It seems this year’s family vacation would take us to Pennsylvania. My father was born here, and this is where we buried him in 2001. It’s time to go pay pops a visit and see the rest of the family as well. I decided to cronicle this adventure more for the sake of posterity for my family than anything else. But if you care to read about it, feel free!

So today we woke up around 10:30a to my mom calling us to ask us if we were ready to meet Aunt Dot and Uncle Lou at 11:00a. Yeah, apparently I spaced our conversation last night about the plan for today. What? I’m not trying to be sarcastic. If you know me, you know that it is entirely possible that I would space that.. … or anything really. So, after the mad scramble to get ready to go, we were out the door around 10:45. Pretty impressive for two sleep deprived parents and a two year old, don’t ya think?

First stop today was my Cousin Tom’s place. We’re just stopping in to say hi and visit. The house looked like I remembered, and it was good to see Tom. I noticed he had a pistol out on the coffee table — not that I have a problem with that. Was just waiting for Rhys to notice it and start in with his, “Can I try? Can I try?” hahahaha He didn’t notice it, however.

Next stop was my Aunt Nona’s place for lunch. She made kraut and dogs, apple pie, and ice cream. :) Great food for sure. Now, understand something here. The last time I saw my Aunt Nona her house was armed to the teeth. “Oh, she had a lot of guns?”, you ask. No. She was ARMED TO THE TEETH!! hahahah There was literally not one room that wasn’t equipped for a standoff against whatever armed invader you might encounter. Now, I was really young when I was there last, so I’m sure that has something to do with my mind sensationalizing it, but it definitely was an above average collection of firearms — you can imagine I thought it was awesome!

Anyway, you can imagine my worry about taking a two year old to my Aunt Nona’s. Not even so much about the guns as much as about all the collectibles she has around the house. Well, most of the guns had been put away in a safe not too long ago. As my Aunt Nona put it, “I only keep enough guns on hand to defend myself. And when those woodchucks [I think she said woodchucks] come around… well… I shoot them.” So there was no worry about my son blasting off a toe or anything, or for me blasting off my toe. I swear, the last time I was there, there was a machine gun in the guest bathroom!! hahahah Her place is where I shot a gun for the first time, rode an ATC (before the days of ATVs) for the first time, and my visit there is still one of my fondest childhood memories.

We had a great time at Aunt Nona’s visiting and showing Rhys all the neat collectibles she had. He had a blast. She had a surprise under his plate for him — five dollars. I don’t think I’ve even ever given him five dollars! It was a great visit.

After Aunt Nona’s we went to my Cousin Karen’s farm. A bona fide active working farm. Let me sum up my experience there with this: There’s nothing like a visit to a real farm to make you realize you are a city boy. ;) Heidi had the time of her life, however. Not that I didn’t. I just wasn’t as interested in slogging through pig and cow shit to see unbutchered food. I’ll gladly step in after it’s butchered. ;) Anyway, Heidi has always had all kinds of questions she wanted to ask a farmer and lo, she had one available to her. One that was more than happy to answer her questions.

Rhys was so excited to see real cows, and pigs and a real farm! He talked about it all day long! When the time actually came, however, he wasn’t so excited. Karen let Rhys see a calf and as soon as the calf came out, the other cows and a steer came up to the nearby fence. So Rhys was maybe eight feet away from these huge walking steaks. His comments quickly went from “Oooo Wowwww!” to “Go bye bye, GO BYE BYE!” I couldn’t agree more. I mean I like my steak rare, but, not that rare. ;)

Karen and her family made us all feel so at home and welcome. It was just spectacular. I wish we had more time to visit with them. I suspect we will be back to visit sometime in the future. Oh, and the apple cider was awesome! Although, I was told if you drink too much of it, it will give you the “scoots”. ;) hahahahah Thanks Karen, Joe, and Sara for making us feel so welcome.

Next stop was an Amish country store. First thing that struck me was the electricity. I mean, these are Amish… Aren’t they supposed to shun modern conveniences like electricity, phones, and credit card merchant accounts? Well, all that aside the store was awesome. We got some spices, chocolates, extracts, and a couple toys for Rhys there. I wish we had a shop like that back home. I’d shop there all the time!

Our final stop for the day was Lake Erie. I told Heidi all about it for so long. “You should see this thing! You’ll think it’s the ocean!” and things like that. So, we get down there and drive by the marina which gives us a view of the lake. What’s that? I can see the other side!?!? This is definitely not how I remember it. I remember a huge expanse that was nothing but water all they way out as far as the eye could see. So disappointed. You could almost hear the sarcasm dripping in Heidi’s head, “OMG WOW!! That lake is HUGE!!! Nay, GINORMOUS!” After a couple missed turns and an unmarked road later we arrived at the shore. The good news is this was exactly how I remembered it. Water as far as the eye could see!!! YES! Vindicated! It’s definitely something to see if you ever get the chance.

That’s it for today. Tomorrow we are off to Pittsburgh for our final night before flying home. Chat at y’all later!