On the Road Again

We are back on the road! Kelly, Jake, and myself. This time we're not off to France like the last time we took a trip together! Which was only a few months after we were married. That trip made lots of memories, mostly good but a few that weren't so great too (at least we didn't thinks so then!)

This time we're off to Las Vegas for the Con-Expo show. For some reason we're always the 'lucky' ones that get to go early and set up the booth and iron out all the problems. Well at least the guys do. I mostly just do what they tell me to do, which is being a 'go-fer', and cleaning all the equipment!

It's a 30 hour drive! But I have the whole back seat to myself, so I can just chill and read my book, blog, pinterest, or eat sour gummy worms!! :) And I might as well just be settled in, cause we mostly just stop when we need to fuel up!

Really nothing overly exciting has happened on the journey so far, so I'll sign off!

A Visit From the Sis

Erica arrived January 30 and was greeted with a chilly breeze and lots of snow! J Some of the things we got done were:

-        Kenora

-        Ice Roads

-        Wiener Roast out on an island

-        Snow Shoeing

-        I had to work one day, so Erica came and hung out there

-        Shopping a couple of days

-        Organized my kitchen!

-        Skating at the Forks

-        Crepes in Osborne Village

-        Tubing at Valley View Bible Camp

-        Walking at the Forks

-        Boston Pizza

-        Hanging out with friends

All in all it was a wonderful time, and went by way to fast!! Hope to see you again soon, Erica!!

...Valley View...

Land of Cactus (No.2)

...I'm back! So since the plane didn't leave on Sunday, they changed to the flight to Monday night of all things! Why they couldn't fly out in the morning is beyond me! So in the end I still missed Grandma's birthday! But I went to Grand Forks early and did some shopping and sat at Panera bread for a while. Why is it hard to fill up time when you have it??? Finally got to the airport and the flight left on-time and was quite uneventful except for the man who sat beside me and talked the whole entire way.... Most of it was interesting!

Got to PHX and Jayme's and Wayne's had left Jayme's truck at the airport for me. Found it no problem and headed out to find the family! And all went great! Thank Goodness. I do get quite frustrated with the US gas pumps that have to have zip codes, and since our postal code doesn't work they try and make you prepay. Like I have any idea how much money will fill up Jayme's truck! Guess that's what I get for living up here! LOL Got to Jayme's around and midnight was very glad to see them and Wayne's!

Tuesday, we went to pick up Grandma for breakfast. She was quite surprised to see me! (But she hid it well!:) Had a yummy breakfast and Ihop and then said goodbye to Wayne and Tiff! At least I got to see them for a couple hours!  Back to A. Jan's to work on a scrapbook of memories we were planning to make for Grandma, only that Jess and I sat outside enjoying the warm sun till the rest got there! A. Rita, Kim, and Heather finally showed up and we got busy scrapping! Was a great afternoon! Then Heather left to go pick up Brent, Renata, Ava, and Emma. A. Rita and Kim went to break the news to Grandma that she had more family coming to celebrate the week with her!! Jayme, Jess, and I went to Caraba's for supper!

Wednesday, we were off to Heather's for a ladies brunch. So was all of us and 2 of Grandma's snowbird friends. Had a very scrummy quiche, cinnamon rolls, fruit platter.... After that was done we spent a few hours just sitting out in the sun! Was SOOO Awesome!! Later on we went and played mini golf with Grandma, then to U. Randy's for supper and to work some more on the scrapbook. I went to Heather's for night since Jess had to work Thursday. Heather and I stayed up till 3 AM catching up!

Thursday, slept in and was sitting at breakfast when I realized I was supposed to be heading for the airport and my hair wasn't even combed! So flew around and A. Jan and A. Rita took me. Got there in plenty of time so that was good. Just was sad to leave the warm sunshine! Flew home with a couple from Altona, so was glad to know that there would at least be someone in Grand Forks to help me if the vehicle didn't start!! Landed and went to find the car, and believe me it was cold and windy!! Couldn't believe it, but the car started!! Boy was I glad! So went and filled up gas and let it warm up while I waited for Erica's flight to come in!!

That's all for now!

Land of Cactus (No.1)

My last post was about leaving Sunday for the warm land of cactus! Here is how that went…

Sunday came in with a snowing, blowing, roar! Yep, you guessed it, another blizzard! Well I got ready to leave, and Kelly drove a few miles down the road to see how bad it was. He came home and said, “Oh it’s not that bad, you easy go 100 km/h!” So I thought well that’s not bad, I can do this. Kelly packed the vehicle with my luggage, winter clothes, and survival bag (just in case there were problems) and 15 minutes later I hit the road! Well, I got just a mile or so down the road and it was Bad! Put I kept saying I can do this, this gust of wind will let up and it’ll be better. But sad to say it only got worse, and I mean Much worse! Finally I resorted to driving on the rumble strip so that I knew I was at least on the right side of the road and in my lane! I couldn’t see Anything! And then to make matters even worse, my windshield wipers started freezing up. So I finally found a spot on the road that had some trees blocking the blowing snow, and got out and tried to bang off the ice. Then back into the vehicle creeping along, praying no semi-truck would rear end me! Finally I got to the border and they informed me the roads are closed in the states, and that I had to go back to the Canadian side!! So I turn around and inch myself off to the Canadian side and they informed me that the road was closed back to Morris!! So there I was stuck at the border! Don’t worry, I was totally calm, cool, and collected!! NOT (Just ask Kelly.) Anyway my I kept calling in about my flight and finally they canceled it and said it would go on Monday. So since a storm normally blows thro in just a couple of hours and I had no idea what time my plane would be leaving, Kelly got me a motel room in Grand Forks. Now back to sitting at the border… More and more folks were showing up there and border folks were getting tired of us sitting in there office so they got the fire guys from Emerson, a town 3 miles from there to come and lead us to the Emerson Community Hall. We got to the hall and someone had brought in soup and chili and even a bunch of games. There were about 40-50 of us there. Then the grocery man opened up the store so we could go and get more food and drinks. So we were well taken care of. Well the blizzard just didn’t want to move out, so finally the tables were turned into beds and the blankets were pulled out! (By the way, Kelly was somewhere over the ocean by then, so no talking to him.) Around 1:30AM (12 hours after I had gotten to the border) we got the wonderful news, “The roads are open!” But my luck was still out! Yes, the roads were open in Canada but not in the states! They thought they might open the state’s roads around 6:30 – 7:00! So I said forget it and went home for night! And of course the motel refused to give me back my money. But I made it thro the whole looong day safe and sound! So that was my good luck! Oh one more thing, I was actually glad the roads were closed, at least I was sitting somewhere warm and not off by the side of the road trying to stay warm with my tea lights! (Tiff you would have had to quick ship all yours to me!)

Well this is getting kind of long and I need to go make a cheese cake with Erica, so more later…