Home Sweet Home

Friendship House

Around 2AM on October 2, I figured out that the cause of Ian's vomiting the previous day was not due to anything he ate. I came to this conclusion because Nadia started throwing up. Most of the time I went to bed early on the vacation. Unfortunately on the night of October 1 I stayed up until 10pm, so I only had gotten four hours of sleep when I was cleaning up Nadia's mess, and it was a couple of hours until I fell back asleep. We had planned to visit the West Virginia State Museum at 9am. We scratched that from the plans. After four of us had a hot breakfast, we left the hotel a little before 10am. Our first stop was the Clay Center in Charleston, West Virginia. That was another museum I had thought we would visit last year, but we weren't able to due to COVID. The boys would have liked to have spent more time there than we did, but we knew we had more than 6 hours of driving ahead of us, and we didn't want to show up too late for Milo. Although Nadia still felt queasy throughout the day, thankfully she never threw up after we checked out of the hotel.

Our second stop was our 27th National Park of the trip - Friendship House. It is very close to Fort Necessity, which we visited last October, but beginning in October it's only open on the weekends and we weren't in that area on a Saturday or Sunday last October. This park had a "senior" badge option that was for ages 13+. Nadia started doing that one, but then she realized it was going to take her a long time so she switched to the book for up to age 12. Nadia earned 30 badges on the trip, Ian earned 25, and Oliver earned 24. I gave them each $1 per badge, and I gave Nadia a bonus of an extra $5 since she completed 30 during our vacation. 

To save time we went through a drive-thru at a Taco Bell for dinner on our way home. During our drive home I finally spotted two Rhode Island license plates! We had found the other 49 states much earlier in the trip, but it took coming back to Pennsylvania to spot a Rhode Island one. I thought Alaska or Hawaii would be the hardest to find, not Rhode Island! We also counted VW bugs on the trip. I believe our total was 18. Ian spotted the most of those. We got home at 8pm after having driven 423 miles for the day, which put as at 7,045 miles for the entire trip.  After I figured out how to get into the kitchen, we used the bathroom and emptied out the trunk so we'd have room for Milo's crate. I thought because I had learned how to easily get up and down from a curb that I could handle two steps from the garage to the kitchen. Wrong!!! On our way to get Milo, Paul also ran into the grocery to buy milk and bananas for our breakfast today. Last night Paul teased the kids that there wouldn't be a hot breakfast tomorrow since our usual fare is cold cereal or oatmeal. Nadia and I stayed in the van while Paul and the boys got Milo, his crate, food, etc. I held Milo during the drive back home. He gave me LOTS of kisses. 

At home we did some unpacking prior to going to bed. Usually I put everything away myself upon our return. That certainly wasn't the case this time! We went to church this morning. After lunch, Paul went to Walmart as I had made an appointment to have the oil changed and tires rotated on the van. I also gave him a grocery list to buy some food during the appointment. Afterwards he also stopped at Dunkin on the way home because today was Nadia's spiritual birthday so we'll have her birthday donuts one day late. I made rigatoni and meatballs for dinner and also M&M cookies. My foot was very swollen, and the kids commented that it was turning blue. Nadia mowed part of the lawn this afternoon. It was her first time mowing. I usually enjoy mowing the lawn, but obviously that's out of the question for me until next spring. Nadia likes being able to earn money so she was grateful for the opportunity. Hopefully she'll be able to finish the lawn tomorrow. I did a load of laundry and a load of dishes. Ian changed the bedding in the guinea pig cage. The van needs to be washed (lots of dead bugs on it which look really gross) and also the inside needs vacuumed out. Nadia wanted to attend youth group this evening, but they had to skip it because tomorrow morning men are coming to install new flooring in our dining room and it took Paul and the kids awhile to move everything from the dining room to the living room. The flooring was originally going to be installed on August 17, but we couldn't do it that day because of Oliver's doctor appointment, so I didn't have the heart to call and reschedule it again. Tomorrow it's back to school for the kids and I! Ian is very glad that his new glasses arrived during our absence. He had to go without glasses during our whole vacation. Aside from my broken ankle and swollen foot, we all are healthy today which is a blessing.