Indiana – Go Sassy Sisters!

I’ve been on the road again, and it’s gotten a little bit crazy, even for me! Hop in, fasten your seat belt, and I’ll take you on a quick whirlwind trip…

It all started at the end of September. I got in my little blue Prius and took off for Atlanta, where I was going to be doing a pixels2Pages LIVE event for some of friends who had hired me to represent pixels2Pages at their fall digital retreat, and I was so excited! Armed with the audio book version of Winter of the World (second in Ken Follett’s newest trilogy – excellent series!), I was off! Sadly, as usual, my 10 AM ‘want to leave by” passed my 12 Noon “hope to leave by” but I was pleased to get away at 1 PM before my “HAVE to be on the road by” 2 PM. That meant I rolled into Montgomery, AL just a tad bit after midnight. I was on the road early Friday (well, it was before 8 AM!) and made it to lunch with the gang before the food got to the table.

What a fun weekend we had! Almost fifty digital croppers spent the weekend learning and practicing what they learned. There were even a couple of women from Florida and two from South Carolina in attendance! I did my best to help people learn their way around the brand new website. And boy, was I ever glad the site had FINALLY gone live a few days before!

Before I knew it, the weekend retreat was drawing to an end. I had such a good time visiting my old friends, meeting new ones, and sharing my love for pixels2Pages. Thanks, friends, for having me! Sunday afternoon I set off for Memphis, where my sister lives. I finished the audio book just a few miles before her house – perfect timing! I loved driving through north Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi on roads I hadn’t been on in years. It was a relaxing drive through pretty country.

Kim and I were taking a road trip to Mackinac Island, Michigan, at the invitation of p2P fan Kathleen. We were so excited – we had never been there before! Kim was supposed to play in a golf tournament on Monday, but it rained, so we decided to head up the road to our hometown of Paducah, Kentucky, that afternoon. As luck would have it, our friends saw from our Facebook posts that we were headed that way, and before we got there, we had dinner plans with the girls and a place to stay! We met our friends Judy, Mary, Mary, and Jan at Doe’s Eat Place where we wolfed down good eats and shared the famous Chocolate Cobbler. Oh my, it is so good! Judy got us tucked in and then out the next morning (after homemade blueberry waffles!) and our northern adventure began. Did I mention it was in the 90’s when I left Tiki Island?

Our route took us up through western Kentucky and across the Ohio River at Owensboro. We stopped in at Santa Claus, Indiana, in hopes of finding some Frozen Hot Chocolate at Candyland, but it was closed. Sad face. On we went to Indianapolis, where we would be staying with Pixie Carolyn. First, a detour to Nordstrom for Kim to try on her mother-of-the-groom dress and for me to buy some appropriate clothing – warm PJ’s, a pair of Uggs (I had flip flops!), and some socks. We met Carolyn for dinner and then spent a lovely evening chatting at her house.

The next morning, once we finally woke up (!), we had breakfast and headed for northern Michigan. We quickly realized that we would not make the last ferry of the day, so the pressure was off. We were able to relax and enjoy the beautiful fall foliage, and we stopped in Lansing to visit the Capitol and we even made a side trip there to visit an old high school friend. We stopped in Grayling at Dawson & Stephens Diner and Coke Museum (what a treat!) and it was o’dark thirty when we rolled into Mackinaw City. But bright and early the next morning, we were on the ferry and meeting Kathleen on beautiful (but foggy) Mackinac Island.

We spent a lovely day exploring the island by foot (no cars allowed – bikes, feet, or horses are accepted modes of transportation) and the sun came out and the temperature was pleasant tee shirt weather. We met Janice, Katrina, and Connie, and we were loving the slower pace that Mackinac offers. Carolyn and Tameka arrived after the cold front the next afternoon. By the time they got there, I had bought a warm windbreaker, a couple of long-sleeved shirts, a scarf, and a hat! Good thing I wasn’t flying! I’ll share the rest of the Mackinac adventures on my pages – at this rate, we won’t get far! Suffice it to say that Kathleen’s hospitality is boundless and we thoroughly enjoyed our stay! Thanks, Kathleen, from the Sassy Sisters!

By the time we left the island on Sunday, it was still cold but the trees were GLORIOUS! We took Highway 119, aptly named the Tunnel of Trees, and ate delicious pot pies at the Good Hart General Store. We parted ways with Carolyn and Meka and made it to Kankakee, IL, in time for my weekly p2P call. We made it back to Memphis the next day, after detours to the Corvette place in Effingham, a hike in the woods at Fern Clyffe, ice cream at Parker’s Drive In in Paducah, and a stop at mom’s house (wish she were still there….)

The next day was all business for me, as I needed to be back on Tiki before Rex got home (about an 11 hour trip!) I made it with 15 minutes to spare, and then we turned around and drove into Houston for dinner with some of his college friends. At least I had time to change clothes and freshen up! You’ve probably lost count, but it was now Tuesday evening, 9 October, and I had four high school friends (from Paducah!) coming in for the weekend on Thursday! Needless to say, I did laundry, went to the grocery, cleaned house, cooked, got a haircut, and checked in on mom. And I was ready when they flew in Thursday afternoon!

As always, we had a fantastic time and the weekend came to an end all too soon. Last Monday morning, when I took the girls to the airport, my flight left before theirs (only 15 minutes!). What flight, you ask? Well, I was headed to Tucson, Arizona, with my dear NC friend, Jenny, for a meeting of women entrepreneurs called ‘The Secret Energy of Money”. I arrived at the Phoenix airport about an hour before she did, then we picked up a car, stopped at Z Tejas for lunch, and hightailed it to Tucson.

We had a fantastic week, learned lots, ate lots of Mexican food, and even got to spend a lovely evening with p2P Peep Martha! She saw my Facebook post and came to our hotel for a drink and a bite to eat! Thanks, Martha, for making the effort! On our last day in Tucson, we took a walk up to a really cool waterfall on the hotel property and wished we had an extra day or so just to enjoy the Southwest scenery. But no, we drove back to Phoenix Thursday night so that we could make our before 7 AM flight on Friday!

To view the photo gallery, click HERE.

Tuesday, 27 July 2010

OK, I’ll take all the blame for our late start today!! I know, it’s not like I haven’t known for weeks that I would be leaving this morning, but it’s sort of like knowing when Christmas is and still not being ready. And I have had just a little bit on my plate lately! But Anne and I spent a good part of the evening printing transfers, ironing transfers, washing t-shirts, buying t-shirts, printing Flats, laminating Flats, cutting out Flats, making a cute suitcase for the Flats, shopping for some last minute necessities, and enjoying a fantastic dinner at Margaret’s. By the time we got all those preparations done, I still had a bit of packing to do…

Suffice it to say that even getting up before seven didn’t get us out the door before 10:30. And I think Anne thought we would be ON THE ROAD by ten. Oops. But we did get going, and shortly after we were on our way it started pouring down rain. We need the rain so badly that we couldn’t be upset about it! And it only rained for a few minutes, anyway. When we realized we would be going through Mt. Airy, NC, at noon, we decided we would have to stop at Snappy Lunch for a Pork Chop Sandwich. You may remember that Kim and I stopped in Mt. Airy (aka Mayberry) on our 2008 Sassy Sisters Trip, “Ye Olde Curiosity Tour”; however, we had breakfast there, as we had gotten an earlier start!

We parked right on Main Street and strolled down past a big crowd at Floyd’s Barber Shop and turned into a very crowded Snappy Lunch. Right up front was a woman whose only job was cooking pork chops, and boy, did they look good. We never even saw a menu, which was fine. We just ordered our pork chop sandwiches “all the way”, like the locals eat them. Talk about YUMMY!! A HUGE boneless, breaded, fried pork chop (twice as wide as the big bun it was served on) dressed with mustard, slaw, tomatoes, and chili – what a mess! And have you ever noticed that the places that serve the messiest food usually have those little napkins like we had in the “Hav-a-Nap” dispensers in the grade school cafeterias? The ones that cover about six square inches of your lap? Seriously. We attracted a bit of attention when I started pulling the Flats out of their cute suitcase and lining them up on the table, but it was so worth it! I didn’t see anything even close to resembling this food in Australia!

After lunch, we were lured into Opie’s Candy Store by the smells and the colorful variety of candies inside. Mmmmm, mmmm, as Andy would say. Mighty fine candy! We only bought a little, and the Flats loved it. Did I mention it had poured down rain the whole time we were at Snappy? And that the line at the barbershop was for the tour bus load of people who had to board the bus in the pouring rain? It was the happening place to be, but we were running so late that we didn’t even go to the old jail! We zoomed right past the Blue Ridge Parkway and traveled up I-77 through Virginia on our way to Charleston, WV. From there, we thought we were going to Huntington, Ashland, Lexington, Louisville, and Indianapolis, but Lee, our wonderful Australian Garmin guy had another plan…..

We sort of missed a little exit on the interstate, so we just did what Lee said on his ‘recalculation’, and the next thing we knew, we were headed for Ohio!! So instead of crossing Kentucky, we crossed Ohio from Chillicothe to Dayton! We were running so late!! But, in the good news category, there was NO traffic, five o’clock or otherwise, and the scenery was lovely – gently rolling hills reminiscent of Pennsylvania Dutch country. So we just sat back and enjoyed the ride, and felt bad that our time with Carolyn would be less than planned! In fact, we took it so easy that we almost ran out of gas, and Priuses are not forgiving when they are not fed. When the tank is empty, they just stop. No sputtering. Not that I’ve ever had that happen to me….So, around Dayton, we took another unintended detour in search of a little pusholine. You know you cut it a little too close when you put 9.44 gallons in your ten gallon tank!

Crisis averted, contact made with Carolyn, and plans in place, we stopped for a quick drive through at the Steak and Shake (Anne’s VERY FAVORITE thing) in somewhere, Ohio. Soon, it commenced to being dark thirty, and we skedaddled on around Indy and soon pulled in the driveway of Carolyn’s beautiful home. We had a quick tour of the house (it was FANTASTIC!!) and met her two sons. Daughter Ann was fast asleep already, but Jack and Sam were hanging out in the basement watching TV. They had graciously given up their rooms to Anne and me – what troopers! Then it was sharing time – Anne shared jewelry, I shared the Flats, and Carolyn shared DESSERT! My, oh my, did we enjoy that! Key lime pie with macadamia nut crust, a humongous piece of carrot cake, and shark’s fin pie (chocolate and peanuts and vanilla ice cream). YUM. Soon it was bedtime – Anne couldn’t get there fast enough!! Of course, I found things to do online for a while. What a great day!

Sweet dreams!

Jan