SEPTEMBER ALREADY?

 We have had good visits with all the family. We watched Brady's and Chase's football games, and had a nice picnic at Brian's. (Sorry I forgot to take my camera).
 Lynda had us to her house on Labor Day. We celebrated Pam's birthday. (in  pink) She is my son's girlfriend. Bob is sitting on the step.

 Tuesday evening we had a storm then a beautiful rainbow. It was even a double one.

 Today we moved to our rental property.  Yesterday a tree service came and cut down one tree and cut off all the damaged branches on the other trees. It was a hard winter on them.

  Some of the trees only have branches left on one side..

 This tree is beside the house and we were lucky when the branches broke off during the storms this winter and landed on the roof no damage was done.  We are blessed that we have good renters that took care of cleaning up the property until we were back and could hired a tree service.

We are leaving tomorrow and driving our car to Branson, Missouri for the NOMADS annual meeting, because we have a time share to stay at while we are there. The daughter of our tenant is going to watch Godiva for us while we are away. It is nice we have a place to park the RV.

SURPRISE

 Thanks to Mystique's realtor we were able to surprise Mystique with her baby shower. She had to convince Mystique to come and talk about what they might need to do to help sell the house. She was totally surprise when she came in and found us there.

 Eric joined in with the fun, and Ali kept track of who gave her the gifts.

 I made her a sock monkey.

 The theme of the party was books. Her Grandmother gave her an old Peter Rabbit book that she had as a child, a special keepsake.

 Her Aunt Molly's family went together and gave her a Pack and Play.

 A group photo: Larry, Dottie, Courtney, Ali, Eric, Vi, Mystique, Molly and Kathy.

 Diane and Mystique taking a selfie. Vi enjoyed looking at all the nice gifts she had received.

 Refreshment time.

 Larry and I had fun making the watermelon carriage and baby.

 My desert were these cute rattle cookies. They took a little time to ice, but I enjoyed creating every one.

I'm glad Mystique was surprised and enjoyed her shower. Then we had a "shower" for Ali and Larry.

Mystique had nominated them for the ALS ice bucket challenge, so the shower ended with Larry and Ali having a bucket of ice water dumped on them. I think Mystique and Eric enjoyed doing it a little too much! No dry clothes and only a small towel, they were so brave.

WHOOPIE PIE NIGHT AT THE BALL PARK

 We had gotten Lancaster Barnstormer tickets for Christmas, so Saturday night we asked Lynn and Jim if they would like to go with us to the game. It was a perfect night for a game, not too hot or too cold.

 Always good seats. The only thing you have to watch out for are left handed batters. Foul balls come our way, the man behind us caught one.( I was ducked down!) Larry caught some fun stuff. A barnstormer ball which he gave to the little boy in front of us and a whoopie pie, which I ate.

 Lancaster was winning all the game till the top of the ninth. But they were able to tie it up and it went into extra innings.

 but the eleventh inning did them in.

 There was just enough time for fireworks.

LOTS GOING ON

We were able to extend our stay at PA Dutch till August 11. It is closer to Larry's mom then Circle M. She came home from the hospital under the care of Hospice and the agreement that someone stayed with her at all times. Larry's brother and his wife, who live close by, agreed to move in with her. We visit as often as possible.
We have had the car and RV inspected, I have had my physical and Larry has had many appointments for check ups at the VA. Our days are usually filled with some appointment.

   We have played golf several times since we have been back in PA. We enjoyed a game with Larry's sister Barb and her husband Tom at Evergreen. Tom showed us his new blue truck.

 One evening we went to the Mount Gretna Playhouse and saw a play. Then we enjoyed a Christmas in July sundae at the Jigger shop.

 Mystique is selling her home in York and moving back to her mother's farm.  They are adding an addition to the second floor.

 Eric and his brother putting on the roof. Eric has worked hard building the addition, along with Larry, Mystique's step dad.

 Eric and Mystique, six months pregnant.

 The first week in August I spent the week in Wildwood Crest  with Kathy, Lynn and Lynda.

 The water was great and Kathy and I went in swimming several times. I'm still able to body surf.

 Most of the days were sunny and we spent the day on the beach.

 We spent the evenings playing games. It was a very relaxing and enjoyable week.

Friday night was meet the players of the Hempfield football team.. Number 56 is our grandson,Brady. He is a senior this year and was chosen to be the team captain. We are so proud of him.

TRIP HOME

We left Minot on Friday about noon and made it to Fargo where we stopped in a Walmart for the night.

On Saturday we drove through Minnesota.

 We saw a field with many steel poles piled around. Then we saw these electric poles being installed and realized what those poles were for.  The poles ate really tall! This was the warning sign at the rest stop.

 We had torrential rain and wind at Minneapolis, and for some reason our GPS took us through the city instead of around it. We were glad to stop at the Walmart at Menomonie, Wisconsin at 3:30.

 We were up early Sunday morning and on the road at 4:30. We went around Chicago at noon on I-290 to I-294. Glad we did this on a Sunday! We were ready to stop at this RV park just off I-65 at exit 230 in Indiana.

We were surprised to see another large wind farm in Indiana along I-65.

We arrived at Tom Raper RV on Monday afternoon at Richmond, Indiana. We had an appointment here for Tuesday morning. We had a full hook-up site for the night.

Our appointment was at 9 but we were to get in line at 8. I was up by 6 and Larry was looking at his emails on his phone when he noticed it was 8:45 not 7:45. What time zone are we in anyway? We didn't think it changed to Eastern Time till we were in Ohio, but it changes between Illinois and Indiana.

The water intake valve had to be replaced with some other valves, because when we would hook up to city water it just made a circle and the pump ran continually. It took them till 2 to fix it.

While they worked on the RV we took a bike ride.

. It is a very nice rail trail and the weather was perfect for a ride. We took a 7 mile bike ride.

We left the dealership at 2 in the afternoon and headed home.

We drove through Columbus at 5 o'clock.

  

We stopped at a Walmart at exit 10 in West Virginia. It had a special area for RV and truck parking. It was almost like being at a rest stop. We got up early and were on the road by 5 in the morning. When we got on the PA turnpike we didn't get a toll ticket. We found out when we went to get off that the EZ pass on our car had been picked up and that is why we didn't get a toll ticket. It sure had us worried for we thought we would be charged for the whole length of the turnpike.

We are staying at PA Dutch campground until Monday. We are busy visiting with family, sure is good seeing them all  after almost a year away.