new
camper. It is so hard not to think about
the cost of this new RV. If it had it my
way, I would have tried to purchase one at a garage sale or thrift store. Just dreaming!
