home sweet Atkinson!

after three weeks of traveling, I made it home to the house i grew up in in Atkinson NH tonight. :) I am so happy to be here, and plant my feet on the ground for a few weeks.

went out to a casual dinner with the folks tonight, and I am now happily tucked into bed, in my old bedroom. :D

tomorrow I relax. then possibly do some laundry, and a good clean out of the car. but relax comes first. :)

cape cod Lawson-fest 2012

drove north from NY to cape cod to visit with Kristin (lawson), Jason, grace and Cameron at their vacation house in Chatham. tracy (lawson), Emily and Alivia were there as well, mr and mrs lawson rolled in shortly after I arrived, and Andy came in that evening. it was a wonderful and chaotic reunion to see the Atkinson Lawson's all in one place!

all the kids have grown up so much, it was fun to spend time with them, and watching them play together.

spent two days on the cape with them, shuttling the clan to the beach, avoiding thunderstorms, playing games, reading books, and sharing good old fashioned family meals together.

also had the pleasure of catching up with teddy bear! we even snuck out for a night, and had a lovely kid-free dinner together in chatham.

had a wonderful time with my "atkinson family" at Lawson fest, but my fatigue from being on the road and living out of the car, sleeping on couches and non-stop visiting has totally caught up to me. I'm really pooped!

red house kids & their kids

leaving pa tues morning, I continued north into ny, and stopped by to visit my college buddy andrew, his wife Amy and their cutie kids Nate and Emily in westchester. super fun to see my friends all growed up n stuff with new houses, kids, jobs, etc. so proud. ;)

we went out for a yummy Thai dinner (welcome change after a lot of road food!), and then met up with Duncan for a drink. it is funny how much we have grown up, yet I still feel like we are all the same dorks we were back in the Syracuse red house days!

crashed for the night with Amy & Andrew, and was back in the car again early the next am as they got the kids packaged up for school. and, again. I was a slacker and didn't get any pics with those guys. :( next time....

catch up time with cousin jakatt's

after a lovely lazy morning with Melani, she had to head to work, and I drove out to coatsville to catch up with auntie Maria and uncle steve.

auntie Maria welcomed me right Ito the house, and made me a sandwich for lunch. it was really nice to have some quiet time to chat. after that, mark, Jessica and their kids Braydon (vivacious 3 year old with a new Mohawk!) and emleigh (4 months) surprised me with a visit! shortly after that Erika also came by, and uncle steve returned with maria's cousin patty from holland. it was nice to see everyone, and we lazily hung out for a few hours catching up.

after the kids left, I stayed and had a yummy dinner with Maria steve and patty. our conversations wandered all over the place, and then steve and I dove into his files on our family history. it was super interesting to hear more about my fathers mothers family and our Lithuanian heritage. I am going to have to bug my dad when I get home to dig up anything he might still have of my grandmothers. I know some stories from my grandparents, but I really eat this stuff up! :)

i spent the night, and had such a nice relaxed visit. my extended family is so small, and we see each other so infrequently (weddings and funerals), so this was really special to have this time.

bummed I didn't snap any pics of the kids, I think we were all pictured out after the wedding!

BBQ with the sf kids in Philly

from state college, I drove out to north Philly to Melani and kyle's house for a BBQ. super sweet of them to host, and have all sort if yummy food prepared for us. the day was really hot and humid, and they had a party tent set up out back with a blower fan to keep us cool!

it was a lovely afternoon catching up with saf and Bev, Menard, Regine and jean Se and the kids, Mel & Kyle. it had been quite a while since I have see most of the east coast contingent.

we finished the evening off relaxing I. the front porch while taking in a awesome thunder and lightening storm. it was impressive, and a delight. I really miss thunder storms on the west coast!

old friend!

Sunday morning after the wedding I had the awesome opportunity to get together with erin mcnulty, the girl who was my best friend from 1-4th grade. her family moved to state college pa when we were In middle School, but our moms have remained close friends. it has easily been 20+ years since we have seen each other.

it was delightful to have breakfast and catch up for a little bit. I even got to meet Erin's daughter Fallon. such a cutie.

I hope it is way less than 20 years that go by before we see each other again!

dani & troy's wedding...

my cousin dani and Troy had a lovely and fun wedding ceremony at the penn stater hotel in state college pa. their friend who officiated the ceremony pulled off an amazing "princess bride accent", and the happy couple receded down the aisle to the star wars theme. I was very impressed with their unique and personal touches to the ceremony!

the happy couple had a photo booth set up for the guest book, and later on, just for plain fun! such a unique and fun addition to the night! we had a lot of fun with it with the whole fam!

had a total blast catching up with the cousins and family, dancing the night away at the wedding! such an happy evening.

the weeks to come

I have a lot of little things lined up this week as I make my way up to NH. I'm looking forward to a bit more of a relaxed pace this week.

after dani and troy's wedding tonight, I'll hopefully catch a little more time with the jakatt's in the morning, then I'm off to a BBQ at Melani & kyle's in Philly. super excited to see all the east coast kids again! from there I might do some more visiting in pa and ny, them make my way up to Cape Cod to spend a few days with Kristin, tracy and the kids. I expect to make it to NH around the end of the week where I'll have time to relax for a few weeks (and clean out the car!).

when I get to NH, Kate and I are going to connect to figure out where we want to explore for the east-west journey across the country. we need to end at the grand canyon, and Phoenix (for kate's flight home), but between here and there, are possibilities are endless. after this crossing in the northern states, I am left wanting so much more time to explore. it is so hard to fit all I wanted to do in 2 weeks... and this crossing gave me a little perspective on how to balance out the time somewhat.

what is to come remains to be seen.... I'm excited. :)

hanging with the cousins!

we came to state college pa for the wedding of my dear cousin dani to her long time boyfriend troy. always exciting to spend time with the Jakatt clan!

after a nice dinner with our fam, Greg and I headed downtown to meet up with the big kids for some merriment and dancing the night away. it was great to see everyone and catch up a bit. mark and Jessica are the proud new parents of their second child, little girl named emleigh. Erika and Matt are expecting their first this winter, which is super exciting. and dani and troy were having a blast surrounded by many friends! what Greg and I figured would be a quick hello, then back to the hotel didn't wind down until 1am. ;)

travel log!

in addition to the blog, we kept a log of our miles covered each day, sights seen and highlights.

in the 11 days we traveled together, we covered a total of 3,362 miles from San Francisco, CA to State College, PA. traveling with Christina was so much fun, and an adventure I hope we both remember for a lifetime. :)

although this chapter is done, I still have a long way to go this summer!

final push into pa

on our last day if our Roadtrip together, we still had 6 hours to drive. we made the best if it, but it was definitely a boring driving day, filled with our anticipation to reach state college pa to see our family.

we passed the time finalizing a few postcards, more madlibs, and Christina watched a movie while I listened along. true boredom had set in by the time Christina made puppet faces in all her toes. ha.

excitement in the day was when I got pulled over by a pa state trooper. I was soooo annoyed that we were less than 2 hours from our destination, and I got clipped. ugh. luckily, he just pulled me over to key me know I had a headlight out, and had a grand time talking to Christina and I about our trip. phew!!

we arrived in state college just after 4pm, and had a lovely reunion with mom, dad and grandma. :) we chatted for a few minutes, and Christina wasted no time finding the pool in the hotel. ha.

our last Roadtrip night...

I was on the fence about pushing some more miles tonight, but decided to call it just outside Toledo, a little more than half the distance left that we need to cover to state college PA. good thing too cuz we crossed into eastern time, which meant we arrived an hour later than i planned. we used the handy holiday inn rewards app to book a room for the night, and for the same price, we chose a jacuzzi tub and a king bed over 2 queen beds. the jacuzzi tub in the room turned out to be huge!!

as we drove in, we saw that the hotel actually had a huge water park attached. Christina's eyes almost popped out of her head. checking in, we found out we only had 30 left to catch the pool park, so we changed fast, and ran down. only a piece of the water park was open, but it was fun regardless!

after a quick dinner in the hotel, we went back to the room and soaked in our jacuzzi tub while watching tv. we both felt like we died and went to heaven for our last night. quite a fun note to end on!! :)

we still have 6 hours to drive tomorrow, and are sad to end our road trip together... but are also looking forward to seeing everyone In state college! should be an exciting reunion!

I can't believe how fast the last 11 days have gone, and how much fun Christina and I have had together. it has been far beyond all my expectations, and I look forward to doing it again sometime! :)

I-I-I-O

Iowa to Illinois to Indiana to Ohio. spent the day making some miles on the road. opposed to yesterday when we were boring, today we played games and had fun to pass the time. Christina thought she brought a madlibs book, but couldn't find it, so she proceeded to write her own. story after story, it was fantastic. you will have to get her to tell you the "legend of the jackalope and golden cowboy". awesomest madlibs story ever!!

at the halfway point, and lunch we decided to make a quick stop at a park along lake Michigan just outside Chicago. we went to Indiana sand dunes state park which turned out to be an awesome beach! we had to put on our bathing suits, and hang out for awhile. the water was delightful, and we had fun playing around. it was super sad to leave, but we had miles to go.

mississippi river & holiday inn

started our morning out I front of the hotel saying hello to the Mississippi river. Christina collected a little jar of the river to keep with her pacific ocean.

we have become quite the holiday inn fans. they are everywhere, and since the whole chain of hotels did an overhaul, they are quite nice! I became a rewards club member for the trip, and we downloaded an app to find the closest places to stay on our route. Christina is an expert at negotiating the pool and breakfast buffet. I think that holiday inn has replaced the national parks in interest level in this second half of the trip. ha. ;)

jolly green giant!

we stopped at a rest area for a picnic lunch and a little time to stretch. I checked my roadside America app, and it turned out that just mile up the highway in the direction we were heading was the jolly green giant statue! definitely worth the quick picture stop. :)

55 1/2 feet tall... he was quite impressive!

crossing Minnesota & Iowa

today was driving. driving. driving. cornfields, windmills and highway. we drove halfway across Minnesota, then dropped down into Iowa, out to davenport on the Illinois border. all in all not a ton to report for the day. we we drove, and it was pretty boring. Christina played on her iPod, and I listened to bad Midwestern radio. ha.

we cheered our road wary bodies up with a yummy well-rounded dinner at the olive garden, and made it to the hotel with enough time for a quick dip in the pool and hot tub.

tomorrow is going to be another big day of miles... but Christina and I made a deal to have more fun to make the drive go by faster. :) im also going to try to find a few interesting stops to break things up.

paying the price

our sunset climbing stop put us on the road at 8:30pm, with 4 hours to drive. I juiced up on some diet coke, and drove drove drove.

I figured (and strongly encouraged) Christina to get comfy and sack out for the drive. little did I know that she doesn't sleep in the car. :( ugh. she was a big trooper. watched a movie, played games and kept me company for all but the last 20 min of the drive. poor kid was a loopy mess! lesson learned.

and to add insult to our valiant effort to make some miles, we crossed into the central time zone on the way so arrived at the hotel at 1:30am.

Christina was asleep in 2 min or less once she sprawled out on the bed. let her sleep till 10:15 this am. quick shower, and we are checking out of the hotel by 11 to hit the road again.

for the next three days, we just need to make miles. not sure where we will end today... just going to hit the road heading east, and go from there.

sunset and rock climbing stop

leaving the badlands, the sun was going down and the light was just awesome in the valley. we stopped at the final pullout, and it turned out to be an area you could run around and climb all over the rocks. Christina was in HEAVEN! we scrambled (in flip flips) up and down the ledges until the sun ducked behind the rocks. the smile on Christina's face getting back into the car was priceless. I think I even got a "wow, national parks can be fun when you can climb and stuff. I am going to come back here someday!".

I drove away into the sunset a proud auntie robin, with a little tear in my eye. that one sentence is all I set out to accomplish on this trip. :)

dinner and on the road again

leaving the park, we stopped for postcards (of course!), and got dinner at the little lodge there. Christina chomped down a yummy buffalo burger, and we agreed not to tell our furry buffalo companions about it.

we added our new badlands sticker to the car top box, and set off on our way. I had decided no matter how slow we took our day, I wanted to make it the remaining 4 hours across SD today. I was pretty much resolved that it was just going to be a late night, but luckily I was well rested and relaxed. leaving badlands at 7:30 would put us into Sioux falls around 11:30. told Christina to relax, and settle in for the drive.

pretty scenery = happy (big) girl!

along the way, between my many scenery stops, we came across a bighorn sheep crossing the road. he hung out for a while, and Christina was so excited and got many pic with the zoom lens. as we carefully drove by, he sat down on the side to the road.